Tag Award Winning

The most wonderful time of the year

Michael 8 Comments

It’s almost here. The day we’ve been waiting for. (Don’t you just love ads, articles, blogs even that start that way. Like all of the world is “we.” It’s like the YouTube videos that begin, “You’re doing [something incredibly common and impossible to do wrong] wrong.”) (But I digress.) The day we’ve (cough cough) been waiting for is almost here.  Yes…[dramatic overture type music]…it’s Oscar time. (You know I’m really not allowed to say that. It’s copyrighted and a couple years ago they were going after those using it without permission hard. Yeah, well, tough on them! I said it!) Now where was I. Oh yes, it’s Oscar time!

For movie buffs, it really is a big time. Those awards still hold a mystique among awards, and people who live and die for movies have no real life. 

I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to say that.

Take 2! People who live and die for movies look forward to this time of year like normal people look forward to Groundhog Day. And I can say that because I too look forward to Oscar season. Oh not for the awards. I mean I guess they’re okay even though they really have gotten away from awarding the best performances and replaced that with awarded the performances that have the most to say but then sometimes that happens to be the same picture like last year. That was a good movie and I can’t wait to se it again when it’s like 40 years old. Umm…

Oh darn,I lost my place again. Don’t go anywhere. Hmm, people live and die. Look forward to too. I’m one of them. Oh yeah, I found it.

And I can say that because I too am one of them. One of the them who look forward to Oscar season but not for the awards. I look forward to this time of year because my favorite television station, TCM, plays an entire month of Oscar nominated and winning films from when they really were really good. I’ve said many times, my passion is old movies, preferably pre-1950s, certainly pre-1960s, and a rare one after that.

There was a difference in the movies from 70 and 80 years ago. There will never be a movie couple so well matched as William Powell and Myrna Loy. There will never be an actress so perfect in every role she played as Audrey Hepburn. Nor a musical as free spirited as Singing in the Rain, or a drama as soul searching as The Red Shoes. And there will never be another Casablanca. What made so many of the great movies of the golden age of movies such great movies is something we will never see again in movie land. The studio system. So completely controlling of all that went in the it should be The Studio System.

Take Casablanca as an example. Every part was perfectly cast. Not just the leading roles which none of the leads were who the producer Hal Wallis wanted but who the studio gave him. Even the director Michael Curtiz was not the first choice. All off the minor characters filled their roles like they had been doing those jobs for ever. And they had. Actors then were on contract to the studios and they all filled a niche. You want a bartender? They got an actor who played a bar tender so often he’d be a better bartender than a bartender. Do you need a street vendor? Central casting has a dozen to pick from, what do you want to sell? The system worked. Casablanca was nominated for 8 academy Awards and came away with 3, best picture, best director, and best adapted screenplay.

So next Sunday while most movie maniacs will be glued to their sets to see who gets slapped this year, I’ll be halfway through a smorgasbord of the best movies, some that even won for being the best movie when being the best mean being the best and the only message was “let us entertain you.”

Every moment of every day has the potential to be one that will be never forgotten. Those memorable moments can be anything and happen anytime. Last week in Uplift! we asked, will some moment today be your most memorable?

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The Price of Popcorn

Michael Leave a comment

“I’ll see your two small popcorns and raise you a medium soft drink.”

“You’re bluffing.  There’s your medium drink and I’ll raise you a soft pretzel.  With honey mustard.”

Over the past several years we’ve done remarkably well seeing all of the Academy Award nominees.  Not necessarily in the same year they are nominated, but eventually.  And we’ve done remarkably well seeing entertaining movies also.  They aren’t always the same you know.  But every so often there comes a critically acclaimed movie that ends up walking away with all the awards that we also like.  Those are the two- popcorns-two-drinks movies. And then there are those that everybody says we have to see so we do.  Usually they end up walking away with all the awards and frankly, we wouldn’t even waste the price of a box of Milk-Duds on all of them put together.

Sometimes the movies are the big hits.  And sometimes they are the big flops.  But hit or miss, we still go to see them.  And when we’re there we never go in without our popcorn.  We invite you to join us as we place value on today’s film offerings based on concession stand items.

It makes sense.  You can see a movie any day of the week, any time of the day and the price varies.  The movie doesn’t.  The winners are winners on Tuesday afternoon just as much as they are on Friday night. If it’s a dog, it barks every time it’s played.  First run, second run, it’s still either running away with it all or just running away.  Just because we have to pay $4.00 more after 4:00 it doesn’t get 40% better.  Nope, there is no correlation between the admission for a movie and how good is that movie.  So when some smarmy film critic says, “It wasn’t worth the price of admission” what admission are we to assume?

Yet with all the variances in how much a theater will charge to get you into the seat, they know their gold standard is what is so prominently displayed well before you make your way to those seats.  The concessions!  Popcorn is popcorn and it’s $10.00 for a medium one of them any show, any day, any time.  Not long ago we were at an afternoon showing of one of this year’s best picture nominees.  It was a matinee so we got in for the low, low price of $14.00 for the both of us.  Two small popcorns and drinks later, He of We had dug out another $20.00.  We were almost outraged that the snacks cost more than the main dish.  But a few weeks earlier we were at the evening showing of a movie that we enjoyed but will never have “Oscar Winner” on its DVD cover.  Admission for two?  $24.00.  Popcorn and pop for both?  $20.00.  Here we have our measure of comparison!  Not admission. 

We paid more for what was put out as fluff, marketed as fluff, and played as fluff than we did to see the award winning performance in a movie everyone has talked about since it was released months ago.  Had we watched those two movies on the opposite days and times that we did, would we have instead gotten what we paid for?  It’s too hard to tell.  Every mathematician will tell you that solving simultaneous equations went out with the IBM 200.  One variable.  Period.  And that variable is the movie.  For sure.

So here is our gold standard for clear movie worth.  If after you see the movie you first thought is, that wasn’t worth the price of the popcorn, you won’t be watching it when it comes out on your cable company’s Movies On Demand list.  Not even the free one.  On the other hand, if your initial reaction is “that was worth more than the biggest, saltiest, butteriest popcorn, I’ve ever had,” and you wish you had even more, you’ll be back next week for an encore. 

It only makes sense. The price of admission goes up, goes down, goes half-off, and gets the Entertainment Book coupon special all to put seats in those seats.  And it’s all to get you in the door. Once you’re through those doors they bring out the big gun. The ultimate money-maker. The true measure of entertainment success. Snack food!

That’s because sometimes the movie is the attraction, and sometimes it’s there just to accompany the popcorn.

Now, that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

An Oscar Winning Performance

Michael Leave a comment

The Academy missed an award last night.  That was the best performance by an individual or individuals who are supposed to be care givers but clearly don’t care.  The nominees were:

Your doctor who said you really needed to lose about 10 pounds between appointments and on your way out asked you if you’ve been to the new seafood house off the interstate.  But he lost his edge when you returned 6 months later and measured out only an 8 pound loss.  He had the chance to chastise you for the un-lost pounds, instead he said was that you did well and you’ll get those last two pounds in another month or two.

The second nomination was a group effort that went to the local nursing home administration in total for their performance before the local television news reporter when refusing to answer questions on air about the apparent loss of 3 residents who wandered away from the facility and hadn’t been seen for 2 days, the alarm being raised only after a family member of one of the missing elders reported the situation to the police.  In what looked like a lock for this award the group lost their opportunity to take home the gold when it was discovered that the administrator had already disciplined, fired, and reported to the state licensing boards the entire nursing staff that was on duty the day the three just walked through a door that was supposed to be locked but was left open so staff memebers could sneak outside for a smoke break.  They further fell from consideration when after they found the trio they not only welcomed them back without trying to blame the oldsters but then gave them a month’s stay for free.

The third nominee was a dark horse, your very own auto mechanic who said on three different occasions that he couldn’t find the same noise you heard every time you turned left on a gravel road.  Just when everyone was certain that he was going to charge you an arm and a leg for each visit and double dip by charging the warranty company as well, he found the problem, made a call to some mechanic friends of his, fixed your problem for parts only, then reported the issue to the manufacturer who is now recalling all 5 million models for the same safety repair.  In a surprise move, the National Transportation Safety Board awarded your mechanic the Silver Torque Wrench for unrelented test driving.

And the winner is…your dentist.  This supposed integral cog of your health care team takes the first five minutes of each of your semi-annual visits to harangue you for not flossing, not flossing enough, not flossing with the right kind of floss, or not flossing correctly, while scraping at your defenseless teeth with a metal probe the size of Rhode Island, refusing to let you inhale for periods of up to 3 minutes, and then telling you on your way out that he no longer takes your insurance, payment is expected immediately, don’t forget to make your next appointment, and please, have a nice day.

Congratulations!

Now, that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you?