My hatred of Eyes Wide Shut has been well documented in other threads, but I must admit that it made for possibly my favorite movie theater experience. "Yeahbuhwha," you say? Allow me to explain:
It was opening night and the combined lures of Stanley Kubrick's reputuation and the promise of boobs-a-plenty drew such crowds that both screening rooms were filled to capacity, which was exceedingly odd, as the film advertised nary an explosion. I guess any movie review that contains the words "Nicole Kidman" and "orgy" is guaranteed a big opening weekend box office, at least in my town.
As the movie rolled on my friend and I - both longtime MSTies - grew increasingly restless, and found ourselves riffing this celluloid travesty quietly to ourselves. I would usually be rather self-conscious making fun of a movie in a crowded theater, but much to my surprise, we weren't the only ones. Whispers grew into shouts, comments became heckles, and if there was anyone still trying to quietly enjoy the movie, well, they didn't seem to complain. Now, this wasn't an all-out, popcorn throwing, unruly situation, but amazingly just a theater full of people who realized it was up to them to provide the entertainment this evening.
My favorite moment: nearly the entire audience humming along in unison wih the unbearably repetitive soundtrack. It's like shouting out the punchline of a joke you've already heard. Maybe it was the group discomfort of a large number of strangers watching a movie that bordered a little too closely on porno, I dunno. But it felt a lot like when the whole crowd at a concert is singing along to a song that you love.
Much less of a group experience was me at the inscrutable French kung fu werewolf movie Brotherhood Of The Wolf screaming "END! For the love of God why aren't you over yet?! FINIS!" It was my birthday, and I just wanted to go home and get drunk. Very riffable movie though. It was in French and subtitled, and for some reason the sound effects were WAY louder than any other part of the soundtrack. Footfalls in the mud thundered like Michael Bay explosions. The theater must have been having some sort of problem with the sound system and then all the speakers suddenly went out. Dead silence. Some genius shouts out, "Hey, I can't hear anything!" "Yeah, I can't understand what they're saying!" replied someone with quicker wits than me. Ah, what a crappy movie.
Topic: Most Riffable Movie (Read 4613 times)
