Screening Screeners
You’ve heard me mention going to a list of premiers and getting the opportunity to see many of today’s greatest stars on stage. So far, we have managed to get seats in the front row for every premier we’ve attended so we feel like we’ve gotten up close and personal with Rene Zellweger, Danny Boyle, Richard Curtis, Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Ray Romano, Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, Margot Robbie, John Lithgow, Tom Hanks, Chris Cooper, and more. In theory, this special access is to help Kim choose her nominations for the Academy Awards in all categories. I believe that committee of nominators is a big group, given the number of people with similar credentials that are on the waiting line with us every week. As for me, I am the plus one to which Kim is entitled, so I am along just for the ride.
We have been accumulating the screener DVD’s that Kim is supposed to use to make her decisions (in addition to the premiers and regular big-screen movie-going). So far (and this goes up every day), we have received thirty-three movies. By my count, I have now seen nineteen of those and have fourteen to go. I can’t tell how far Kim will get through this stack (I see more movies than she does, both by choice and by virtue of having a broader tolerance for violence on screen). I figure I can earn my keep with the Academy by counseling Kim on movies she may not choose to screen. Maybe that makes me a screener screener of sorts.
I love movies and always have. I remember once meeting Ron Howard about a dozen years ago (he was already a highly accomplished filmmaker). When I told him that I watched 2-3 new movies each week he was amazed and said it was not a pace he could claim. Ii somehow thought movie people saw scads of movies every day. Not necessarily so. Back around that time, I had a movie blog and had an uncomplimentary article written about me in the New York Times (I got set up!) about that blog and the fact that I may have been going to movies while Rome proverbially burned in my hedge funds. I immediately stopped blogging (clearly, I didn’t learn my lesson), but my only real regret on hindsight is that my last blogs were about Evan Almighty and Mr. Brooks with their combined Metascores of 82.
If I were being honest, I would bet that I watch six movies per week if I’m at home and probably closer to ten if I’m traveling. I am prepared to see movies many times if I really like them. I am also prepared to walk out of a movie occasionally and may never revisit it to see it through. For some strange reason, The Good Sheppard is one such movie that I’ve simply arbitrarily gotten on the wrong side of. I could probably detail what I like and what I dislike in movies, but for this story’s purpose I will just say that I like thoughtful and well-constructed films about a wide range of subjects and have a decided preference for optimistic and hopeful movies. I am soft-hearted and like to find redeeming value.
Strangely enough, I scan the new releases less to be the “first on my block” to see a movie and more because I always hanker for new stories. I love immersing myself in a good story. I lose myself. I am transported to a different place, time or circumstance and I love that feeling. One would think I am a Walter Mitty sort that lives a boring life, but I don’t think that’s the case at all. The only thing I like as much as losing myself in a movie is losing myself by writing or telling a story. I have a hard time explaining that and could probably use some serious psychological analysis about what that means about my soul. Many people live lives that are as interesting and exciting as mine and they feel no need to reconstruct it all into a story. They probably also don’t need to dive into other people’s stories the way I feel prone to do. It is forever getting me into trouble in some way or another. My family and friends wonder why I feel inclined to share so much. Others wonder why I disengage for two hours at a time to wallow in other people’s stories. I have few good answers to either.
I hear some people saying they don’t like or respect fiction and prefer reality and non-fiction. They like to learn real things rather than waste time on made-up things. The movie Sideways is about that very subject. I’ve had people comment to me that they are less interested in some of my stories if they think they are fictional or stylized and that they prefer the real stuff. That shouldn’t surprise me based on the explosion of reality TV as a popular pastime. But I think I like non-fiction for what I can learn, fiction for what I can imagine and stylized non-fiction for what I can parse about what may have been. I like stories from whatever source, and I guess that makes me at least partially a dreamer.
Is being a dreamer a bad thing? I watch movies that feature hard-bitten men and women who have learned not to expect too much from life or from other people. They are pragmatic. They are about the basic needs of life and survival. I might suggest that they lack grace, but I can also imagine that there is grace in survival just like there is beauty amid harshness. The little flower that grows out of a mass gravesite is beautiful in its symbolism as much as its absolute delicate color and sweet smell. Dreaming about a better world or a more promising life for mine or others may be folly to some. I would suggest that without those dreams our species would stay in the mud for eternity. Someone had to dream that they could harness fire. Someone had to dream that life over an unknown hill was better than life in the here and now. In no situation can I imagine a world where dreaming doesn’t add critical value. And dreaming comes from letting yourself loose to enjoy the highs and lows of others through their stories. Letting those stories motivate you to create more stories that might motivate others is a part of the dream process. Somewhere along the line, a dream will be turned into a reality and won’t be so much a reflection of the author of the story as it will represent the ambitions of the dreamer. There is no better use of my time than to drive this process in my own humble way, so I will keep screening screeners.