Last Friday I was surprised to find so many people at the mall in the middle of the afternoon.  Since my calendar was free for this afternoon I decided to use the time for a little research.  (Research sounds a lot more official than goofing off.)  Since there were so many people at the mall on a weekday afternoon, I wanted to see if the same was true for other things that don’t seem to be work related.  That seems like enough justification for spending an afternoon at the movies, not to mention the fact that I just felt like going to the movies.

It seems that going to the movies does not rate on the same level as hanging at the mall.  It was quite a nice surprise to find that I was one of less than ten people in the theatre.  I didn’t have to worry about those late people (you know who you are) stepping on my feet or spilling their drink on me as they searched for those last two seats which are always in the middle of the row.  Truly I was doing my part to stimulate the economy by pumping a little money into the capitalistic pipeline.  I went to the Regal Natomas Marketplace 16 theatre for the matinee at 3:00PM.  The theatre looked nice and clean and there were even paper towels in the restroom.  Although I’m not sure what that slight odor was in the hallway, maybe someone burned the popcorn.  Speaking of popcorn, I wanted the full experience so I got a medium drink and medium popcorn which cost a total of $11.75.  Hard to believe that stuff cost more than the ticket which was only $6.50 since it was before 5:00PM, I think it is $8.00 in the evening.  I usually don’t indulge like that for the whole experience, well maybe not the whole experience since I skipped the Milk Duds, but remember this sacrifice was in the name of research.

Movie Review

My research was going well until the movie actually started.  I guess I did learn a couple of things even though I was a little disappointed I had to spend money to learn them.  First thing is you can never trust Ebert and Roeper or any of those other official movie reviewers.  I think they probably spend too much time in the dark and need a little sunshine and fresh air to help the blood get flowing to the brain.  If you can’t tell, I read the reviews before I chose to see “Burn After Reading“.  And the second thing I learned is just because George Clooney and Brad Pitt are easy to look at doesn’t mean things always work out when they are on screen together.  All those Ocean’s things eleven through twenty seemed to work, even if the plot was a little thin, but this “Burn After Reading” one really should have been burned before it made it to the theatre.  There were a few funny moments if you don’t miss them when you doze off.  Actually I was having flashbacks to “Weekend With Bernie” (another not so favorite movie froma a few years back) so I might have missed a couple.

Brad Pitt

George Clooney

 Never the less I would say that my research was quite successful.  If you find a movie that really does live up to that official four star rating it would be well worth your while to work overtime on the weekend and take time off to spend your Monday afternoon at the movies.  It’s not crowded so you can have your pick of seats and you can save a couple of bucks with the afternoon price, and if the movie isn’t very exciting it’s nice and dark so you can take a nap.  Don’t tell anyone what a deal it is though or the crowds will be at the movies instead of the mall in the afternoon.  Any suggestions for my next research project let me know.  I think I’m on to something, now if I could just get someone to pay me for all this valuable research.  Who do those Ebert and Roeper guys work for anyway?