Wish I'd Seen It!

Unlike last night's Oscars show, which was pretty my lacking in any entertainment, I wish I could say I have seen "The Hurt Locker". But I didn't, and the odds are you didn't either. It only grossed about $21M, which is about what Avatar did in it's first weekend at my local theater.

So, bravo for the academy voters for not making the same mistake they did with James Cameron's previous Oscar winner, the dreadful "Titanic". They chose a movie that they thought was the best, paying no attention to the ticket sales. And a big "BOOOOO" to Hollywood in general for not putting any money into the marketing of the winner. And another big "BOOO" to the theaters, for running a system where good films only last about a week if they aren't doing big box office.

Here in Boulder we now have only one theater, with 16 screens. This sucks. Before this theater opened, we had an art film house across the street from where it opened. I likely would have had a chance to see "The Hurt Locker" there. But it closed when the new theater opened, as did every other theater in town. So, now we have one high tech theater that shows mostly big budget crap, and have to go to Denver or wait for Netflix to see the stuff that doesn't appeal to the masses. And we can just forget about seeing a documentary if we don't want to go to Denver (the exception is "The Cove", which won best doc last night, and was made by Boulderites). I find it astounding that a city as educated and ....well, different...as Boulder can not support an indy theater.

Hopefully, "The Hurt Locker" will reappear in theaters now. In the mean time....Please Landmark Theaters, open another place in Boulder! I promise to go every week. I'll even stop sneaking in my own beer and M&M's.