I realized that I might have a movie addiction issue sometime in the late 80's when I began associating life events with movie premiers. Something like,
I lost my first tooth when Star Wars came to the theatres.
My love of movies probably came from my Dad who could watch a movie from his couch over 15 feet away from the T.V. with the 6 of us kids running in and out of the living room. I revered his level of concentration and I knew I had mastered it when I sat through,
Father Goose, while our roof caught on fire. I did not even notice the smoke coming out of the wood stove near the chair I was hunkered down in. It was a defining moment in my life. He also showed me the magic of Sci-fi that I may not have found on my own. Star Trek was a must see on Friday nights in my house hold, later it would be Westerns that we shared a passion for and ultimately it must have been the old Disney Cartoons that we b0th loved most. My Dad was 6'7" and had an 8 foot couch on one end of the living room. He would lay on his side and I would get the best seat in the house, the triangle shaped space created behind his knees. I watched many movies from there. I came home from college one year and my older brothers had rented,
Army of Darkness, I must have been 18 years old and I ended up behind my dads knees on the couch watching that movie. Truly those were wonderful times in my life.
I love movies for many other reasons, they take me to places I have never been (see 7 years in Tibet), they offer me points of view from people I will never meet(see the entire God Father series), they teach me about love(see What's Eating Gilbert Grape), hate (see To Kill a Mockingbird), violence (see Fight Club), laughter (see A Mighty Wind), really the entire spectrum of human emotion.
I consider myself a devoted fan but not a fanatic. Is there a difference? Oh yes. I do very poorly at those movie games though people think I would do well. I am terrible at remembering the names of movies but I can remember portions of entire scripts verbatim. I recently found out that I can place a voice pretty well. I mean by that, that while watching,
Over the Hedge I accurately named all of the actors who were doing the voice overs for the characters. I was pretty proud of myself. (Not one of the better Computer Animated Films I've seen.)
The movies brought me the boy too. I met him at work when I was dating a non movie goer. I started going to the movies with the boy pretty regularly and when I broke up with the non movie goer it was not long until our love of movies had started a long and lasting friendship that ultimately turned to a romance.
You can tell a lot about a person by the types of movies they like to watch the most. For example, I love a good thriller. I am a person who needs to try and figure things out before the ending and I love a good challenge, in my life I over analyze things. The boy likes Drama because he is really into story lines. I think this reflects his introverted and reflective nature. He is a people watcher because he likes the complexity of human communication. He uses films in his analogies I've noticed. It is very interesting to get a few beers in him and get him talking about this.
We should own stock in Hastings and Movie Lovers but renting is better than cable unless you have AMC. I have not tried the online renting thing as the experience of finding the perfect movie in the store is almost likened to finding the perfect book, the cover speaks to you, there is a thrill in finding a great "unknown movie" (see
Priscilla of the Desert) or an International film that will make you blush, (see
Emile). You never know what will strike your fancy because your mood has as much to do with the enjoyment of the movie as your taste does.
I am off to see Word Play
. I will let you know if it turns out to be something recommendable and of course I am always looking for suggestions... Oh, please, just no heavy gore; my Dad has long since passed and I don't think the boy would understand if I ended up behind him on the couch.
