Scattershot Post - Filler for September

Nothing of importance, really. but I don't want a gap in the blog archive that shows absolutely nothing for September. Topic? Lets pick... entertainment!

Books:

There's the Dresden Files Side Jobs book that's out next month, followed by the next to last Wheel of Time book out early in November, then another Dresden files book way out in April that'll continue the main storyline. Good reading! I need to go over the first Wheel of Time books again to re-familiarize myself.

Games:

Team Fortress 2 is without a doubt the game that made me love online gaming. Eve didn't do it; there's a reason why this game is nicknamed "Spreadsheets Online". Starcraft II didn't do it (as great as the game is, you're either the OCD Multi-tasker that builds five bases and two dozen Battlecrusiers/Carriers within ten minutes, or the guy that repeatedly gets overrun by the former when he starts building his first Siege Tanks. Usually, I'm the latter. (Also, sorry for the majority of you that had this paragraph go over your heads.)

TV:

I think I mentioned before that I do not have Televisions service of any kind, including the free over the air kind (signals don't get out to here), but now that an HBO miniseries based on A Song of Ice and Fire is in production, I may have to reconsider. Yeah, I could wait and buy the inevitable DVD collection, but... There IS something to be said for seeing it sooner than later. Then again, why have another monthly bill, especially for something that I'll never use? If this one doesn't make me call up DirecTV or Dish, then I don't think anything will.

Movies:

Due to 1) the closest decent theater being an hour away, and 2) a lack of Television that walls me off from the primary marketing outlet for new movies, I haven't seen much that wan't on Netflix, and I still only bother watching maybe one Netflix movie a month. Still, I decided to go see Scott Pilgrim vs The World Last month, and have to say it was pretty good. Sadly, juding by box office returns, it looks like I was one of only about 300 people nationwide that actually paid to see it. This pretty much says it all.

Nightlife/Social:

One of the reasons why I adjusted so well to moving to Nowhereville, WY is that to me, a Saturday night at home is better than a night on the town, even when said town is hip and trendy. But I still have my karaoke, and I still run the show on Friday Nights. Good times!

Music:

I went to see Streetlight Manifesto Back in July, and in spite of a great show, I was reminded why I don't go to concerts. I can recreate the experience by walking into a sauna fully clothed, tape a picture of the backs of people's heads to my glasses, and just play one of their albums through. I could probably get closer and a better view if I was willing to muck about in the mosh pit, but I don't feel like getting shoved around by 19 year olds that have no other outlet for aggression. I'm just too old for that shit.

And now, posted with no explanation or reason, ELO's Don't Bring Me Down.

"Tank, I need a milestone, FAST!"

So someone at work pointed out to me that today is the Tenth Anniversary of The Matrix. I cannot believe that it has really been that long!

When this movie hit theaters, I was:

• Contemplating colleges. Ended up with community college, followed by Harvard on the Mon. For those of you not familiar with Southwestern Pennsylvania, the "Mon" is the Monongahela River.
• Eighteen Years old. between getting out of High School and finally going to study things that I was interested in, this is the time when I, like most people, feel the most free. When you are driving up the the crossroads of Interstate-Life and State Route Destiny. I, ended up taking
• Watching people get real nervous about that whole Y2K thing. I guess everyone needs something to worry about, Mutally Assured Destruction through the 1980s, Y2K in the 1990s, and now Global Warming Climate Change in the aughts. For a Matrix tie-in, there's some truth in Agent Smith's monologue to Morpheus when he said that "human beings define their reality through suffering and misery." We all need something to fear, something to fight/rebel against, etc.
• Raising money for my senior trip. Best single week of my whole life! Remind me to tell you all sometime about planting frogs in the girls' motel room. Good Times...
• Working in a movie theater while this was playing. I dismissed this as some cookie cutter sci-fi B-Movie, when an usher recommended that I sit in for a few minutes. So I did, and I became intrigued. And that is how I saw the Matrix about 3 times in bits and pieces before I ever watched it end to end.

Another fun memory of the movie: When I was working as an usher at said theater, we waited until all the people exited the auditorium which is just about when the end credits soundtrack changed from Rage Against the Machine to Marilyn Manson. This is when we engaged in our three man mosh-pits. We'd run into each other and jump around like idiots as if we were at some thrash-metal concert. All done with a great sense of Irony, though. These were more like mock-pits.

So, cheers to ten years of choosing the Red Pill! I'll be watching my DVD of the Matrix Tomorrow.

More Movies

Crank: Jason Stantham is a pleasure to watch, as always. He's a hitman trying to get out of the bloodmoney business when he wakes up poisoned with a plot device- er, I mean chemical that can be inhibited by keeping your adrenaline levels up. What are the best ways to do this when you have no time to arrange a bungee jump or skydive? Well, if you are like our protagonist, you could start a fight with a bunch of rough looking black men, have sex with your girlfriend at the side of a busy city street, or break into a hospital and demand epinephrine syringes. The options are varied, and hilarious!

Talladega Nights: Will Farell as a Redneck stock car Racer and Sacha Baron Cohen as a Gay Frenchman. As funny as it sounds.

The Transporter 2: More Stantham! Hooray! Quick! How do you dislocate a bomb attached to the under carriage of your car, with seconds left before it detonates? By gunning it up an uneven ramp, causing your car to spiral like a well thrown football, and at the precise moment your car has torqued 180 degrees, the crane, which is conveniently hanging from juuuuust the right spot, dislodges it. I know it's a popcorn action film, but this was still a violation of the Tier of Suspension of Disbelief that I had previously mentioned in my Stardust blurb. Then again, it was friggin' awesome, so I'll let that slide, I suppose.

Reservoir Dogs: A Tarentino Classic that I haven't gotten around to seeing until now. Pretty much what you'd expect from him: It opens with people talking about nothing in a Seinfeld kind of way, then quickly transitions to violence.

The Brother's Grimm: The Brother's investigate the disappearance of little girls from a village in France-occupied Germany. A bit creepy during a few of the abduction scenes, but other than that, a bit too disjointed to be really entertaining. Bonus: It will make you hate the French even more. Seriously.

Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels: I like Guy Richie films. It's something about watching inner city Brits plotting how to pull off some simple criminal activity hoping for a big payout, only to have it foiled by their own incompetence, the unexpected rash of logical thinking by their inept prey, and the miscalculated retribution from the party that's bankrolling either side. All of which is broken up by a few anecdotes and a plethora of F-Bombs now and then. Oh, did I mention Jason Stantham?

Super Troopers: An amusing flick, damaged only by the needless addition of a plot. Listen guys, this is not a movie where you need rich storytelling. We need more Highway Patrol antics, like screwing with the heads of a car full of stoners, or saying "meow" as many times as you can during a traffic stop while speaking in a Mississippi accent. That's crack-up material right there.

Why So Serious?

George Lucas, due to your perversion of your Star Wars Franchise, you've been on the Chopping Block for a while. Now, with the latest steaming pile of cinema excreated from your hindquarters still setting my teeth on edge, I hearby demote you to "Schumacher." We have already found your replacement, and his name is Christopher Nolan.

In addition to directing the wicked cool Memento, He has also delivered My favorite DC Hero out of the land of suckage, into the land of Milk and Honey, first with Batman Begins, then again with The Dark Knight.

The Joker is less Overtly Comical and more Creepy. Not that I minded Overtly Comical; I still think Jack Nicholson did a fantastic job playing the screwball, but Heath did a lot better than I could have hoped for when I first heard that he was cast. He's unquestionably murderous, but he still can pull off a one liner or a physical gag that's amusing enough to make you chuckle, yet seem rather natural to the character.

Christian Bale: He was good in the first one, he's still good in this one. I'm talked about the total package of Bruce Wayne/Batman, here. All of the other actors in the Tim Burton/Captain Suck versions of the film could pull off exactly One aspect of the dichotomy, and do it well (except Clooney, who is two scoops of lameness), but Bale can do it both.

I believe that Kevin Conroy is still the best voice for Batman, as Mark Hamill is for the Joker. If you've never seen the Animated Series, then you have missed out.

The frequent complaint of most superhero movies lately has been the need to fit as many villians into a film as possible, where they crowed each other out. For example, Spiderman 3 was ok, but it Would have been a lot better if they had taken a pair of scissors and cut out anything and everything that is touched by the Sandman, or his backstory. If they're hurting for space, write in more of Harry Oswald's character, and give us a propper Hobgoblin.

But I think Nolan actually managed to do it, and do it right. Two Villans, in the same movie, and while one of them probably could have gotten his own movie and been fleshed out a bit more, the product was satisfactory.

You need to go watch this now, if you haven't already. The sooner you do, the sooner you can wash the awful taste of Indiana Jones 4 out of your mouth.

Movies and Hack Writers

Check this one out when you have a chance, if you haven't already, and thanks for reading this and indulging me in this little exercise!

I guess I probably should have warned you about spoilers or something, but as I said above, hacks don't really care, and don't have much respect for their audiences.

It's not an easy thing, to do either. Dirty Harry (A.K.A. John Nolte) once wrote (in a post I'm too lazy to find and link to directly) that you have to keep one step ahead of your audience. once they catch up, you've become predictable. Two steps ahead, and you've lost them, and they are confused. It's a thin line to walk for two hours.

It's the kind of thing M. Night Shamalan got a lot of attention for when he was doing stuff like The Sixth Sense ("Wait a minute, he's dead?!?"), and not junk like The Happening ("Teh trees are killing us because mankind have abused mother Gaia for far too long!"). The surprise ending is absolute GOLD when you can pull it off, but an eye-roller if you don't execute it perfectly.

It's unique because of the execution of that device. The audience is fooled by a "spoiler" within 60 seconds of the title screen, causing them to believe they can predict the theme and direction of the rest of the film. These predictions are dashed to bits at about the halfway mark. "OMG! He killed Kenny! You bastard!"

People talk about this nifty cinematic device at great lenghts, but that mechanic isn't what makes the movie unique. Heck, I remember that an episode of Seinfeld did this exact same thing in the mid 90's, predating this by six or seven years.

I'm writing this post in a similar fashion in order to more closely illustrate that effect. I'm sure this was all the rage during the movie's theatrical release in 2001, but I write like a total hack, and I'm not above doing it again. Like most hacks, I don't let substance get in the way of style, even when the style is lacking as well as the substance! For the last shall be first and the first shall be last!

Continuing my series of posts regarding movies that were cutting edge over 5 years ago, I'm going to talk about Memento, the latest gem on DVD that arrived via Netflix. As most of you probably already know, all the scenes in this movie are played in reverse order from beginning to end.

Indiana Jones and the Abused Franchise

The first time I heard about a fourth Indiana Jones film, I think I was about 15 or 16. At 20, I had lost all hope. About two years ago, reliable sources told us that it was filming at last. I had high hopes that after over ten years of delays, we'd get a finished product that could live up to the Indiana Jones legacy.

:-(

My sister and brother-in-law met up in the Big Bowl in Reston, VA for some Chinese Food and discussed the problems with it over Kung Pao Chicken and Pad Thai. My thoughts bascially echo everyone else's thoughts that I've read, but here's the gist with spoilers fully functional:

Action: we need more of it. There was a nice opening scene in the Government Warehouse (Same one at the end of Raiders) that ends with a nuclear explosion. Good. There was a nice little motorcycle chase Shia LeBouf, or LeDoof, or whatever his name is. It was a little too short, but it was done satisfactorily. Then there's the Jeep chase in the Jungle which is the 3rd action scene in the movie, at about the halfway mark. Set's a good tempo, but then it's a snooze fest.

Do a tally of all the action scenes from the first three movies and compare them to this. Kingdom falls a bit short. And the worst part is that you could see where they could have put in some gratuitous action in quite easily. It almost feels like they were trying to dull the pace a bit.

Speaking of the Jeeps in the Jungle, let's talk about ill advised CGI. I'm all for CG for things most things, like fighting 100 Agent Smith Clones, or the afore mentioned nuclear explosion ("What? You couldn't be bothered to get a REAL atomic bomb for this movie?"). But what's with the CG animals? Opening the movie with a CG Gopher? I'll ignore it. Ending the scene with a family of 4 gophers that serve no purposes except to show you CG Gophers? Lame. The same can be said for CG monkeys as well. Shia LePew's scene where he swings on vines to land himself in the Commie-Mobile worked just fine without them. This whole issue of adding-cute-things-that-serve-no-purpose can probably be traced back to it's roots with the Ewoks from Return of the Jedi.

Also, I can understand the need to use CG to simulate LeBeef's riding two Jeeps with a leg on each one, but could you polish it up so that it's less obvious that you had to make his legs spontaniously grow 8 inches to accomplish that? or at least make some allusion some kind of stretchy-limb super power that he has, so it's just a little less out of place? maybe?

Kate Allen reprises her role as Marion Ravenwood from Raiders. She was good then, she's good here. She might be even better this time, but that could be due to her surroundings being a bit lackluster.

And these crystal skulls? Yawn. I guess this is really a half hearted complaint, but what ever happened to the Judeo-Christian Artifacts? I guess you can't top the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy Grail, but I was hoping for something less X-files.

And as long as we're splattering Sci-Fi all over Indyland, the rumor is that one of the reasons why this movie took so long was that there was several script rewrites ordered by Ford and Spielberg becuase Lucas was trying to put too much Star Wars into it. Almost as if the original title was Indiana Jones and the Men from Mars.

Villians: In two of the previous three movies, it's been Nazis, which always make a great villian just becuase the're friggin' Nazis. You don't need any other reason to hate them; they're the greatest symbol of evil the 20th century has to offer. Russian Comunists? A good start but you need something more. There was no reason given to Hate Cate Blanchet's character other than she's a Ruskie. We needed her to make us hate her by doing something. Throw someone in a Gulag, set off a nuke in a metropolis, give Indy a wedgie, do SOMETHING. The indifference to the villian does NOT help the slow pace of the movie.

The actor who played Marcus is dead, Sean Connery declined to come out of retirement to be Jones Senior, so some things you can't work around. But John Rhyes-Davies is alive and well, so where's Sallah? C'mon, you couldn't write him into this mess somehow?

One last note on the Action scenes, becuase they are vital. My brother-in-law summed it up thusly: Whenever Indy does someting cool, or makes off with the goods, the iconic Raiders March theme music is played. This is done when he hand-hitches a ride on the Submarine in Raiders, drives a tank full of Nazis off a cliff and survives, etc. This theme isn't played at all until the End Credits, which is just as well, becuase nothing happens that's cool enough to warrant it.

In spite of all this, the movie is still watchable, but I can't tell you that it's good. See it in the cheap theaters, only because you have too. Last but not least, I'm to tired/lazy to proof-read this post for spelling, grammar, or flow, but I assue you, it's better than the writing for the movie.

The Chronicles of Rewrites

Prince Caspian opened on Friday, but I was busy all weekend with other engagements, so I didn't get to see it until today.

If you believe that Canon needs to be respected at all costs, even to the detriment of the movie adaptation, you might want to sit this one out. Wardrobe was merely tweaked in a few places to add tension, but parts of this were rearranged, run together, and in a few places, written completely from scratch.

A few years ago I finally decided that this was ok, even desired, in order to make a good book into a good movie. "But Fuzzy," you might protest, "aren't you worried that Hollywood will turn our beloved classics into bastardized mockeries of themselves without close adherence to the author's original vision?" Sure, that's always a risk, but take the example of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

If you read the books, think about how long and detailed they were. How many pages were filled with hobbits crawling around through dark caves, marching through forests, and just generally doing mundane stuff. Imagine if all of that was transposed into a script. The LotR trilogy was long enough without of the drudgery of the journey. They cut out most of the ending of Return of the King and it was still good... and three hours.

Imaging converting a +600 page tome into a watchable flick that has to go under three hours. Any longer than that while sitting in a theater with a 44oz Cherry Coke in one's bladder , and even the best Book-to-Movie attempts just seem like they drag on. That's why things like Wurthering Heights and Shogun get turned into mini-series.

One of my friends always believed that Caspian was the most boring of the books. I couldn't understand why until tonight. For the first 15 minutes or so I was balking at all the things that got cut or changed. Eventually, I noticed the things that were removed wouldn't make the transition to the screen very well. Even though I enjoyed the book, I now remember the first time I read it, I skipped over several pages of the usual filler: Walking around in a forest for a long time, Councils of War which were eavesdropped on from the next room, dinking about on a runined island for a while. It's one thing to read them, but there's no need to put that humdrum in the movie unless you're intentionally giving the crowd an intermission to use the restroom.

Some of the good/important stuff also has to go, too. The history of Caspian's upbringing and tutelage could easily pack on another hour on what is already 150 minutes. The timeline is kind of... condensed for it all to fit.

My only real complaint is that they didn't cut out some of it cleanly. If your going to refer to Trumpkin as the D.L.F., you need to put in the scene where that nickname is earned, otherwise cut it completly. This happens with a few other small details that fans of the series will notice.

But the writting and casting of Reepicheep was well done (Eddie Izzard!?) and made a lovable personallity from what could have easily turned into the most obnoxious character if the book was to be followed too closely.

You go see. Now!

Shopping Trends

Today I was doing a little Mother's Day Shopping for my grandparents when I found a nifty little tea gift basket that I'll probably pick out for the Maternal.GrandParents.

But I found this a bit odd:

So... I guess a lot of people's Moms love Tea and Bruce Willis?

Scatter Shot Post 4/28/2008 - Movies

Ah, Netflix! catching me up on my movies! Much like Episode 3, here's my thoughts on several movies from the past few years (and one even older still):

• The Transporter: I think I can watch anything with Jason Statham. Snatch, Italian Job, It's all good. I have Transporter 2 and Crank in my Netflix queue, so a Statham deficiency shouldn't be an issue.


• Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End: First one was great, 2nd was... alright, this one... meh. Interesting ending, sort of, but just bit too... slow. You'll get better entertainment by watching this pirate movie because it's funnier, shorter, and free.


• Casino Royale: This one gave me all kinds of Elvis-esque celebrity sightings. Le Chiffe looks like a young Chris Walken, The local police captain (brief scene) looked like Stan Lee, and I think Richard Branson had a cameo in the airport security scene.


• Clerks: Entertaining? Yes. Overhyped? Yes again. I think the big draw with Kevin Smith is that he's an independent flim guy which gives him street cred. When a Major $tudio makes a movie with potty humor, it's crass and appeals to the lowest kind of movie-goer. When an indie guy does it, it's high art! (There's a little more to the film than that, but not much). But from what I hear, Mr. Smith is a pretty down to earth guy, and recognizes this himself, so I can't begrudge him for his hipster fans.


• Stardust: Suspension of disbelief works in tiers; you much choose which tier you need when seeing any fiction or fantasy movie. Sure you can rig a bomb to go off if the bus goes under 50, but there's NO WAY IN HELL it could jump that gap in the highway without any ramp.
  Likewise, if a star crashes to earth in hot-chick form and the only ill effect on her is a bit of disorientation, I can overlook the Wall. You know, the one with the broken part guarded by an old dude in lieu of repairing it. Nevermind that it's only about 6' tall and anyone with a step ladder or good running start could go over easily. And standing solidly on a cloud is just fine. Same with the air pirates making a living by bottling lightning. Once you establish the 'Bedtime Story' tier of SoD, it's perfectly acceptable. But the Bus jump in Speed? Pure BS.


• Ocean's Twelve: I was hoping for a real thief-off between Lefleur and Ocean's team, stealing bits and pieces from all over. But there wasn't as much of that as I hoped for. The ending ranged from convoluted to lame, and just didn't do it for me. But the part where Julia Roberts' character, Tess, masquerades as {spoiler redacted!} just drops me with laughter. I always thought that someone should make a movie where a Big Name does something like that with their role.


• Ocean's Thirteen: Ok, now we're back to what made the franchise great! (whether O11 should even have ever become a franchise is a different question.) Al Pachino screws over one of the team's good friends which sends him into a coma. Now, they're going to elaborately ruin his new casino with all the shiftiness that made the first installment great. Plus Pachino, who always does great when around gambling or mob activity in movies. And the means of how they get the funding for a major piece of equipment makes a great ironic twist. But LeFleur's Cameo seems tacked on. They didn't use that character to its full potential in the last movie, why even bother with him this time?


• Shoot 'Em Up: Much like Snakes on a Plane, it's really all in the name. Escapist Action with a high body count and sweet gunplay. Should you watch it? Let me tell you this: The first entry on the High Body count list gets there by having a carrot forcibly inserted into his mouth, and then it's punched through the back of his throat. If that makes you roll your eyes disapprovingly, don't bother. Everyone else, check it out.

That's all for now. I'm sure I'll do another one of these in the future. In the meantime, I will not apologize for getting the chorus from the pirate song stuck in your head; you will suffer just as I did. Give it two weeks before the healing can begin.

Only About Three Years Behind

Ok, I saw Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith on Thursday. Yeah, I know, I'm late to the party. so late, in fact, that I arrived long after everyone else left and the host is dressed in his PJ's, wondering what the hell I'm doing at his door at 3AM with a bowl of French Onion Dip.

On one side, I have my friends who all loved it. But then again, several of them are Fanboys, who would be entertained by Yoda reading names from a phone book for two and a half hours. When I told them in September 2005 that I haddn't gotten arround to seeing it yet, they just looked at me like I had just told them I wasn't toilet trained or something.

Then there's my sister and brother-in-law who HATED IT. As I'm told, everyone they know hate it. It must be a DC/Northern Virginia thing, because they are the only two people I know personally that didnt' like it. Even the Fanboys (and Fangirl) who detested the first two prequels, were more than satisfied with the third.

Here's my impressions, long after anyone cares:

• I couldn't figure out why the first half of the movie was composed fully of these panoramic shots of forests, with the sound of wind blowing through. Then I realized that those trees were just the actors talking, and it was just bad diologue, bad acting, and bad directing.
• Not being a Star Wars guy, I have to ask, is there some kind of symbolism with peoples' hands or limbs in general getting lightsabred off? In the whole series, by my count, Luke gets it, Anikin loses an arm twice (once in Clonewars, once in RotJ) and gets his legs cut off by Obi Wan, Dooku loses both at once, Greivious loses two (but has two to spare), and I know I'm forgetting others.
• Bad Acting? Awful Script? Whatever. Must like the first two, these can all be forgiven with proper light sabre fights and action scenes.
• I know the Dark Side Corrupts your physical body as well as your soul, but why does Darth Sidieous's face go from 'I'm a distinguished gentleman' to 'bag of haggis sitting on my neck' after a few seconds of shooting Force-Lightning? Better question: If could turn yourself fugly to shoot Lightning from your hands, would you do it?
• Sometimes when actors from other famous roles take parts in other important franchises, you start to mix together bits and pieces of both those roles. When Mace Windu finally confronted the Chancellor, I was waiting for him to break out some Ezekiel 25:17 on his ass. See also Hugo Weaving in Lord of the Rings. "The Ring must be destroyed... Deploy the Sentinals!"
• Emotional impact of the extermination of several nameless Jedi: Much Sadness. Emotional Impact of Padame dying of a broken heart? Meh. The protagonists just weren't appealing.
• About the alledged policital commentary in the movie: I think it's much ado about nothing. for the past 7 years, everyone's been looking for signs that BusHitler is cracking down on free speech and human rights or overanalyzing all media looking for pontification on the State Of Things. In either case, sometimes it's there, but not as often as we think it is. If you're jaded to look past those things now, maybe watch it again in 5 years. It was probably (possibly?) in your imagination.

Overall, I rank it as Satisfactory, despite the best efforts of the script writers and director to make it stupid. I'd make a recommenation to see it, but as I said at the beginning, Most of you already have about 3 years ago. Thankfully, Netflix is going to be catching me up on all the important movies I missed in the past 5 years.

At the Movies

So, Lyman does have a theater. Size: 1 screen, 1 showing per night. That doesn't sound like much, but... really, that's about all the Valley will can support financially. This week, we had National Treasure 2. I was amused at the way the opening scenes of this version quickly dashes to pieces the ending of the first one.

End of NT1: They find the loot, donate it to a museum and receive a finder's fee large for Ben Gates and Abigail to buy a mansion, and for their sidekick, Riley, to purchase an exotic sports car.

Beginning of NT2: Ben has split with Abby, and moved back in with Dad, Riley has his Car repossessed after his accountant gets caught doing some book-cooking on his Taxes, and now has to pay it back with interests and penalties. "You know how much tax is owed on 5 million dollars? 6 million."

For those whining about the "spoiler" I just gave: this is revealed in the first 10 minutes. Suck it up.

Anyway, the theater is tiny. The box office is outside the main building, as often portrayed in TV and movies, the tickets aren't custom printed, but are basically those carnival door prize tickets. As soon as you step in, you're 5 feet from the concession stand, and makes it difficult to maneuver due to the limited space. It's not big enough for me to properly refer to it a as a lobby. But the prices are good: Popcorn costs $1.50, $2.00, or $2.50, as do the drinks, and the candy. You can get a small everything for less than 5 bucks.

One interesting promotion they do is they mark each purchased item with a number, and select about 3 of those number at the end of the night for a small prize of some kind. From what I hear, this is to encourage people to bring out their cups and bags and things to throw them away, rather than leave them on the floor. The movies they show are mostly family fare, and from my own theater experience, I can tell you that this high mess potential, and they don't employ ushers to clean up the auditorium when finished. This, like most enterprizes in this town, is strictly Mom, Pop, and the kids. More small town quaintness.