2005-06-30

Can we just take a moment to acknowledge how much Blockbuster sucks? I am an individual with a high film-need quotient: I have no television, very little money and no social life to speak of (yeah, what of it?). I watch a lot of fucking movies. One might even call me a �film buff�, if one was inclined to receive a punch in the mouth. In this town, however, life as an FB ain�t easy: Portsmouth has no repertory cinema and not one single cult video shop; and so I am stuck with Blockbuster, where the employees have nametags instead of opinions and half the films in the so-called �New Releases� section made their big screen debuts at the drive-in. Bah. I will concede that the whole three-films-for-seven-days-for-five-pounds deal is a very economical, but you have to select your movies from the equally-ironically-titled �Favourites� section, which, as far as I can make out, contains whatever random unwatchable DVD remains physically intact after periodic carbon dating reveals it to be past even the most exaggerated conception of a �new release�. Featured prominently in the �Favourites� section: Treat Williams! Dolf Lundgren! Rob Schneider! Low-budget soft core porn! Thankfully not all in one film! Mixed in amongst these gems is a �collection� of classic films that comprises the following: two Alfred Hitchcock films (Rear Window and Vertigo, because everyone likes to see Jimmy Stewart hanging from stuff), one copy of Citizen Kane and a VHS tape of Casablanca. A while back I reached the point where I�d sat through as many Ashley Judd thrillers as one human being could be expected to withstand, and I�ve now made my way through about three quarters of the �Foreign� section � not surprisingly, I�ve come across some genuinely brilliant films in the process, and seen enough naked Frenchmen to fill the Centre Georges Pompidou. I�ve even eyeballed and warily considered renting a Bergman film, but I�m just not there yet, you know?

At least tonight I get to break free of the blue-and-yellow cartel, as this evening is the debut of the latest in this year�s lineup of heartily disappointing summer blockbusters: War of the Worlds! In which Tom Cruise runs away from some giant computer-generated tentacles and Dakota Fanning wields her fearsome giant computer-generated lower lip. It�ll get me out of the house, anyway.