Don’t Panic

We went to see the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy movie yesterday afternoon while my parents watched Carrie. I did enjoy the movie, although it deviated from the book quite a bit. (Plus my memory of the book is kind of fuzzy, so I had a hard time figuring out what was different and what I just didn’t remember.)

However, I’m not so sure the whole movie theater experience is worth it anymore. Aside from the fact that a matinee cost $6 per ticket (I remember when it was $3.25, $2.50 if you had a valid student ID) and the concession prices are outrageous, the actual pre-movie content was appalling. Instead of the slide-show type thing with trivia that they used to show – and that you could easily ignore – they had 20 minutes of advertising, mainly for television networks. It was loud, obnoxious, and made me want to run home and cancel my cable subscription. Quite frankly, I think they should have paid me to sit through that, rather than the other way around.

And I shouldn’t even start on the 15 minutes worth of movie previews. Is there not one single original idea left in all of Hollywood? Every single movie that’s coming up is a remake of something else – including one that is literally Jumanji repackaged as a space-themed game.

Don’t get me wrong, I like movies. But I don’t know if I’m going to bother seeing them in the theater anymore. I can just as easily wait for a few months for the DVD – in fact, it’s easier since I don’t have to worry about who’s going to watch Carrie. Of course, then I think about the new Harry Potter movie coming out in November and wonder if I can really wait to watch that one…