Sunday, February 23, 2014

Best Picture Nominee Marathon - Day 1



I spent yesterday sitting in a movie theater watching movies for over 10 hours.   If you had told 14 year old me that I would have thought that would be nothing but a slice of heaven.  As I mentioned in some posts yesterday, AMC has been doing these marathons for several years now.  I've always been interested but the stars have never aligned for me to take advantage of that before yesterday.

I was very cautious going in, to 43 year old me it sounded like it might be closer to hell than to heaven.  I had some ideas on how yesterday would go and as I documented, I was dead wrong on almost all of them.

I was surprised by the crowd.  There was a really good turnout in the biggest capacity screen in the theater.  I thought there were going to be like 12 people there.  I couldn't have been more wrong.  The people there were looking to have fun.  They came prepared and were in a very good mood.





I got a kick out of the fact that they brought pillows and blankets.  What I noticed later was that a lot of them had laptops as well.  I wasn't the only one blogging the event.  During Philomena the crowd was laughing a lot and I think that helped my enjoyment of the movie.  It was a lot of fun.

This experience is something that's been going on for awhile.  The laptops and stuff reminded me of what the Steve Jobs Apple presentations must be like.  Everyone there seems to be broadcasting to an unknown amount of people across the internet.  Movie marathons aren't new but they were to me.  The Ain't it Cool News butt-numb-a-thon that happens every December in Austin, TX has always intrigued me.  24 hours of all kinds of movies. 

I'm pretty sure I couldn't survive that but yesterday made me think I could.  One thing I had going for me was the movies themselves.  I hadn't seen any of them and they were all very good.  My buddy Ken Stevenson posted that this was nothing compared to a Star Wars marathon.  While he's right that 6 movies are longer than 4, my thought is, I've seen the original 3 so many times, I'm not sure I could make it through.  I love those flicks but watching on TV is much different than in a theater.  I can distract myself at home with phones, iPads, bathroom breaks, etc.

The theater is such a different experience, you have nothing to distract you so the movie has to be good and having not seen them is key for me.  I get bored quick these days.  I know I couldn't watch the newer Star Wars flicks back to back in a theater, those things drive me nuts.

I have to give AMC credit, they had some fun trivia games set up and the dinner break was really cool.  I was able to run to a bar next door and had a really good meal.  Oh, some beers too.  That was nice.


If the stars aligned again, there is no question I would do it again.  I'd need to have the time which is doubtful once I re-unite with my family.  I think it also helps that I hadn't seen any of them before.  Not sure it would line up like that again.  Also, I'd like for Angela to be there, it would have been really cool to discuss the flicks with her.  No offense to you lone blog reader but I would have preferred to debate the movies with her than type on my phone about them like I did yesterday.

So, with 2 nominees left to see - here is how I'd rank the 7 that I've seen:

1. Philomena
2. Captain Phillips/Dallas Buyers Club
4. Gravity
5. Wolf of Wall Street
6. American Hustle
7. 12 Years a Slave

I might have 6 and 7 as a tie, I'm not sure.  As I mentioned last night, I'm not sure 12 years got a fare shake from me but that's where I am with it now.  That surprises me to be honest, I really expected to love that one.

I'll probably see Nebraska in the next week since it's available to rent, not sure about Her though, it doesn't appear to be available to see in the week before the Oscars.

Overall, yesterday was a whole lot of fun, if you have the opportunity to do it, it's a lot more fun that I ever would have thought it would be.  I was expecting an Iron Man Triathalon type event for lazy movie geeks.  Turns out I was wrong about that too. 


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