Feminist Film / Media Studies

You know it's been awhile since I've gone to the theatre, and I rarely rent. I have only a small laptop screen to watch on, and I find the experience uncomfortable. Mostly I wait until that nostalgic flick comes back to the uptown theatre, Back to the Future or some Tarintino reel and I'll ask a friend to go. If some auteur who has managed to gain his or her way into my heart, such as Kaufman, the Cohen Bros, Terry Gilliam, Wes Anderson, and the lot come out with a new movie, I may watch it if it comes highly regarded. Mostly I don't have patience for them. The amount of times I've walked out of a theatre feeling like no better of a person, only to think of the things I could have done instead has caused me to be weary of the movie as media in general. I'm hoping this class can help make it interesting again. We do currently have cable television at my house but I've been lobbying for awhile to get rid of it. I never watch it and it seems a waste of money. Mostly, when I watch anything, it's The Twilight Zone episodes I have on DVD that I got from a friend who was moving to China and wished to live lighter in general.

Posted by Douglas Young at 12:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The radio is my main conscious exposure to media. Commercial media bothers me, consequently, I tend to tune toward stations with less commercials. KFAI and MPR stations do all right; However, my current favorite station is KMOJ, 98.9 "The Peoples Radio." They play a lot of R&B and some rap. I especially enjoy the weekends when they play older hip-hop and even some fusion and funk. One of my favorite things about the station, besides their rarely redundant play list, is their choice of commercials. With one exception, an ad for a music venue, I have never heard them advertise anything except public services and public safety information. For example, while MPR tells you be whom their commercial free radio is supported, KMOJ will let you know how important it is to breast feed your baby, wonderful!

Continue reading "Remember the wall screens from Fahrenheit 451?" »

Posted by Michael Kirk at 12:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I love the megaplex. The smell of new seats (the giant, stadium variety) coupled with tacky carpeting, cliché classic Hollywood paraphernalia and enormous snack counters brings me to a place that must be close to that elusive Heaven. The megaplex, to me, is the absolute best thing about being an American consumer. My love of the megaplex is negated only by the fact that I dislike most Hollywood movies, resulting in a twice-yearly trip at most. I should mention that I love art-house cinemas just as much, though nothing quite beats the delicious enormity of a consumer-laden giant. I go to the smaller theaters much more frequently, mostly the Landmark and independent varieties. I go to these theaters at least once a month to see a new film. I prefer independent films to “Hollywood� films, if just for plot and originality’s sake.

Continue reading "Ah, The Megaplex!" »

Posted by Anna at 11:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My partner and I are looking at two bedroom apartments this Friday. It seems we need a separate room to store my TV, my DVD collection, and my computers (I get the feeling my red couch will end up in there too). Right now, I just don't use the TV too often-- when it's homework time (which is pretty much always) I put on my headphones and keep my noise to myself and my desk. I keep my four-at-a-time from Netflix constantly flowing, trading recommendations with my best friends (including my Mom and 14 year old sister). I've seen almost 1000 movies that I can remember. Childhood (before age 12 or 13) viewing is still, for the most part, hard to trace.

I try to find directors and check out as much of their filmography as I can. If I can't find it on Netflix...

Continue reading "Compulsory Consumption" »

Posted by moviesofmyself at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I love going to the movies. That being said, I don’t go all that often. It probably boils down to about 3 times a month that I visit my local theatre. It isn’t an even rush throughout the year though. I tend to see a lot more movies in December and January as I am a bit of a snob and like to check out the indie and award baiting films that all hit mid-winter. I do however enjoy a good popcorn movie in an air-conditioned multiplex on a humid summer afternoon.

Continue reading "Consumption" »

Posted by CGM at 11:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I’m a couch potato. I watch WAY too many movies and TV. I rent from Netflix, usually the harder to find movies I watch come from there such as independent and foreign films, I live three blocks from a really cool movie theater that only has two screens, relatively cheap, they show smaller budget movies and really popular new releases. So I go to the theater sometimes, but not as much as I’d like to. I also have on demand from Comcast which means I get to watch lots of really old movies (they’re the free ones). But mainly I watch television shows on DVD or streamed from online. I have a relatively large movie collection that I also sample from; including tons of Disney movies on VHS (an entirely different feminist nightmare of its own).

Posted by gagui001 at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

The way I watch most of my movies nowadays is through Netflix. A few times I’ll throw down some watch it now joints that I’m fiending for but mostly I’ll just pop in what I get in the mail. It’s funny how you can tell what kind of kick you were on at certain times by what comes through Netflix. All of the sudden I’ll get a rush of documentaries, then old sci-fi films, then a bunch of anime, and to top it all of a bunch of foreign films.

Continue reading "Da media is to be sold, not to be told" »

Posted by Paisley Fontaine at 7:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If I could I would love to watch all movies in a theater with a big screen, surround sound, lots of people all of us feasting with our eyes. In one of my favorite movies, The Dreamers, The main character describes why he likes to sit up front at the theater…

I was one of the insatiables. The ones you'd always find sitting closest to the screen. Why do we sit so close? Maybe it was because we wanted to receive the images first. When they were still new, still fresh. Before they cleared the hurdles of the rows behind us. Before they'd been relayed back from row to row, spectator to spectator; until worn out, secondhand, the size of a postage stamp, it returned to the projectionist's cabin. Maybe, too, the screen was really a screen. It screened us... from the world.

Continue reading "My Media Consumption" »

Posted by Sophia at 12:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I typically find myself watching films in the comfort of my own home more often than going to a theater. Maybe it is because of the high gas prices, or the cost to see a film at the theater is currently around $10/person, and being that I am a struggling college student, I cannot always afford to go to the theater. Or, maybe it is for the simple fact that I like to kick back and relax on my couch while watching a film, and I also like the idea of being able to pause (or stop) the film in order to take a bathroom break if need be. I normally like to rent movies through Netflix, or watch movies that I already own on DVD and yes, even VHS. I must admit, I do only watch “Hollywood� feature films, but it does not mean that I am not open to watching Indie short films. I have not had the opportunity to attend screenings on campus, or film festivals, but I would really like to in the near future. The films that I watch usually reflect upon my mood/and or interest in the film. Because of what, how, and where I watch films, I feel that it does affect my ability to read/understand the material due to the fact that I am not very knowledgeable with all of the media concepts.

Posted by smiles79 at 9:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I do, indeed, consume my fair share of film, time permitting. My most common way of consuming film is in the comfort of my own home. We don't have a fancy setup with surround sound, though we do have a widescreen TV which I find makes my home viewing experience a little closer to what you'd see in the theater. There's no cable at my house, though we do get a few channels we're not supposed to (unintentional theft I suppose...and it was indeed a sad day when the National Geographic Channel disappeared). One of them is TBS, which likes to play the same @#$%@&*! movie three nights in a row.

Continue reading "I'm Not What You'd Call "in"" »

Posted by Radical Dreamer at 9:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What with the exorbitant price of gas and the rising prices of food—not to mention the fact that I am trying to pay for college—I find that I rent movies far more than going to a movie theater. At home, my family has a living room with surround sound, so I am able to attain some of the high quality movie theater sound. But at college, I am forced to watch movies either on my small television or on my computer. Watching movies on a computer is a completely different experience—I am constantly distracted by my roommate, people in the hallway, or the overwhelming desire to pause the movie and check out what’s new on youtube. But in a movie theater, with its dark atmosphere, enormous screen, and music blasting from the speakers, I am entirely engrossed in the film. An explosion in a film is far more effective when the floor rumbles underneath you from the sound’s vibrations—you not only see it, but you feel it.

Continue reading "The Cinematic Experience" »

Posted by Samantha B at 9:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The way I watch movies has greatly changed over time. When I was younger I used to go to the movie theater multiple times a month. I would buy my ticket, get a soda and bucket of popcorn and enter the dark theater and wait for the magic to start. Nowadays, I am lucky if a go to the theater a few times a year. I believe there are two reasons for this:

1. Infrequent/insufficient free time
2. Ticket prices are absurdly high

Continue reading "The movie theater used to be the place to go" »

Posted by baker473 at 8:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

When I was young my family would go to a movie every Wednesday night. We would grab the paper and look at what was playing. We had five options at most, and would argue about what we were going to see for the week. Soon after that we started renting movies. It was cheaper, we could watch more and we could pause for food or phone calls. The experience completely changed for me. It isn't a designated time to sit and enjoy a movie.

Continue reading "I don't go to the theaters anymore, I just press pause" »

Posted by Abby Newberg at 6:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)