I watched Backrooms. It’s very good.
I’m an official member of the Morris Theater Co-Op board. I’m going to be running the projector at the theater about once a week. Pro: I get to see a free movie, in addition to my $1 discount. Con: Our scheduled projectionist couldn’t make it tonight, so I’ve volunteered to take it on at the last minute. This will be my first solo! I’m worried that I might forget to flip some essential switch and a horde of movie-goers will lynch me.


Upcoming film The Dog Stars is based on a very good book.
It’s been getting some good press. I have taken a break from horror reviews by Splattercast and Ghost Pirate Entertainment, so don’t know if it was reviewed on either channel. I don’t go to theaters (even if in Morris sorry), so will wait for streaming or disc.
The new Mandalorian bellyflopped at the box office. I’ll watch that when it streams. Maybe people are burnt out on Pascal or the Star Wars franchise. I liked him in Eddington though Phoenix was over the top as usual.
Wait you did a video review of Backrooms. I’ll give that a looksie. I don’t care if there are spoilers.
I AM AT THE THEATER! ALL SYSTEMS ARE GO! I AM IN CHAAARGE!
I’m glad you’re parlaying your projectionist gig into a reason to do movie reviews. Yeah the wallpaper on those walls in the movie is creepy in its aging. I like unreliable narrators and ambiguous endings, the latter a bane of many a book reader or movie goer.
As far as theaters go it’s cool you are so involved in keeping yours going. I’ve seen movie houses come and go in my lifetime. When I was really young my mom took me to see Flipper in a theater that would become one of several local drafthouses into my teens and adulthood where you could order sorta fast food and beer while watching movies that had been out a while. I saw Bambi and Chariots of the Gods at a drive-in in mosquito infested Florida. That would soon become an outdoor porno theater. Who knows what then went on there. Then it was demolished for a housing development.
In my teens the 12 theater complex became popular and replaced the twin theaters. Now we have stadium seating. Last movie I watched in a theater was Terminator: Dark Fate.
Most of the theaters around me are mega-plex chains who don’t require my business. My 55” 4K works just fine.
Enjoy, PZ.
—
Me, I can’t remember the last time I went to see a movie in a public place full of people.
Decades, for sure.
Anyway, nothing wrong with group experiences where one can’t pause or rewind or adjust the volume and must behave as if in public. And the coughing and the sniffing and the chomping and the giggling and chittering and whatnot from the audience sure adds atmosphere. The evocative scent of junk food float in the air… I remember. But I don’t miss it.
(Gotta love the internet just for that)
Suspending disbelief is one of the things I miss from childhood.
I could walk out of a theatre standing on clouds.
This theater also shows the old movies. It’s all old horror movies in October, we just did a matinee of Cry Baby. We actually make good money with the oldies—they’re cheap, and most of our revenue comes from concessions.
I was going to invite you to a showing gratis, John, but I guess you won’t show.
Wait a minute…outdoor porno theater? We used to climb the trees & hillsides to watch cowboy movies. How would you control the mobs peering over the fence?
fishy @ 6
I remember mostly stumbling out of the Fox Theater after 4 hours of watching promos, a double feature, and a couple cartoons in between, feeling bloated and a bit nauseous after eating a huge tub of salty popcorn saturated with real butter, several king size sodas, and 3 or 4 giant candy bars. Mom couldn’t figure out why my brother and I weren’t too talkative during the ride home.
You get me, PZ.
I might still see the movie. Just not in public.
Merits of a movie as a movie and as an outing experience are distinct for me.
Though you make it sound like a nice, smallish venue.
Also, I take it you are right now hard at work, even now movieficating.
(Hobbies: projectionist)
Oh no. I have to work concessions! I’ve never worked retail before!
I may have told this story before.
The first time I saw, “Blazing Saddles,” was outside a drive-in theater in South Dakota, on a family vacation, while staying at a KOA campground.
I was looking over the fence.