Here is this weeks 'Thought of the Week' from our resident whino, Mr James Assinder (You're gonna regret calling me the 'editor from hell' mate, i'll cut your already-minimal salary)
From The
Silver Screen To The Grotty Picture House, The Fantastic Journey Of The Hollywood
Blockbuster
I have been
reliably informed by the one that they call Quiff that, I don’t know how many
of you or how many lines of crack cocaine you had had, some of you read the
first instalment of the Assinder report as it has come to be known. I therefore
came to the conclusion, under a certain amount of pressure from Quiff, the
editor from hell, that I should enthral you all with another page of worthless
drivel. As with AR#1 as I will now be calling it, I had many psychological
battles with myself over what the topic could be. I was relying on Quiff to
give me a topic for my second piece but I can’t be arsed waiting for him to
pull his finger out and reply to my e-mail so I’m just going to go ahead and
write whatever the hell I want. I ultimately, after many hours of conversing
with myself decided that today I would talk to you guys about another of life’s
great mysteries… the cinema.
Movies. It is a
word that conjures up many wonderful images in our minds. Images of Gene Kelly
singing in the rain, tap tapping on the sidewalk or of Marlon Brando with
an over-sized chin reminding us of the need to respect his family. Alternatively,
for those of you who are into the new crap that Hollywood produces, it may
conjure up images of Tom Cruise attempting to take on both Cameron and Penelope
or of Leonardo DiCaprio crying in the rain having just shot the hell out of
John Leguizamo. The truth of the matter is, the closest that we, the general
public will ever get to these wonderful images is the local cinema.
If anyone, it seems very unlikely, from outside of the North Wales area is
reading this then I cannot see things from your point of view and I apologise
in advance if you have the kind of cinema that a reasonable human being would
actually want to go to. Where we North Walesish people live, the terrible
decision that faces us is whether to grace Llandudno Cineworld with our presence
or whether to take the shorter and more enjoyable trip to the new, refurbished
world of wonder that is UCI Bangor. Either way, I think that you will agree,
there are more pleasurable things in life than spending 2-3 hours in a pigsty
that makes the service in hell look like a five star hotel. I believe the
experience is worsened by three main factors, namely people, food and legroom.
Let’s begin with people. Firstly, let me get one thing straight, I have no
problem with the couple groping in the back row, I have no problem with the
two old biddies that sit munching on mint humbugs and pear drops, I even have
no problem with kids who insist on kicking the back of chairs in a vain plea
for the last thread of their parents’ attention. I do have a problem with
the annoying cider-drinking, hub cap-stealing, skinhead youths that insist
on sitting in the very front row making as much noise as is humanely possible
as if they were announcing the fact that the light brigade had recovered from
their first charge and were about to take another go. I may seem naïve but
I fail to comprehend the reasoning behind paying an extortionate amount of
money to go into a dark room to not watch a film, perhaps someone out there
can explain the allure. I also have some issues with the employees of cinemas,
again, I apologise if you are an employee of a cinema, you may be an anomaly.
Generally though, the owners of cinemas feel that it is a good idea not to
employee people who either know something about or give a damn about films.
Instead, they employ people who wouldn’t know a Scorsese movie from a Christopher
Columbus picture and think that Luc Besson was an artist in Renaissance France.
I don’t mean to sound picky; they may have been employed because of their
wonderful customer service skills (only if scowling is the new smiling). All
I want is to be able to go to the ticket desk and to say to the tousle-haired
miscreant ‘what would you recommend?’ and for them to be able to tell me the
plus points of some of the films that they are showing instead of grumbling
incoherently before proceeding to say ‘well, you gonna buy summat or wot?’
1 down, 2 to go, bear with me. Secondly, a major concern of mine is the issue
of food in cinemas. I have no problem with the general appetising nature of
the food on offer except for the toffee popcorn with non-existent toffee and
the Coke that is 1 part Coke and 11 parts water. I do have a problem with
the prices, especially when they are combined with the cinema staff (don’t
get me started on them again) confiscating any food that has been purchased
at a regular retail outlet, forcing you to shell out for stuff from the refreshments
counter. Either that or sit through the film in a non-air conditioned room
with no drink and no food to take your mind off what is going on on-screen.
It is a terrible situation and I think that we, as the future of this great
nation should take a moral stand and refuse to pay over the odds just to put
an extra buck in the pocket of some fat cat. We have the power; we must wield
it.
Almost there, permit me just to rant about legroom for a second. I resent
the fact that cinema owners are clearly of the opinion that people in North
Wales have very short legs and therefore do not need the legroom that we deserve.
I do not see why we are made to suffer the sling and arrows of outrageous
deep vein thrombosis because some guy who clearly couldn’t organise a proverbial
piss-up in a brewery didn’t have the common sense to put the seats far enough
apart.
Anyway, I had 3 exams today, which irritated me. I have now released the pent-up
aggression that I had and am ready to go back to my calm life of Buddhism,
self-improvement books and hypnosis tapes. Thank you for taking some of your
valuable time to read this, I know that you are all busy planning the best
way to becoming masters of your own destinies. Good luck to you all, I hope
we can speak again soon.
If, unlike last time, you have any comments, e-mail and share them
James [email protected]
Quiff [email protected]
p.s. For those of you who are wondering ‘when in the hell did that happen?’ the four movies that were mentioned were ‘Singing In The Rain’, ‘The Godfather’, ‘Vanilla Sky’ and ‘William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet’. I do not own the Copyrights to any of these movies so I am using their names illegally. Thankfully, Quiff will be the one who gets the blame and I, like Ronnie Biggs, will get away with no convictions whatsoever.
Wow, yet again, taking 'creative' journalism to the point of no return; that was this weeks Assinder Report. If you're a newcomer to this rather bizarre persons musings, please feel free to read last weeks exciting instalment Here