Without a second-thought I will go to a movie theatre by myself, totally undeterred by the social stigma of such actions. This is partly because when I want to see a movie, I want to see it now–I’m not waiting until later when others can join me.
There is another reason for my solo treks into the land of Sour Patch Kids, though. I have always considered watching a film a personal experience, which usually translated into a private one. As far as I have been concerned, watching a movie involves three elements:
- projected image
- sound
- audio/visual receptor (me)
This leaves out the contextual relationships (settings, political climate, etc.) from which a movie’s meaning is derived, but that’s not what this post is about. I am discussing the direct experience of watching a movie.
My mind started changing about the elements involved awhile ago and I have been struggling to find the reason. For lack of a better phrase, I’ll call it the NETFLIXIFICATION of movies (a word that currently returns zero results only this page from a Google search). When I first joined that mail order DVD company, it was so that I could see every great film I desired. Just think, $15/month and a new or old classic every day. Right now my queue has 135 discs in it (plus 12 that are not currently available on DVD) just waiting to hop into my player and take part in that image/audio/me trifecta.
Most of them will never get the chance. To alter one of my favorite Home Simpson quotes,
“In theory [Netflix] works. In theory.”
He was talking about Communism, but the flaw in my doctrine shares a central axis. Whereas Communism depends too much on people’s harmonious nature and shared ideals, my Netflixism ignored the importance of THE MASSES.
The films on my queue include many of the same that I originally added back in 2005. The TV shows, however, get watched and returned immediately. I love sitting by myself on a couch watching the first season of 30 ROCK but can’t psych myself up to watch THE BIG SLEEP. Much of this has to do with a larger than life medium being squeezed onto a 27″ screen, but I have come to believe that’s only part of the problem. (David Lynch has of course addressed this topic more passionately, more humorously, and more succinctly than I.)
Really though, I think the problem with watching a movie at home relates back to a common theme in technology, Isolationism in the guise of freedom.
Tune in soon to learn how my crumbling beliefs played out in the real world —