Can't a Man Sit in a Corner Ignoring the Party He's Supposed to Be Hosting and Watch a Movie in Peace?
I was going to talk about Miller’s Crossing today, but as it happens, I didn’t really watch it last night. Having a party where I ignore everybody and watch a movie is really enticing in theory, but difficult to pull off in practice. Apparently, most of the people in attendance were under the impression I was joking about it. I know, I’m baffled too. When have I ever joked about watching a movie? Assisted suicide and colon cancer, yes. Movies, no. When I discreetly gave the signal to shift the party locus from the living room to the kitchen (I believe my exact words were, “Okay, I’m putting the movie on now, everybody get out.”), there was actually laughter to be heard. Not to point any fingers or lay any blame, but I must sadly note that Mama Dog didn’t help my case any by ignoring me and continuing her conversation. Seeing no alternative, I put the movie on and tried to concentrate over the din of party conversation. On later consideration, it seemed to me this must be what it’s like to go to Foreign Cinema in hopes of seeing a movie.* I sighed and turned the sound up really loud, but of course that just raised the volume level of the conversations so that people could make themselves heard over the volume meant to drown them out. Then Baby Dog went to bed and I had to pause the movie to shush her to sleep. With that mission accomplished, I didn’t want to blast the movie again, so I put the headphones on and turned on the subtitles for the benefit of the one other guy who was halfway paying attention.
Sadly, this was not a choice moviegoing experience. My reasoning had been that, since I’ve seen the movie enough times to have it memorised, I’d be able to follow it regardless of babble and distraction. Alas, there was so much noise and so many interruptions that it just became hopeless. The party broke up when I was about 45 minutes in, and dishes needed to be done and freelance work needed to be finished, so I just packed it in and left the disc paused to the point where I’ll pick it up next St. Patrick’s Day.
Despite all that, I had a bunch of notes on stuff I wanted to mention about the movie, but I left them at work and now I’m too tired to try to reconstruct them from memory. So let’s call it a night for now and later I’ll either return to the subject or not.
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*A restaurant where a movie is played against a wall while you dine. They’re successful, apparently, but this strikes me personally as a simultaneous offence against both dining and cinema. The place must be run by people who believe movies are meant to be background noise; which is to say, by the enemy.
Sadly, this was not a choice moviegoing experience. My reasoning had been that, since I’ve seen the movie enough times to have it memorised, I’d be able to follow it regardless of babble and distraction. Alas, there was so much noise and so many interruptions that it just became hopeless. The party broke up when I was about 45 minutes in, and dishes needed to be done and freelance work needed to be finished, so I just packed it in and left the disc paused to the point where I’ll pick it up next St. Patrick’s Day.
Despite all that, I had a bunch of notes on stuff I wanted to mention about the movie, but I left them at work and now I’m too tired to try to reconstruct them from memory. So let’s call it a night for now and later I’ll either return to the subject or not.
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*A restaurant where a movie is played against a wall while you dine. They’re successful, apparently, but this strikes me personally as a simultaneous offence against both dining and cinema. The place must be run by people who believe movies are meant to be background noise; which is to say, by the enemy.
posted by PapaDogDuvalier | 10:01 PM
1 Comments:
Oooh, Papa Dog... I'm sorry that my obliviousness to your hints resulted in your not getting to watch your movie properly. I mistakenly thought that you wouldn't mind having the movie play in the background while our guests made merry; I guess that makes me the enemy, huh? Sorry, Honey. I hope that you had a wee bit of fun, anyway. I certainly did. We have lovely friends.
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