By BEN GREMILLION
Contributor, SNSPost
Contributor, SeriousMovieLover.com
The movie seeming to garner the most attention at the Golden Globes was “The Artist.” This then leads to some interesting movie going news to follow. Apparently in the United Kingdom, moviegoers, upon finding out the movie is largely silent, walked out. Now, this surprised us here, mostly due to the fact that the Golden Globes pointed out that it was a silent movie about a thousand times during the broadcast. So our response is to begin an on-going list of rules for watching movies. Please feel free to add your recommendations below, and then we can finally avoid morons from ruining out theater experience.
Rule #5: Research the movie you are going to go see. There are thousands of websites devoted to critiquing movies. These range from local newspapers to Internet blogs. Use these sources to get a synopsis of the movie you want to see. By doing so you then know you will not be going to see movies that you will not enjoy. For future reference: IMdB, Rotten Tomatoes, Dark Horizons, Google, etc.
Rule #4: Have an open mind. Not every movie is made for those that are stuck in comas and don’t care about what is on the screen. What this means is that once or twice a year, a movie is made that challenges the audience to focus on other parts of the movie-making process than how many robots blow up. This is where we refer you to Turner Classic Movies and the delightfully calming Robert Osborn to educate you in classic movie techniques and backstories. After a few weeks, you will realize that not all movies with booby shots are instant classics.
Rule #3: Shut Up! This is not directed to the sassy woman loudly talking on the phone during the credits, nor to the gentleman making funny wise cracks during horribly awesome movies. This is directed to the person that goes to a movie and has to ask questions throughout the movie. Questions like: Who is that? What is he doing? What is going on? What happened while I was in the bathroom? Or statements such as: This does not look good. Ooooooh, I wouldn’t do that. That would never happen in real life. All we can say is shut up. If you cannot go two hours without making a sound then you need to stay at home. Just be quiet and let the movie explain it to you. Ninety percent of the time, your question is answered within five seconds.
Rule #2: Stay for the Credits. I know this one is kind of out of place for this article, but is a cardinal rule by our standards. We get it, you just spent the last hour and a half plus sitting in one place (quietly), and you got places to go and people to see. All we ask is that you take the extra five minutes to stay through the credits. There are other people that work on the movies that are not on the screen or walking the red carpets. All these people get is their name lumped in a large group of people that goes by rather quickly. Sometimes staying even gets you rewards like an extra scene or bloopers. So before you leave your next movie ask this question, “Who was the Best Boy and the Key Grip?” Answer those questions and you may leave.
Rule #1: Just because you love movies doesn’t mean that you should see just any movie. We at Serious Movie Lover obviously love movies, but we disagree on many films. That doesn’t mean the movie is bad or not worth watching. It just means people have different tastes. For instance with two best picture contenders, as mentioned before, if you sit watching a Charlie Chaplin movie and think to yourself, “This would be better if he only would talk instead of acting out his emotions.” then “The Artist” is not for you. Or take “Tree of Life.” If watching Kubrick‘s 2001: A Space Odyssey makes your brain hurt, you don’t get the connection between the bone and technology, or you wish HAL would have a more cheerful tone; then “Tree of Life” is not for you. If you cannot wrap your mind around ideas like these, then stick with what works, the newest Shia La Beouf movie.
Care to add a rule of your own?
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