Next Week's Films

Next week had one of the largest numbers of available films but the choice wasn't too hard. I had already booked There Will Be Blood in and I only had to decide if there would be a late show. Because of the running length of Blood the late show would have to be at 10:15, really late for us.

These were available.

Jumper- bad movie I wouldn't have played anyway plus it was from Fox so they wanted all shows.

Doomsday- This was a fun movie that was better than I expected but not a film that would work at Western Film.

Definitely Maybe- I am going to play this film but I didn't want to play it as a late show. I'm planning to play it the following week unless Juno is available.

Semi-Pro- this was the only movie out of this group I thought could work as a late show. However I was iffy on playing it at all. I checked back on how Wil Ferrell's previous films had done at Western Film and it wasn't all that great and those films were hits! I decided not to play it at all.

So in the end I decided to play just one show of There Will Be Blood at 7pm.

The booker said Juno was close to coming off so it may play the following week.

Poster of the week - Quantum of Solace.

The title of the next James Bond movie is interesting if a bit unwieldy. The poster I think is one of the best I've seen. It's very simple with little text. I'm willing to bet most people would know it's a James Bond poster even without seeing the title.

Changing the movie seasons?

From IMDB: "The head of the National Association of Theater Owners charged Tuesday that both the owners and the studios could be earning a lot more money if the studios did not rely on an outmoded release schedule. John Fithian chastised the studios for failing to provide attractive movies throughout the year, noting that April and September are "virtually empty," because studios save their prime product for summer or the winter seasons. "They look at their calendar and wait for May and say, 'OK, now we can open our tent-pole movie.'" He said that if the studios hadn't tried to release the latest Spider-Man, Shrek, and Pirates of the Caribbean sequels all within three weeks of one another, the exhibitors "could have done at least another $50 or $60 million" -- particularly if the studios had decided to open at least some of them in April. "A good movie will be successful no matter when it is released," Fithian said"

I agree with this in most part. It is a bit silly to have three of the biggest movies of the year open within three weeks of each other. Despite what the studios may think most people don't see every movie they want to because of time, money etc. By releasing them so close together many people would have to choose between them.
There are however seasonal considerations. Obviously kid's films will likely do better when the kids aren't in school. The weather affects movie-going a lot, people tend not to go out as much when it's cold.
On the other hand, Cloverfield and 300 last year showed that a good movie played off season can do big business.
I remember when the redone versions of the first 3 Stars Wars movies were released in 1997. Theatres were very happy since George Lucas released them in February I think it was. It brought in a ton of business in what is normally a quiet time.

Some of this is irrelevant to Western Film. Between being 2nd run and subject to the student cycle we often get big movies at slow times for other theatres. However we also run into problems. Certain times of the year attendance drops no matter what's playing because the students are busy with school work. There's also things like Juno, at the rate it's going I might not be able to play it until well into exams. Last year I didn't get 300 until the last few days of exams. Most of the students had already left.

An interesting study that states the obvious about concession prices v.s. ticket prices.

Without the high price of popcorn at the concession counter, the price of tickets would be a lot higher, according to a study by the University of California Santa Cruz and Stanford University. Today's (Wednesday) San Jose Mercury News reported that the researchers studied data from 43 multiplex theaters in 30 cities over a five-year period and determined that the concession stand in effect subsidizes relatively low ticket prices and that without it, the ticket prices would rise 25 percent.

This is especially true in cases of cheaper theatres that have a more price sensitive audience.

It's really important for Western Film. A 10% provincial Entertainment tax would kick in if we raised our ticket price even a penny. We would have to go straight from $4.20 to about $5.00 but only make about 25 cents extra ourselves.

With the minimum wage going up significantly we might have to raise concession prices. I'm hoping not.

Movie Review - Doomsday.

The ads for this made it look like a standard scf-fi apocalypse thriller. The movie seemed to be composed of equal parts Mad Max and Escape From New York with a female lead. The Mad Max influence was so obvious and blatant the director must be a fan of the series. Normally I would assume he was a hack director but also did the movie The Descent, one of the genuinely scary flicks I've seen in a while.

Overall it was a fun action movie with occasional horror thrown in. It was better than I expected. The lead actresses Rhona Mitra probably has quite a future as an action heroine.

Questions about 3-D.

A convention for movie theatres called Showest just ended in the US. There was a lot of talk about 3-D being the saviour of the theatre since it can't be duplicated at home. A few questions occurred to me.

Some of the films are supposed to be coming out exclusively in 3-D. The Hannah Montana film was like that and so is the upcoming Journey to the Center of the Earth. I wonder how long the exclusive part will last? There are still a lot of places that don't have a 3-D theatre. 3-D is expensive both to put in and maintain. For example the small city St. Thomas south of London isn't likely to have a 3-D screen any time soon. Are they willing to forsake all places like it in order to play exclusively in 3-D?

There's also the matter of second run and independent theatres. Western Film won't have 3-D any time soon either so does that mean we won't be able to play James Cameron's Avatar when it comes out next year?

The 3-D thing also messes up the normal pattern in a multiplex. Normally a film opens in one of the larger screens then gradually moves into smaller screens as the run progresses. Unless they all have 3-D this won't be able to happen.

For example,the Silver City at Masonville converted their largest screen (#2) to play digital and 3-D. They are playing the Hannah Montana film but since none of the other screens can play it they will have to drop it right off the big screen.

Hannah is a bit of a special case but imagine this. Let's say Shrek 4 opens in 3-D only on May 1, then Spiderman 4 opens May 7 in 3-D only. The Silver City would have to either drop Shrek completely after one week or not play Spider-man. Not a choice I would want to have to make.

I predict a similar situation to when Stars Wars: The Phantom Menace opened. Initially Lucas insisted it could only open on screens with digital sound. There was a huge uproar since so many places didn't have digital sound and that requirement fell by the wayside. The 3-D movies will all or at least most have 2-D versions available as well.

Next Week's Movies.

The choice this week was pretty easy. These were the choices.

Alvin and The Chipmunks- I wouldn't have played it anyway but even less so since Fox wouldn't have let us split it.

Spyderwick Chronicles- Apparently good but a kid's movie. I might have played it during the summer.

There will be Blood- I guess the Hyland dropped it since it was offered to us.

No Country for Old Men- finally.

The booking office had actually already booked There Will Be Blood in but I said I would rather have No Country since it's out on DVD plus we've been waiting for it for so long. I decided to play it for both shows. There wasn't anything good available for a late show and I expect it to do well.

I went ahead and booked There will be Blood for the following playweek. By booking it now I can start advertising it. I figured I was safe to book it now. The only title I would rather play than Blood would be Juno but I don't see that coming off yet. There may or may not be a late show the week that Blood plays. I'll see what's available on Monday.

Al Pacino and Robert De Niro together in a cop film?

There's a bit of buzz about this film as it features two heavyweight actors. The new trailer is below. It looks interesting but nothing special. Hopefully I'm wrong.

Righteous Kill.

The Ten Moviegoing Commandments.

This has got to be one of the funniest things I've read lately.

The Ten Moviegoing Commandments

I think I'll post these in the slide show that runs before the films. Should be good for a laugh and hopefully some educational value.

Movie Review - 10,000 BC.

The first I heard about this film was when I checked into what films actor Steven Strait had coming up. I liked him in The Covenent. 10,000 BC sounded interesting and Roland Emmerich was directing. Emmerich has had a spotty career with both good and bad films, I think Independence day is one of the best popcorn movies ever made. Popcorn movies tends to mean big budget, special effects driven spectaculars. His movies tend to be big and loud without a lot of substance but usually exciting. I was expecting something similar from 10,000 BC.

It was fairly obvious Warner Bros was hoping for a hit similar to 300 from last year, same release date, same genre, similar marketing.

Unfortunately the movie sucked. It was almost boring, only had a couple big action sequences which were obviously computer generated, didn't make sense and even stole a couple scenes right out of 300!? Steven Strait did a fine job with what he was given to work with, he looked pretty good shirtless for most of the movie.

I'd love to see the outtakes from this, the dialogue was so corny I bet they had a lot of takes where the actors couldn't keep from laughing.

I don't think this will play at Western Film. Not just because I didn't like it but for a couple reasons.

-it's getting negative buzz

-these kind of action films don't tend to do great at Western Film even when they are hits and considered good.

I might play it if I have an opening in the schedule.

Next Week's Movies

I was a little disappointed this week, I really wanted to get No Country For Old Men since it comes out on DVD. However it was still doing well enough that at least one first run theatre held it. We have played films (Walk The Line , Brokeback Mountain) after they were on DVD before and if it's something people want to see they will still come. No Country is a film that should be seen on the big screen. It will still play, hopefully the week after, I don't think I can not play it at this point with who knows how many people have been waiting for us to get it.

I was told on Friday that 27 Dresses would be available. Fox puts time between first and second run so I often know early when their films will be available. Unfortunately they wouldn't let me split it so it has to be both shows.

The current week I choose to play Atonement over There Will Be Blood, planning to play Blood next week if No Country wasn't available. Paramount Vantage decided to give the Hyland There Will Be Blood which I have no problem with. I had decided to play 27 Dresses over Blood for reasons similar to why I choose Atonement this week. Blood will still play but I'm not sure when.

One decision I didn't have to make was what to play for a late show if No Country had been available. I could have played two shows of No Country or kept Atonement for a late show. It would have been a tough call.

Why the Hannah Montana Concert Film won't be playing at Western Film.

I'd never heard of Hannah Montana until a couple months ago when word of this movie came out. She's a bit of a sensation, the weekend the movie opened it was #1 with $20 million on only 683 screens, most wide release movies open on at least 2000 screens.

However the reason it only opened on that many screens is because it's in 3-D and there are a limited number of screens with 3-D capability. It was supposed to be a one week only engagement but naturally was held over with that kind of money involved.

A couple of local theatres are opening it next week which means they must be installing Digital Projectors with 3-D since no theatre in London could show 3-D before.

There is no 2-D 35 mm film version so Western Film can't play it. I'm not sure if we would anyway, she's most popular with pre-teen girls and there ain't a lot of them on campus.

Poster of the Week: Religulous

I think Bill Maher is one of the funniest people around. He uses his humour to get across a political message I usually agree with. I hope this movie plays in Canada, his TV series on HBO doesn't and that pisses me off.

The movie comes out later in the year. I'd say it's fairly easy to tell from the poster and title what the subject matter is.

A movie I want to see: Wanted.

I'm a sucker for action adventure films, especially those based on comic books or graphic novels. The first trailer for Wanted with Angelina Jolie and James McAvoy didn't wow me but the new one looks like a movie I really want to see. I guess Angelina has actually been working, it seemed like she spends so much time in the tabloids she wouldn't have time to do anything else.
I've always found her interesting. She has such a extreme look, she's beautiful but in a weird way. I'm curious to see how she ages.

Wanted Exclusive Trailer

Add to My Profile More Videos

Watching movies twice.

As far as I know few people see as many movies as I do, at least one a week, usually two. I bet there are even fewer people who see as many movies twice!
I go see a lot of films in first run release before they come to Western Film for a few reasons. Seeing the films myself gives me a good idea how they will work at Western Film, I get to keep up on what's happening at the other theatres and I can really relax because I'm not in charge.

One of the staff always watches the first showing of any film at Western Film, usually Friday. We do this to watch for technical problems such as splicing errors or sound problems. It's usually the projectionist that watches the film but on nights that person doesn't want to watch the film I often will. It works out that the usual Friday projectionist Chris and I have different taste in films. If he doesn't want to watch the film I usually will and vice-versa. I do occasionally pull managerial prerogative and make him watch a movie I really don't want to watch. Some movies are good once but not a second time or just plain sucked the first time.

Sometimes I watch a film again just because I want to.

So as a result I often end up seeing films twice. It's an interesting experience. I can watch the film more closely and see how shots were set up, notice things I didn't the first time etc. I sat and watched Cloverfield again last night. This is the best kind of film to watch twice. It's full of so many small things that can be missed the first time. The fast action is also more interesting to watch as I can get a better idea what I'm seeing. I can also watch for stuff I read or heard after I saw the film the first time. I read there is a image of something large falling into the ocean in Cloverfield which I missed the first time. The second time I was watching for it.

Next Week's Movies.

When I initially got in to the office I was told There will be Blood was available for sure and a couple others were still being checked on, I decided to wait until I found out about the others. While I was waiting I tried to decide what to do about a late show if I booked in There will Be Blood. It's very long so a late show would have to be at 10pm, pretty late for us. My original plan was to play Cloverfield as a late show after Blood but I ended up playing Cloverfield this week.

I decided to try a little experiment. I noticed we had a lot of students coming to Persepolis so I thought I would try it as a late show and see what happens. Generally the 'Art' shows only do well for the early show but I wondered how one a lot of students wanted to see would do.

It turned out Atonement was available so I booked it in instead of Blood for a couple reasons.

-it'll do better

-next playweek is one of the heaviest in terms of student workload. I figured more would come out for a two hour film than for a 3 hour really heavy film.

-I could play it for both shows, a late show of Atonement would do better than one of Persepolis.

My current plan is to play There Will Be Blood the following week followed by a late show of Atonement if it does as well as I think it will. This kinda depends on if No Country for Old Men is available. I hope I don't have to choose between No Country and Blood, it would be a tough call.

R.I.P. New Line Cinema.

One of the more prominent smaller studios has been erased. New Line Cinema has been owned by Warner Bros for a while. Warner has decided to fold New Line into Warner's film division effectively leaving New Line a shell with a name. New Line is known as the House that Freddy built based on the fact that it's earliest successes were the Nightmare on Elm Street films. It has in recent years produced some classic films including the Lord of the Rings films. New Line had been having some bad times lately, except for Hairspray they hadn't had a hit in a while. They produced The Golden Compass which is getting a rep as one of the biggest bombs ever. I think there's more to it than that, probably a clash of personalities with the studio executives. All studios have bad times, movies are an inherently unpredictable business. New Line took one of the biggest gambles in movie history and won. The three Lord of the Rings films were all shot at the same time at a cost of some $300 million. If the first weekend of the first film has been a bust that would have resulted in a huge loss.

I read they were keeping New Line but it would no longer produce, distribute or market films. My first thought was 'what else does a studio do?'. After a little more thought I think they are keeping the name to attach to certain future films. For example if Warner makes the Hobbit films they will probably release them as New Line for legal or continuity reasons. New Line also has some films that haven't been released yet.

This could get interesting here in Canada. A company named Alliance is the biggest Canadian movie distributor. They tend to release a lot of the high profile award magnets (Atonement) as well as some lower films (Good Luck Chuck). They also release most Canadian films. New Line's films are distributed in Canada by Alliance and constitutes a large portion of Alliance's releases. Alliance will presumably release the New Line films that haven't come out yet but after that who knows?

Alliance was just bought by new owners including the Quebec government. Their investment may have just taken a turn for the worse.

There's an extensive posting on New Line at Cinematical. including a list of all their films. There's some real classics there.

What's with Movie Titles lately?

This isn't a new phenomenon but seems to be getting more common. Movie titles that seem to have no connection to or explanation from the film. Here's a few recent examples.

Cloverfield- There is a mention of the cloverfield in a title card but it's not really explained where it comes from.

Before The Devil Knows You're Dead- an apt title for the film but as far as I could tell was never referenced in the film.

Persepolis- A quick Google tells me that Persepolis is the name of a city in the Persian Empire and now in Iran. That's never explained in the movie, it is kinda a cool title though.

I Am Legend- Maybe it's the title of the book the Will Smith movie is based on but it doesn't make a lot of sense. Perhaps they are referring to the status of his character after the events of the film.

Western Film Movie Review - Vantage Point.

The trailers for this film were really well done. I really wanted to see it and it looked really good. Unfortunately the movie didn't quite live up to the trailer. It was still a good, interesting, fun film but not as good as I had hoped. It used a somewhat unconventional narrative form which some of the audience members seemed to have trouble with. It was one of those films where the elements of a great movie all seemed to be there but weren't quite put together right. It's still worth seeing though. I don't think it will play at Western Film even if it was a better film. The kind of mid-range action films it represents don't get well attended at Western Film any more. I might try it as a late show if I have an opening.

Next Week's movies.

I was really hoping for a big movie to come off this week as it's typically busy since the students tend not to have too much to do right after Slack Week. I didn't expect to get any of the Oscar movies but I was hoping for 27 Dresses to come off. It'll do real well here.

These are the movies that were available:

Rambo- wouldn't do well here.

Meet The Spartans - I wouldn't have played it anyway and Fox wanted full shows?!

National Treasure 2 - I decided not to play this for now, maybe not at all. Based on general trends and especially how I Am Legend did these kind of films just don't seem to be what people want to see at Western Film.

Persepolis- This is the kind of film that can do well here. I'm hoping it's like Kite Runner and I'm pleasantly surprised and does better than I think it will. It could also bomb.

For the late show I decided to do a bit of an experiment and put in Cloverfield. We'll see if everyone who wanted to see it already saw it. I'll probably have to put up signs about the queasy-cam aspect of the film, some people can't take the shaking camera and get motion sickness.

New Feature on Coming Soon page of website.

I get a lot of people asking whether we are going to play particular films. Mostly the smaller films that didn't play in the first run theatres. Sometimes it's a film that playing at another theatre and the person wants to know if they can wait until it comes here or should go see it there.

In response I added something new to the bottom of the coming soon page of the website. A list of films and their status as to whether they will play at Western Film. There's 4 categories, Will Play, Will Probably play, will Probably Not play and Won't play. Films will likely move around between categories as time goes on, mostly down the list.

Some people will probably want to know whether films that have just come out or are going to come out soon will play so they know whether they should wait. I'm not listing films like that since it's too hard to know until we see how the critics and audience respond to the film. I had fully planned to play Cloverfield until it came out.

Hopefully I won't get in the situation where a film I listed as Will Play doesn't for some reason. You'll notice that list is pretty small.

This week's Movies ( a little late)

I realized I hadn't posted my usual what and why I booked next week post. These movies started yesterday but I'll pretend that hasn't happened for the post.

This is one of the hardest weeks of the year to book. It all falls in Slack Week so I don't want to play anything the students want to see as most of them aren't here. For example if Juno had been available this week I would have said no. For this week I try to play films that is of more interest to adults and/or we've already played.

There were Three new movies available.

Cloverfield - I've been really undecided on playing this one. It had a lot of hype and was interesting. It really seemed to polarize people as to who liked it and who didn't. However the steep drops in grosses after the first weekend signify it might be one of those films that everyone who wanted to see it already has. In any case I wouldn't play it this week since the students aren't here. If I have an late show opening in the next couple weeks I might put it in. After There Will be Blood might work. The late show that week will be about 10pm since Blood is so long and Cloverfield is fairly short. (plus I kinda want to watch it again myself).

Untraceable- medium level thriller, wouldn't have done much here.

The Eye- horror, not something we play.

I thought of a few adult oriented films that we hadn't played. The first one I asked about was I'm Not There but there are no prints available for a couple weeks. The next one I asked about was Before The Devil Knows You're Dead which was available so I booked it in. This is a great little thriller with great performances. It suffers from a lack of awareness so I don't know how it will do. I find it odd that Philip Seymour Hoffman got nominated for Charlie Wilson's War when he did such a better job in Devil.

I was thinking of only playing one show next week since there was no obvious late show. However I wanted to play one to give the staff that are here full shifts. The staff that stayed behind want to work as much as possible this week while they have no school which I completely understand. I figured out once how much a late show needs to make to break even for weeks like this when I need to decide whether to run a late show. It comes up more in the summer. I looked at what we had already played and Sweeney Todd had done fairly well. I decided it would make enough to show for a second week so I booked it in.

27 Dresses should come off soon. Juno, No Country for Old Men, There will be Blood and Atonement should all be coming soon depending on how they do at the Oscars.

Hollywood Double Standards+ American Ones.

I've noticed this before but these are two blatant examples.

THE PATRIOT a film from 2000 starring Mel Gibson. It was about a small band of American rebels led by Mel Gibson against the British during the War of Independence. The movie carefully made the British out to be really bad guys. However if you watch the film the rebels are using basic rebel moves such as ambushes that are used all over the world. Basically, in England the film would have been titled THE TERRORIST.

CHARLIE WILSON'S WAR. Tom Hanks plays a US congressman who arranges aid to the Afghan rebels when the Soviets invaded in the 80's, eventually leading to the Soviet withdrawal. I noticed two things about this film.

Except for one short sequence the Russians are never seen getting killed. It concentrates mostly on equipment such as helicopters being destroyed. The one short sequence with Russians is similar to The Patriot in that the Russians are portrayed as really bad guys.

The US is basically accusing the Iranians of arranging aid to the Afghans currently fighting the Americans in Afghanistan. Therefore the same film could be made from the Iranian point of view at some point in the future.

I'm not saying the Americans are wrong, I just think it's a bit of a double standard.

Why Atonement got cancelled

We had booked in Atonement for the current week. On Friday about Noon I got a phone call at home from our booking office. They wanted to know why our website said we didn't have any shows on Saturday. I told them we had gotten bumped for the Vagina Monologues.
Apparently Westmount was still playing Atonement and complained, they probably weren't happy to begin with that were playing the same film as them. The distributor Alliance wasn't too happy not to have the whole weekend. I told them we do most of our business on Friday, Tuesday, Wed and Thurs and Saturday is relatively quiet.
Alliance pulled the film and wouldn't let us play it. We ended up playing Enchanted for both shows all week.
I've always tried to avoid getting bumped for various other events, especially on certain nights. The Monologues the last couple years took over a Sunday night which I wasn't too worried about. Hopefully this whole situation will be a good argument against getting bumped in the future. Probably not for the Monologues, the Saturday night show was really busy so I imagine they'll want to do it again next year.

Funny Sweded trailer for Be Kind Rewind.

I'm not sure where the term sweded came from. It may actually be referring to the director of Be Kind Rewind Michael Gondry who I think is Swedish? The movie is about 2 guys who create their own versions of films to replace videotapes accidently erased in a video store.

You have to watch or have seen the official trailer for Be Kind Rewind for the sweded version to make sense. It's the first video below.

For some reason this film is getting a really limited release in Canada. I'm not sure if that means it's either weirder than it looks or not as funny as it looks or they just want word of mouth to spread. The director has made some weird films such as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Darn it,

I had this really interesting post ready to go about 2007 in review. Naturally Blooger is broke and pics won't upload. I'll post it later.

First post for 2008.

Boy, I'm behind. Sorry for disappearing like that. Was concentrating on other things for a while. I found myself still writing blog entries in my head so I guess I should get back to it. Part of it was the low numbers of people reading it according to the Google analytics. I suppose I got into a loop where the low readers made me post less which lead to fewer readers. From now on I'm going to post as I want to and not worry about the number of readers.

I'm going to put the link back on the Western Film website with the subtitle ' now updated daily' since I try to always do everything I say I'm going to update it daily as much as possible.

James Waite
Western Film.

Next Week's Movie

Next week was an interesting one to book for. It's the last week before we shut down for the holidays and typically one of the quietest weeks of the year. There were no new movies available which was kinda good since I didn't want to 'waste' one. So it was either bring something back or bring in something I had turned down or look at something a little different. I asked about Love in the Time of Cholera. It was available so I booked it in as one show at 7pm. No late show.

I decided to play the film for a couple reasons: It has more of an adult/art appeal and that crowd is still around when the students are gone. It's also a bit of an experiment to see how we are with the lesser known art films and whether they could do okay.

We'll see how it works.

The first 4 days back after the holidays will probably be American Gangster.

I hope these movies are as funny as they look, Be Kind Rewind and St. Trinians.

The trailers for both these movies are really funny. I've never been a huge fan of Jack Black but he looks well cast in Be Kind Rewind. It opens Jan 25th.




I don't know much about St Trinians. It's a British remake of an old movie. This trailer made me laugh harder than most I've seen recently. Colin Firth is always good and Rupert Everett in drag will probably be priceless. This movie has come out in Britain but I haven't seen a Canadian release date.

Next Week's Movies.

Next week was a little bit hard to decide on. I had already booked in Gone Baby Gone. The only new movie available was Lions for Lambs. I wasn't sure about playing it since it generally didn't do well and the reviews were mixed. However the only options were to bring back movies we had already played like Across the Universe or iffy movies I had passed on like Rendition. I decided to take a chance on Lions. It does have Tom Cruise, Meryl Streep and Robert Redford in it. It didn't do well in the US because they aren't into movies about Iraq but that doesn't necessarily translate to Canada. One thing in the trailer I thought was interesting. Meryl Streep's character observes that the Iraq war has taken longer than WWII. It was basically a toss up as to what order to play them in. I decided to play Lions first because it has more adult interest.

One week left before we close for Holidays. Not sure what will play. I think I might have to get creative.

Goes to show how important Volume is.

My review of Across the Universe wasn't that favourable but for a reason I suspected and mentioned in the review. The volume was too low. I watched it again the first night Western Film played it and was able to put the volume up to where it should have been. The songs gained so much with the higher volume. I ended up really liking the movie.
It's not completely the other theatre's fault, movies are all supposed to be mixed to play at the same volume level however there's usually some variation. When we play a film in DTS digital sound the volume level is usually set at 6.5 -7. For Across The Universe I had to turn it up to 7.6. Most movies at that volume would be blowing people ears out.

Next Week's (this) movies.

I'm a trifle behind as these movies have already started. Monday was an interesting day to book. I had already booked Into the Wild and Gone Baby Gone in because I knew they were available and there wouldn't be anything new coming off. However Across the Universe did more it's first weekend than most movies do all week so it wouldn't have made much sense to drop it. I also wanted to keep it since this is the last week before exams start. I decided to push Gone Baby Gone back a week and play Into the Wild for the first show and keep Across the Universe for the late show. Into the Wild is quite long so Across the Universe doesn't start until 9:55, pretty late for us.

I'm not sure what I'm going to fill the next two weeks with, American Gangster is the only 'big' movie that might come off. Usually in the exam period I try to play comedies or other good exam break movies. I may bring in Shoot 'Em Up for this reason. Or movies that appeal to the adult market that will show up while the students are busy.

My Poster Collection - Zardoz.

This poster is from a bad 70's movie starring Sean Connery. I can't remember exactly what this is but I think it's an Australian poster. It's almost as tall as a regular one sheet but about half the width and folds in three.

I remember buying this poster but I'm not sure why. I guess I figured it might be worth money at some point.

Next Week's Movies

Across the Universe was finally available. I decided to put it in for both shows. This is the last playweek before classes end and the students will start to study for finals. I haven't had this many questions about whether a film was coming since Borat so I expect it to be really busy.

Into The Wild and Gone, Baby Gone were also available. There is basically nothing else to come off so I've booked them in for the following playweek.

I didn't really plan to play Into The Wild but Rainbow did quite well with it and kept it for 4 weeks. We'll see what happens here.

After the next couple weeks I'm not sure what will happen, American Gangster may get pushed off by new films, other than that most films playing now will continue through Christmas.

Movie Review - Beowulf

I've been wanting to see this and finally got to see it plus a bonus. The second trailer for a movie called Cloverfield I've been wanting to see. The first trailer played in front of Transformers. It's some sort of monster movie. The 2nd trailer made it look cool, but predictably still doesn't give a lot of concrete info.

Beowulf was done in an interesting style. It was shot with motion capture technology then animated over. The same technique was used in Polar Express. It still has some of the same problems with the characters looking waxlike. Personally I think they should stick to unfamiliar faces. I didn't recognize the actor that played Beowulf so I didn't have a problem with him but the characters played by Robin Wright and the others I recognized looked weird except for Angelina Jolie, maybe she already looks like a cartoon.

The story was quite interesting. Some people are upset it differs from the original source but I don't know how the story goes so that wasn't a problem for me.

Overall it was a good fantasy film with some epic action scenes. It's showing in some places in 3-D which was obvious sometimes when things were flying at the camera. It was gorier than I thought it would be. It will be playing at Western Film, probably sometime in January. We are only open for 4 more weeks then we shut down for the holidays.

Some interesting films coming out.

I receive the release schedules each distributor puts out. They often go 2 to three years ahead but are usually only accurate for the next few months. Today I got the one for Alliance Films, a Canadian company that distributes for some American distribs as well as Canadian product.

There's some interesting looking stuff coming out. Of course these lists are very subject to change and sometimes aren't right on purpose. Paramount's mystery monster movie that had a short trailer run in front of Transformers doesn't show up on it's release schedule.

No Country For Old Men the newest film from the Coen Brothers which is getting rave reviews and doing huge business in the few theatres it's playing in goes wide on Nov 23rd which means it will probably play in London. I'll be there.

They are distributing a film called Mad Money about three women ( Keaton, Queen Latifah,Katie Holmes, ) who plot to steal the money being taken out of circulation at a bank. It looks funny and open Jan 18th.

Be Kind Rewind- this comedy with Jack Black and Mos Def looks really funny and opens Jan 25.

Some movie called Superhero! starring Leslie Neilsen opens on March 28th. I'm assuming it's one of those parody movies. Let's hope it more like Naked Gun than Scary Movie 4.

Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay- the title says it all. I'll be there Apr 25th.

Sex and The City opens may 30th.

Sometimes you get the generic titles:

Untitled Ice Cube Family Comedy opens Jul 25th. Do you think he's getting typecast?

A film called Scanners is being released on Oct 17th 2008. Given that it's being directed by the guy who did the Blade films and is coming out around Halloween the odds are good it's a horror film and may be a remake of the Canadian film from 1981 directed by David Cronenberg.

The guy who did Supersize Me, the documentary about eating only McDonalds for a month is releasing a documentary called "Where is Osama" sometime in 2008. That could get interesting.

Something called El Superbeasto is being released at a date TBD. It's called an 'adult animation' and being directed by Rob Zombie who did the recent remake of Halloween. It sounds like another film I'll have to turn people away at the theatre who automatically assume animation = kids.

Looks there are some things for movie buffs and theatre runners like me to look forward to.

Blade Runner the Final Cut might be coming to Western Film.

There is a 5 disc DVD set for Blade Runner coming out in December. It includes all the versions of the film including the newest and final version. It includes some digital cleanup of wires and stuff and some scenes were re shot. Most notably the scene where Joanna CassidyAKA the Snake Lady is running away from Deckard. Joanna came back to reshoot some scenes that in the original film it was pretty obvious was a stunt double.

Blade Runner is one of the seminal films of all time. In my film classes it was discussed all the time. I've seen it about 8 times.

To promote the new release the film was released in two theatres in the US, one in LA, one in NY. That was all that was planned initially. The business was astronomical. I heard these showings were digital prints only not 35mm.

Based on how well it did a further roll out was decided on. If you look at the official site there's bookings up until February which is interesting since the DVD comes out Dec 18th.

There is one reason for this. Blade Runner is one of those films that just has to seen on the big screen, the amount of detail and spectacle is astounding.

Initially there were no plans to release it theatrically in Canada but there was enough interest they have brought in 2 prints.

Warner specifically asked if we would be interested in playing it. I honestly don't know how well it would do but I'm willing to take the risk. Maybe I can get the film department to help push it.

I told Warner we would play it in November or early December. After that the students will be busy studying for exams or leaving. Since there's only two prints they may want to play through the bigger cities first.

The interesting question is whether to play it after Christmas and the film has come out on DVD. I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Next Week's Movies

The choice for next week wasn't too difficult. There were some new films available.

30 days of Night- a cool film which was of interest to a lot of the students but strikes me as one that most everybody who wanted to see it has already seen it. That's part of the reason we don't play Horror films any more.

Martian Child- apparently quite a good movie but died a quite horrible death with no promotion.

We Own the Night- I booked this in as the early show. People have been asking about it and I figure it will do quite well.

There wasn't anything obvious to play for the late show. I decided to bring Superbad back for a third week. It did better the second week than the first which is really rare and I heard a lot of students say they wanted to see it but didn't have time. Even if it does half the business it did the second week it would still be worth playing.

Across the Universe was almost available this week so the odds are good it will be available next week.

It's nice to be right.

The playweek that just ended was Elizabeth: The Golden Age and the second week of Superbad. Some people questioned my logic in bringing in Elizabeth since it didn't do that well first run and was generally not that high profile. My experience told me it would do well at Western Film. Mid -range serious films are one of the types of film that do well here. Some also wondered about bringing Superbad back. It did well the first weekend but not enough to keep normally. I book on Monday for the next week so I only have the weekend numbers to judge how I think the film is going to do overall. I decided to keep Superbad because students tend to go more during the week. I knew from my staff and what I had heard other students say that last week was a peak busy time so many wouldn't have time to go to the movie.

So was I right?
Elizabeth did better than most films played at Western Film, even better than the higher end of the range I expected it to fall in.
Superbad did better the second week than the first. Good enough that I may play it again if I there isn't anything good available.

There are always the times I am almost wrong. Like when I almost didn't play Moulin Rouge because I didn't know much about and it turned out to be one of the highest grossing films of that year for Western Film.

My memory is probably being selective but I honestly can't remember ever being really really wrong. There have been many movies that didn't do as well as I expected but not disastrously.

I suppose it'll happen sooner or later.

Roger Ebert

I'm really glad film critic Roger Ebert got over his health problems and is back to writing reviews. Other than scanning headlines the only reviews I read before seeing a film are his. Generally I don't even read his unless I'm not sure if I want to see a film. We almost always agree on how good the film is. His reviews are written in such a way that not too much is given away. One reason I don't read reviews in general is I find they alter my perception of the film. Elements of the film the critic didn't like stand out more than they would have. I prefer to form my own opinion and then read reviews. For some reason Ebert's don't seem to have this affect on me.

An example of the unpredictability of the movie business.

There are general patterns within the movie business and particular to each theatre. Western Film has some general patterns. Movies that cater to adults sell less food, movies that cater to students tend not to do well late show Saturday night etc.

One normal pattern is that the late show on Sunday is pretty dead. Especially if the film hasn't been really busy. Last night my staff figured the late show of Superbad would be quiet so they didn't even bother to make any more popcorn. This is a decision I would have agreed with. Friday and Saturday it did about 30-40 each show. Not bad for the second week of a film. Based on that I would have predicted about 10-15 people for Sunday's show.

Needless to say they were surprised when 77 people showed up.

Movie Review - Michael Clayton

I booked this movie for next week so I thought I'd post my review. I heard a lot of good things about this film. I heard George Clooney did an Oscar caliber performance. It was a really good movie, quite intriguing. I think Tilda Swinton is a great actress so her part was well done. There wasn't anything really exceptional about the film but it was well done and worth watching. The last shot is quite interesting.

My Poster Collection - Pretty Baby

Another poster I got somewhere and probably tried to sell at some point. This film was pretty controversial when it was released as Brooke Shields played a child prostitute. There were also some pics of her in a bathtub and stuff naked but wearing heavy makeup. There was an issue of French Photo magazine that had the pictures inside and on the cover that was worth quite a bit of money pre-internet. There's tons of these on ebay for about $10.00 each.

Next Week's Movies

Next week was a pretty easy choice. There were only 2 new films to choose from.

Rendition- a good film but I'm not sure it would draw any people. I'm keeping it in my reserve.

Michael Clayton - I booked this in for the early show next week. It's one of those serious films that gets a lot of press but not a lot of people go to see first run. It is however one of the kinds of films that Western Film does best with.

I booked The Kingdom in for the late show. It was available last week but I choose to keep Superbad. The Kingdom is more of a late show kind of movie. I'm not sure how it will do.

Still waiting on Across the Universe.

Next Week's Movies

There were three new movies available for next week.

The Heartbreak Kid- bad movie, bombed, got bad word of mouth, better things to play so won't be coming to Western Film.

Elizabeth: The Golden Age- I booked this in for the 7pm show. It didn't do too great first run but it's the kind of film that will play well at the University, or at least, I hope.

The Kingdom - This one I'm holding in reserve for the week after next. It would make a good late show and I decided to keep Superbad as the late show next week.

I decided to keep Superbad for a couple reasons.

-It's been quite busy, busy enough that I probably would have kept it even without the second reason. In 4 days it's done almost as much business as most movies make all week.

- the students are incredibly busy and this week seems to be the peak from what I've heard. I would imagine there are many who want to see the film but don't have time. We actually had people asking if we are going to keep the film another week which is a rare request. It's moving to 9:20.

I figure Across The Universe will come off soon, probably Michael Clayton and Rendition as well. Both are good movies but not doing great commercially.

This one has my vote for weirdest looking movie coming soon.

I happened across this trailer the other day. At first I thought it was a fake trailer put together by a fan but it appears to be a real movie. Sarah Brightman is in it which is cool, she's a opera singer who's best known for being in the stage version of Phantom Of The Opera. She's also released some albums with a mix of opera and pop songs. Apparently Paris Hilton is in it as well. I like the weird ones so I'll be seeing this one if it plays around here.

Movie Review - Rendition

I wasn't sure I wanted to see this movie on the night I went. I wasn't really in the mood for a serious film but I'd seen all the lighter stuff that wasn't complete crap. Fortunately Rendition was a great film that held my interest well without being too depressing. Jake Gyllenhall did a good job as usual. I don't much like Reese Witherspoon but she did okay. Meryl Streep didn't have many scenes but as usual nailed the character. T%he story was interesting if nothing too original, it seemed 'inspired' by the Mahar Arar story. There was one plot point that was really interesting. It was kind of funny since I had thought of it earlier in the film but it didn't seem like the kind of film that would use it. The film isn't doing too well despite it's quality, Roger Ebert gave it 4 stars. People, don't seem to want to see movies serious movies about Iraq, Terrorism etc. In the Valley of Elah suffered a similar fate. Rendition will probably play at Western Film. It's a fairly high profile film with some well known stars.

Fun stuff- The Wilhelm Scream.

You've all heard it but maybe didn't realize how often. Below is Roger Ebert's explanation and a link to a wonderful video on youtube. Someone went through 175 films and condensed all the Wilhelm screams into one video. It gets a bit much after a couple minutes but it's neat nonetheless. There's yet another one below it.

BY ROGER EBERT FILM CRITIC / July 6, 2007

Q. I came across a mention of "The Wilhelm Scream" on Movie City News. Had never heard of it before, but apparently I've heard it -- lots.Laura Hunt, Chicago

A. So have we all. According to Hollywoodlostandfound.net, in Raoul Walsh's "Distant Drums" (1951), screams were recorded for a scene where a man is dragged under by an alligator. The scream was re-used in many other Warner Bros. films, including "Them!" and "PT-109."Sound effects man Ben Burtt noticed that the scream kept turning up, the site says, and "a few years later, when Burtt was hired to create sound effects for "Star Wars" (1977), he had an opportunity to do research at the sound departments of several movie studios. While at Warner Bros. looking for sound elements to use in the space adventure, he found the original "Distant Drums" scream, which he called "Wilhelm" after the character who let out the scream in "Charge at Feather River." Ben adopted the scream as a kind of personal sound signature, and included it in all the "Star Wars" and "Indiana Jones" films, and many of the other films he has worked on including "More American Graffiti" (1979) and "Willow" (1988).Not surprisingly, it has appeared in two Tarantino films, "Batman" films and "Lord of the Rings "films. Wilhelm Scream fans think it's likely the original was screamed by actor Sheb Wooley.

My Poster Collection - E.T.

This is an original folded one-sheet for what was for a while the highest grossing film of all time. I never liked the movie much, not sure why I have the poster. movieposter.com has a rolled one for $300. If it's real it's pretty rare to find a rolled poster from that period. They have one about the same shape as mine for $80.00

Movie Review - The Heartbreak Kid

This film looked so promising. It reunited the team that brought us There's Something about Mary which I would consider a minor comedy classic. The premise looked interesting. However overall the movie wasn't very good. It was only sporadically funny and some of the jokes were really forced. Ben Stiller was Ben Stiller as usual but started to get on my nerves more than usual. Until I saw it (and read the reviews) there was no question whether this film would play at Western Film but now I don't think it will. It's a well-known movie with a fairly big star but it's got that bad movie vibe so I don't think it would do well at Western Film. I'd maybe play it if there's nothing else available that week.

Movie Review - Eastern Promises

This is the new film from director David Cronenberg starring Viggo Mortensen who was was also in Cronenberg's last film A History of Violence. The film is a bit slow but has really well developed characters. Viggo does great job of making his character truly scary. There was one plot twist that I saw coming. It's also extremely violent in a very realistic way that some people won't like. One of it's best known parts is a several minute fight seen in a sauna with Viggo totally naked. It was an interesting choice. They avoided the movie cliche of him wearing a towel which miraculously never falls off. There's also an extra dimension showing the vulnerability of the naked body. It was edited in such a way that Viggo's 'bits' as the British call them were not shown much. I booked it for next week so it's going to play at Western Film.

Next Week's Movies

Next week wasn't too hard to book. There were 4 new movies available.

-Resident Evil 3- a fun movie but not the kind of film that does well at Western Film.

Sydney White - aimed at young girls, too young to be students.

Superbad - finally, I booked it in, if it doesn't do really well I'll be truly shocked. The only thing that may reduce the numbers is how busy the students are with mid-terms etc.

Eastern Promises - I booked this in as the late show. It sorta should have been an early show because of it's serious nature and cinephile appeal because it's directed by David Cronenberg. However it's really violent so the art crowd may not come anyway. Violent movies usually make for good late shows.

The next movie I expect to do well is Across the Universe. Not sure what else will be played soon, most of the films coming out recently, especially serious ones, haven't been doing too well.

Movie Review - Elizabeth The Golden Age.

I'm way behind on my movie reviews so I'm going to do a bunch of short ones to catch up.

Elizabeth I was really looking forward to, I remember the first one being really good, I'm pretty sure it was the first time most people had heard of Cate Blanchett. The new one was not as good as I expected but was still good. Cate was really good, I see possible Oscar nomination. The sets and wardrobes were the most spectacular part of the film. I found it similar to the first film in having a hard time following the story. I also got the impression I was supposed to know things and recognize people I didn't, possibly from the first movie. Still worth watching. it will be playing at Western Film.

Next Week's Movies

I'm a little behind on this post since these movies started earlier today. On Monday there were some new movies available.


3:10 To Yuma,- good film, not a lot of press but good word of mouth. Surprisingly has the highest gross of any movie released in the fall. (after Labour Day)





Good Luck Chuck- Wasn't a bad movie but people heard it was bad so it wouldn't have done well. In general these 'stupid' comedies don't do well at Western Film any more.

Mr Bean. - Not enough interest.

I decided to play Yuma for the 7:00 show but was a bit unsure about the late show. I checked on a couple films that I thought would make good late shows. Eastern Promises was holding at the Silver City. The Hyland was keeping Shake Hands with the Devil.





I ended up booking one of my reserve films, The Nanny Diaries. I figured it could do well since it didn't do too bad first run and while it didn't get a lot of good buzz it didn't get a lot of bad buzz either. Plus as I've said before, films aimed at women are very popular at Western Film. It could be a bomb though. Probably has a better chance of doing well than Good Luck Chuck which actually grossed more first run.

Superbad may be coming sooner than I expected. Sony usually put 2 weeks between first and second run but our Booker said they have been moving it straight over in many markets. So there is a possibility it might come next week.

PS. I'm writing this post Late Friday night after the first showings of these films and I'm glad to report that it looks like Nanny was a good gamble, it did quite well. Yuma did better than I expected which was nice. We'll see how the week plays out.

Next Week's Movies

There were a couple good choices this week. The Bourne Ultimatum and The Brave One. Mr. Woodcock was also available but we aren't going to play that one. I think there was something else but it was so off the radar I can't even remember. The only minor decision was which one to play first. Being a more serious movie I would normally have put The Brave One at 7pm. Also Jodie Foster is popular among older women who tend not to go to the late show. Bourne really needed to be the early show because it was so much more popular though. I'm hoping enough people will want to see The Brave One to go to the late show.

About the only big movie I'm waiting on is Superbad. There's better movies opening in the next little while so things should start to come off. This weekend alone has Michael Clayton, Elizabeth: The Golden Age and We Own the Night.

Poster of the Week - There will Be Blood.

This poster is for an upcoming movie that looks really good and has already got a lot of press. It's called There Will be Blood and it stars Daniel Day-Lewis and was directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. I've never understood the appeal of Day-Lewis, everyone seems to think he's this great actor, on the other hand I've never been much impressed by Marlon Brando who is supposed to the greatest actor ever.

I do like Paul Thomas Anderson though. He did Boogie Nights and the magnificently twisted Magnolia.

The story is about family, greed, religion, and oil, centered around a turn-of-the-century Texas prospector (Daniel Day-Lewis) in the early days of the business. It sounds fascinating. It's scheduled for release Dec 26th.

My Poster Collection - Condorman

Yet another poster for a silly movie no one has ever heard of. I think I got this poster out of a selection of 500 random posters Western Film bought from a dealer back when we bought posters to sell. The only significant thing about the poster/movie is that Michael Crawford starred in it. About the time I got the poster he was pretty big because he was playing The Phantom of The Opera in either Toronto or London England.

Movie Review - Across the Universe

When I first saw the the trailer for Across the Universe I had two thoughts. I want to see this movie and it's going to be one of those movies where some people will really like it and others won't 'get' it. I was right on the second point and I pretty much didn't get it. However other people have really liked it so this is one movie where a person really has to make up their own mind. I heard some of the other people in the audience as we left saying how much they liked it.

If I had to sum up the film in one sentence it would be Rent with Beatles songs.

I liked the movie but not as much as I thought I would, the story was interesting and I thought it was creative the way they intertwined the names, characters and story lines of various Beatles's songs. Part of the reason I didn't like it as much is my personal preferences as far as music goes. I tend to like faster music with a beat and music that reaches a crescendo or some sort of energy level. The songs in the film seemed to be slowed down and never got above a certain energy level that I wanted. Honestly it could just have been the volume was too low though. The visual sequences were quite wild and personally, I think the movie may have been designed to be watched while stoned.

As an example of the music issue I have embedded the trailer below. I like the part where it reaches a crescendo just after Hey Jude starts. The original song does something similar. However the movie doesn't.

This film will most likely be playing at Western Film. I think there will be enough people who want to see it and it's the kind of movie some people will want to see more than once.

Next Week's Movies

The decision for next week was pretty easy. There wasn't anything new available. I still had Stardust waiting and Fox finally let me split Die Hard so I booked those two in. However I don't expect either to be really busy with Thanksgiving weekend.

Bourne Ultimatum should come off soon. Then there's the more iffy ones like Mr. Bean and Nanny Diaries.