A Sunday Whole Note

From Peggy Noonan, writing about the Oscars: "

But there's another challenge, an obvious one, and in the long term a bigger one. You don't have to be a genius to figure out that viewership of the Oscars is down because movie attendance itself is down, and that movie attendance is down because Hollywood isn't making the kind of movies that compel people to leave their homes and go to the multiplex. "

I hate the multiplexes. They are too noisy, too mausoleum-like, too synthetic. They are buildings made from architectural elements which reference nothing. Inside there is too much stimulus, posters and photos hyping the next ninety minute special effects slug fest. The preview are thirty minutes of loud noises and explosions, in DOLBY!!! None of the films previewed have narratives, storylines. They are not about anything except the technique of film. The last film I saw was Narnia. Before that the Lord of the Rings films, (Even they wwent downhill from the first one, badly. Leaving out the Scouring of the Shire, a horrible omission.) Before that we were fooled twice by Harry Potter. Before that I forget. Hollywood is reaping what it has sown.