Whatever happened to ushers at movie theaters? Was there a collective decision made by people that its a BAD thing to stand around in a dark room making minimum wage, all the while bitching at people to shut up?

They need to bring them back, and give them tasers. Whenever some obnoxious dumbass opens their mouth, ZAP! Thousands of watts of electricity sent through their body inducing a state of paralysis.

And now, the point:

I rarely go to movies. And if you’d bothered checking my profile (or, god forbid, actually know me), you’d see that my primary interest is filmmaking. You’d think an amateur filmmaker who claims to be non-elitist (holy hell!! They exist!!) would venture out to a theater more often.

So why don’t I?

My theater has two problems: Low volume (come on, it’s a theater; blast it), and it’s located in a town where the average joe has little/no attention span. Most people here can’t, for lack of a better term, shut the fuck up. Most of the time I can overlook the first problem. However, after my last adventure, I may just wait until whatever it is I want to see hits DVD.

I went to see The Manchurian Candidate. It was enjoyable, as a movie. As an experience, it blew. Here’s why:

There’s a few types of people that love attending movies who should be shot: The chatty old women; Yes, that’s the one guy from that one movie, and no, its not ok to spend 5 minutes trying to think of his name, people who think they’re either in the movie, or that the actors can somehow hear them; “Hey, don’t do it!”, “Its ok, they can’t see you”, “Ok, I see, I get it”, or any of a number of ridiculous reactions to what occurs on the screen; and the “rebel”; the kid who thinks they’re cool/hardcore/unique for saying aloud whatever is the exact opposite reaction of what the filmmakers intended you to have.

I put up with types one and three at this movie… Two old women sat behind me, and a moronic freshman sat a couple rows ahead of me. Let’s start with type 1…

I always figured old people, usually being senile, are far more likely to attend simple movies. Romantic comedies, “dramatic” finding oneself movies, and anything involving Kevin Costner. Something like The Manchurian Candidate, despite being a remake of a Frank Sinatra film (and most of his big fans are dead/in a nursing home, or have no interest in decent movies), should put them off. Nevertheless, behind me sat two old women who should be at whatever Julia Roberts has crapped out lately. First they tried to figure out who Liev Schriber was (“oh, him…” “what’s his name?” “I don’t remember”), then anytime the setting shifted they’d open up a brief conversation on what just happened.

What is so damned important that it can’t wait at least until the end credits come up? Look, I know you’re old and time is especially short for you, but I bet you’ll make it out of the theater.

And then there’s the pathetic bastard who thinks he’s some sort of “rebel” for dramatizing an opposite reaction to the emotional content of the film. For example, the first time an important character dies in the movie, this kid clapped. Annoying, but… Whatever. Second time somebody dies, he exclaims “Haha! She died!”. I wanted to smack him.

I’m not the most emotionally attached person; I have a small collection of ogrish videos that I can watch without flinching whatsoever (and if you’ve ever seen somebody screaming as their throat is being cut away 3 feet from the camera, you’d know that’s not a normal reaction). That being said, nobody gives two donkey shits what your reaction is to a particularly emotional part of a movie. Clap, make stupid retorts, the only thing people around you are thinking is “Die.” It’s a lot like the whole goth culture (oxymoron, since none of them are actually gothic). If you dress in black with dark makeup smeared aimlessly around your ugly mug, claiming to be a poet because you can form a couple depressing sentences, all the while listening to nu-metal or HIM, nobody thinks you’re cool. Trust me, nobody is secretly thinking “ooh, they’re mysterious and different!”. It’s more like “Wither away and die, scum”.

Attention whores should be shot.

^Look ma, irony!

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