Do I hate the theater? Or do movies just suck now?

I've seen four movies at the theater in the last few weeks:

The Departed
The Prestige
Casino Royale
Flags of Our Fathers

Now, I really liked The Departed and Casino Royale, but I absolutely HATED The Prestige and Flags. My percentage used to be so much higher than 50% positive. Both movies that I could not stand have been getting decent reviews and people that I know and (for the most part) respect their opinions about movies liked both.

So, that got me to thinking... is the act of seeing a movie at the theater sullying my experience? Or were the movies just bad and everyone else is stupid? We all have our opinions, so I can't give an iron clad answer, but right now I'm going for the second one.

There were no real disturbances in the theater when I saw The Prestige, and I really wanted to like it, having loved Nolan's earlier movies. And I did, up until about the last 45 minutes. At that point in the movie I can just imagine the writers table whence they were constructing this pile of crap:

[SPOILER]
"Oh noes! I've constructed this engaging plot but have no way of getting out of it cleanly."
"I know! Clones! Yeah, let's have clones all up in this piece."
"AWESOME. AWESOME TO THE MAX. And then we can end the movie without explaining anything, so that people have discussions about what happened, which will make them think they liked it because it was a mind bender."
[/SPOILER]

As for Flags, I did have a bevy of jickwad assfaces around me putting their feet on MY row and commenting on the movie, but even if I had been alone in the theater, that movie still would have sucked. Let us count the ways:

1. Incredibly bad acting for such a big budget/acclaimed movie, and as a result I felt no connection to any of the characters and could care less if/when they died. Ryan Phillipe was the medic in this movie, and more or less the main character, but Giovanni Ribissi (sp?) was so much better in that role in Saving Private Ryan.
   
2. The war scenes were edited terribly. They showed the same shot over and over and over again, and it wasn't even a cool shot.
   
3. Tear jerking moments that would fail to draw a tear from anyone except people who were actually on Iwojima. I've never seen so many attempts at an emotional moment fall so flat. At least Titanic did that right.
   
4. And their main foul up was the gross misuse of Barry Pepper in a WWII movie. I'm sure there's a rule somewhere stating that whether or not he dies, he should be the coolest character in the movie.

So I don't know what to think. After putting all my thoughts down, I think I hate The Prestige a little less than Flags, if only because I could only come up with one reason to hate it. Even if it was the prestige of the movie (the third act/reveal, i.e. the most important part).

Maybe a little Tony Scott seizure material will right the ship. Anyone up for Deja Vu?

I've never thought about it like this...

"While I suppose that most of the carbon in America's favorite fossil fuel is botanical in origin, it's easier to get a gut feel for unrenewability by considering dinosaurs."

This is funny.

If I were on the phone with TBS asking if this was funny, I think they'd say, "Yeah, kinda."

High security as Pope arrives in Turkey

P.S. I mean only the headline, not the actual article. Because, obviously, it's not about the Pope arriving inside of a turkey, as the headline might imply.

Oh holiday sales, how I loath thee...

Well, I'm not normally one to gripe about spending money, but I've gotta say, I kinda wish I could have saved close to $800 on my new TV. Is that much money worth the price haggling demons that cruise these sales on Black Friday? Can't say for sure as I've never been, but I could use another TV for my living room...

Almost got me there...

Dear Lost,

Nice fake-out. You honestly had me thinking that you were going to do something new. Silly me.

I should know better. I might be spoiling a few things by saying this, but I was really feeling Kate's helplessness at that recent climactic moment. Now, had you actually gone through with it, I might have continued seeing you. Since you're now on Holiday Vacation, maybe that will give me time to get you out of my head. I just think we need to take a break or I might do something stupid like watch the Nine, and neither of us want that. (Honestly, does anyone really like that show?). Perhaps we'll meet again down the road when your storyline has matured.

Waiting patiently,
Nick

So sick...

I've had a debilitating cough for over a week now. That's normal right?

Nerd Alert. Population - me.

I had a "pow-wow" with my boss today, and as a side note, he made me aware of a presentation about video conferencing over the internet that I could/should attend. We then went on to discuss how Star-Trekian it would be to talk to clients this way.

Strike 1.

Me: "Yeah, now all we need is to be able to teleport."

My Boss: "I'm working on it, Coldfusion [can do amazing things]."

Me: "cfteleport*, value=me."

Glorious laughter.

Strike 2.

And now blogging about it.

Steeeerike 3! Nerd out!

* Coldfusion is a tag based server-side web programming language, where all the tags start with the prefix of "cf," hence the laughter. Yikes, I think I just put the next batter in an 0-1 hole with this addendum.

Lost? Yeah, me too.

During nearly the entire second season of Lost, I repeatedly told anyone who would listen that there was, "NOTHING HAPPENING, EVER!" Well, my feelings haven't changed that much, with the start of the new season. I'm especially put off at the "we promise something will happen in the next two episode" promos that have been airing.

I bet something will happen, and I bet it won't advance a story that's been going in circles for over a year now. Well, it turns out that someone finally agrees with me. Feel free to comment/argue that the show is going somewhere, I'd love to have another reason (besides Evangeline Lilly) to keep watching.