So this weekend was the superbowl, I didn’t watch it. I’m not sure what’s super about a bowl maybe it has some good cereal in it or something. This is the second time I’ve been out during the super bowl and not watched it, when I eventually move out here I suspect it will become a tradition. Since I hate sport of all varieties including supposedly patriotic english sports I don’t see the attraction of watching a game of rugby with padding.
So instead I went to see a film. The local shopping centre has an Imax theatre and they were showing Avatar in 3d. I’d seen it before but figured it was worth a look at on the big screen (imax, for those living in a cave using a solar powered laptop to curse the evils of technology on their tree hugger blog, is basically super wide screen usually several stories tall). I also figured since it was an old film, some two to three months since release, and it was a late showing on a sunday it would be pretty quiet. I was quite wrong, the place was packed to the gunnals.
This is a very big cinema in scale with the screen each row is maybe 30 to 40 people and there are maybe as many rows and the place was packed. It was a bit odd for a film that’s been out for so long, maybe in the week it would be much quieter but still.
The film was pretty good, the story is a bit derivative, but the special effects are supurb and it uses the 3d very well. It’s a spectacle film so seeing it blown up to 5 stories tall added to the experience.
One little oddity of US culture is how they react to the end of movies, they applaud. I’m unclear as to why. I never get used to it, I mean I could understand if you were at a premier or a special screening but a regular screening. And even suspect films get a hearty round of applause, I felt fairly unwell walking out of that abomination transformers to a standing ovation.
I guess it’s just one of those little differences between our cultures.
