"Imagine: This fragile print has already been run through one of those antique film-destroying mechanical projector things at least 8 times and it hasn't been ruined yet!! Take that Steven Soderbergh! (Don't tell Steven that reels 4 & 5 both had that wavy rolling line thing for a few seconds, or that reel 5 seemed to have soft focus but the rest of the movie was razor sharp)."

I must have missed something somewhere. What does Steven Soderbergh have to do with Spiderman?

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I decided to wait until a weeknight to see this movie because I figured the theatres would be crazily busy on the weekend nights for this particular movie. Some people from work wanted to go, so on the spur of the moment, we did.

After reading all of the positive reviews, I wasn't as impressed with the movie as I thought I'd be. As a computer scientist, I looked closely at the spider web graphics at the beginning of the film to see if I could notice any aliasing when strands of web went nearly horizontal on the screen. I did not notice any, although I was sitting in the next to last row.

As for the Peter Parker character, it was obvious to me that he was the character I should sympathize with and pull for in the film, but a few of the things he did made me wonder, like when he got mad at his uncle and told him to stop pretending to be his father. The way the movie ended surprised me (and got some "what the hell?" type of responses from the audience as well).

As for the presentation quality, it was excellent, but this was the worst theatre experience I've ever had due to all of the talkers, seat kickers, and cell-phone users sitting all around our group. Both the row behind us and the row in front of us were full of people of a certain characteristic that is not PC to mention that talked during the entire movie non-stop. At times, I missed movie dialog because their talking was louder. We were outnumbered by these people and were in no good position to ask them to stop talking. These people frequently hit our seats with their feet and put their feet on the top of the seats beside me. Every now and then, a cell phone would go off and I'd hear one of them having a conversation on the phone. If I were the type of person that only went to the theatre every few months, after this experience, I would likely have never had a desire to go to a theatre again. Fortunately, I know that this extreme case is the exception rather than the rule.

Another weirdness about this visit: From a previous showing, I'd been given an "emergency ticket" and was told there were no restrictions on it (as I've always been told when given one of these). I tried to use it and was told "We're not taking these for this movie yet." I guess "No restrictions" does not mean "no restrictions".

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Evans A Criswell
<A HREF="http://hsvmovies.com/" TARGET=_blank>Huntsville-Decatur Movie Theatre Information Site</A>

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Greg Mueller
Amateur Astronomer, Machinist, Filmnut http://www.muellersatomics.com/

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David and Evans,

why didn't you get an usher to boot them out? or at least tell them to be quiet?

This theatre still shows 35mm trailers to the lobby area using a rear-projection screen.

I make no bones about telling people like that to shut the PHUG Up!, literally, and have almost been into a few fights because of it.

As for spiderman, the movie was ok...and that's about it. I didn't 'relate' with the main character, everything that happened to him did not effect me in anyway. But, you have to give it some credit, it is based on the comic and they kept it that way. For example, the cheezy effects while spiderman is swinging from building to building looked quite comedic to me.

If anyone takes offense at my statements, I ask them to look up the stats on shootings in and around movie theatres, and correlate those shootings to the type of film showing at the time. Facts speak for themselves. Folks may be afraid and bury their heads when PC issues arise, but when there is an issue that affects patron perception and even patron safety, it deserves to be brought forward in a matter-of-fact manner without fearing either PC hushing or blatent racist rhetoric.

A true "hood" black audience at an action film simply has to be experienced firsthand. Think of "Rocky Horror" interaction with the screen characters, customers changing seats, and multiple unrelated conversations going on at the same time and you'll get the beginning of understanding of what it is like. Short of calling in police and alienating most of the audience, there is nothing that can be done to change the behavior of such a group enough to satisfy the average (in this case minority) moviegoer. In these situations, the movie is simply a meeting place, and has far less significance than the social interactions that occur. Anglos needn't feel superior, there are plenty of white counterpart activities, sports events, and even soccer riots being examples.

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A true "hood" black audience at an action film simply has to be experienced firsthand. Think of "Rocky Horror" interaction with the screen characters, customers changing seats, and multiple unrelated conversations going on at the same time and you'll get the beginning of understanding of what it is like.

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That's a pretty good description of what was going on in the row in front of our group and the row behind our group, on a small scale. The people were reacting out loud to many things happening in the movie and "talking back" to the characters, as well as having their own conversations and occasionally talking on cell phones. If everyone in the audience does this same thing, then there really is no problem. It's only annoying to people that do not treat a moviegoing experience as a big social gathering. Several of my friends say that getting a group together to go to a movie is usually fun, but is not a good social gathering because there isn't a good way for people to interact. If our group had been in the middle of a group similar to ours and we started talking back to the characters and having our own conversations, I'll bet we'd get thrown out.

The seniors down here don't move around as much, but they can be just as offensive in their own way.