by Nora Ephron
reprinted from the April 7th New York Times
We went to the movies the other night. We live in New York City, where it costs $10.75 to see a movie, which doesn’t include the $1.50 surcharge for buying the tickets ahead of time online. I love buying tickets ahead of time online. One of the miracles of modern life, as far as I’m concerned, is that moment when you enter a movie theater, stick your credit card into a machine and it spits the exact tickets you ordered straight out at you. Every time it happens, I just want to say, I don’t believe it! This is great!!
On the other hand, it turns out that there’s a new technological advance in the buying-tickets-ahead-of-time department that takes all the fun out of it: you can now print out your confirmation at home, skip the machine and go straight to the ticket taker. The ticket taker then scans your printout and prints the tickets right at the entrance to the theater thus holding up all the people behind you in the ticket line, eliminating the one miraculous moment you used to be able to count on when going to see a movie.
But the other night, as it turned out, we didn’t have to give our printout to the ticket taker, because when we walked into the theater, there was no ticket taker. The entrance to the theater was empty of personnel. The other customers just walked right in without giving their tickets to anyone, and we did too.
We trooped two flights downstairs to Theater 7, expecting to bump into a ticket taker on our way to the theater, but we never did. We had also hoped to buy something to eat, but the lower-level refreshment counter was closed and the popcorn was just sitting there, getting stale.
I should probably say at this point that the theater we went to was the Loews Orpheum 7, at 86th Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan. I should probably also say that the Loews Orpheum 7 is owned by AMC, but it used to be owned by Loews Cineplex Entertainment Corporation, and when it was, I was on the company’s board.
This was a sad experience in my life because I had modestly hoped, in my role as a board member, to do something about the unbelievably low quality of the food sold in movie theaters. As it turned out, no one at Loews cared about what I thought about the food sold in theaters.
So I dutifully attended the board meetings and was subjected to a series of PowerPoint presentations that were meant to validate the company’s policy of building costly, large cineplexes, most of them conveniently situated right across the street from other costly, large cineplexes being built by rival theater companies.
One day, about two years into my tenure, I was staying in Los Angeles, in a hotel, and I attended a Loews board meeting by telephone; it was so boring that I decided to leave for a while and get a manicure downstairs.
When I got back to my room, only 20 minutes later, everyone was screaming at one another on the telephone. I didn’t want to admit I had left the room — and by the way, no one had even noticed — so I listened for a while and realized that while I’d been out having my nails done, the company had gone bankrupt.
This was a shock to me and to everyone else on the board. I never did find out why the news hadn’t been mentioned earlier in the board meeting, but that of course was one of the reasons everyone was screaming at one another. I mean, there were people on the board whose companies owned shares in Loews who had just found out that they’d lost hundreds of millions of dollars as a result of a bankruptcy no one had even had the courtesy to warn them about. It wasn’t even on the agenda!
A few months later some investors from Canada and California bought Loews at a bargain basement price. Two years later, AMC Entertainment took over, and as far as I can tell it has done nothing whatsoever to improve the food sold at the refreshment counter or anything else.
Anyway, the other night. We passed the shuttered refreshment counter, went into the theater and sat down. The ads were already playing. There were quite a few of them, including a diet cola ad involving trucks and motorcycles that was so in love with itself that it actually recommended going to a special Web site that explained how the ad had been made.

Continue reading The Last Picture Show: Why Cinemas Will Die →

Although a little late in the posting, now that VanRamblings has seen most of the films likely up for Oscar contention, we are able to post our list of what we consider to be the Top 10 Films of 2005.
For the most part, 2005 was business as usual in Hollywood, with the exception, of course, that business was down a whopping 5% (we’re talking hundreds of millions of dollars here), and admissions were down 7% over 2004.
In fact, 2005 produced the worst box office performance since 1985.
Still and all, there were movies to see during the year, many of which are now on video (some movies came and went in one week, while others never even made it to our shores, and more’s the pity in that department). From Capote, Good Night, and Good Luck and Walk the Line to Cinderella Man, Hustle and Flow and Crash there was much that was good that could be seen on the big screen throughout the year.
Overall, declining box office notwithstanding, 2005 was a pretty darn fine year for those of us who love movies. If 2006 exhibits a fraction of the variety and skill represented in the more than 500 films released worldwide in 2005, we’re in for a heady year.
Top 10 Films of 2005

1. The Constant Gardener: Far and away the best film of the year, this provocative and assured thriller-romance provided not only the most alluring love story captured on film last year, this masterwork of suspense and political intrigue proved to be, as well, the most serious, the smartest and most gorgeously filmed piece of cinematic storytelling to reach the local multiplex in 2005.
2. Brokeback Mountain: Poignant, tender, troubling, beautiful, poetic, mournful and mythic, at once rich and spare, gorgeously filmed and elegiac, it is little wonder Brokeback Mountain is the odds on favourite to win Best Picture at the Oscars come Sunday, March 5th. You’ve read about it. If you haven’t seen it: do. Here’s betting it picks up a slew of Oscar nominations on January 31st.
3. Walk The Line: The best straightforward Hollywood entertainment of 2005, in Walk The Line the music soars, the lambent cinematography of the rural backroads of the southern United States evokes a simpler time and tragedy barely held at bay, and Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon do such a bang up job of portraying Johnny Cash and June Carter, it’s little wonder that both are in line for Oscar nods. If you’re gonna see one picture on the big screen this month, this one oughta be it.
4. Me, You and Everyone We Know: Quirky doesn’t begin to do justice to what surely is the oddest film among VanRamblings Top 10 films of 2005, and yet this film — by turns comic and tender, tragic and absurd — gives off what is surely one of the greatest of moviegoing pleasures — the sense of an artist seeing the world from some private vantage that is as original as it is truthful. On DVD, this was the most auspicious début of 2005.
5. Capote: Winner of the National Society of Film Critics Award, Capote boasts the best performance by an actor in film in 2005, and finally gives Philip Seymour Hoffman his due as one of America’s finest actors for the screen. Gripping, transformative, unsettling — with a mesmerizing performance by Hoffman at its centre — Capote is not to be missed. Now playing at Tinseltown, in Vancouver.
6. Crash: Number one on Roger Ebert’s Top 10 of 2005, Crash is not only one of the best Hollywood movies ever about race, it is an exhilarating, contentious, frank and, at times, tragic exploration of the racial divide in America today. And, yet, director Paul Haggis leaves room for hope. Sure to garner Oscar consideration, as it has a whack of critics’ awards, Crash is available now on DVD.
7. King Kong: As Peter Travers wrote in his review in Rolling Stone, King Kong is “the jaw-dropping, eye-popping, heart-stopping movie epic we’ve been waiting for all year.” Offering magnificent entertainment, and all at once wondrous, sophisticated, smart and funny, with a great emotional, heart-tugging core, this is why we (sometimes) love Hollywood films: because they’re larger than life and can be downright astonishing at times.
8. Look At Me: The first great film of 2005, this marvelous and uncommonly observant French drama offers a brilliant, blistering account of a literary Parisian family who are not at all what they appear to be on the surface. Like the baroque chorales in the film, Look at Me builds to a resonant climax that will reverberate long after you take your eyes from the screen. Available on DVD.
9. Downfall: You’ll be hearing a great deal more about the film’s director, Oliver Hirschbiegel, very soon. And little wonder why. This riveting re-creation of three world-changing collapses: those of the Nazi party, of militarized Germany as a whole, and of the Führer who guided them into self-destructive ruin was one of the most powerful films of 2005. Another must rental.
10. Munich: This was the second-to-last film we saw before compiling our Top 10 list, and we’re not sure if we’ve quite come to terms with it yet. Winner of Entertainment Weekly’s Best Film of 2005 award, Munich probably deserves to be higher on the list. Sure, it may be a superbly taut and well-made thriller, but it is the haunting ethical and personal issues which the film explores that stay with you long after the film has ended.
Of course, there are a great many more films that were released in 2005 that are deserving of consideration, both as potential films for you to see at your local multiplex or art house cinema, or to rent on DVD. We loved far more than the 10 films listed above (although we believe our Top 10 encapsulates what we see as most praiseworthy in film in 2005).
By rights, Ballet Russes — which is opening for a week’s run at the new VanCity Theatre at the Vancouver International Film Festival Centre on January 20th — should have made our Top 10 list, and did for the longest time. But only a handful of us saw it last October. As our favourite film at the 2005 Vancouver International Film Festival, this one is a must-see.
Good Night, and Good Luck just missed our Top 10, as did David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence, both of which are recommendable.
VanRamblings hasn’t seen Noah Baumbach’s The Squid and the Whale, about which we hear many good things, but it’s coming to The Hollywood Theatre next month, and we’ll catch it then (we no longer live our life inside a darkened theatre, seeking a sense of connection; we actually have a life now … occasionally … thus we missed this, and other films, in first run).
Matchpoint hasn’t arrived, and we can’t wait (but we won’t see it at one of Leonard Schein’s cinemas, because we’re boycotting him).
We saw both Pride and Prejudice and Rent over the holiday season, and loved them both (we cried our eyes out at the screenings … always a good thing when attending the cinema, we believe). By rights, each could have made the Top 10 list, but we wimped out and went for the more serious stuff (save, King Kong, I suppose … although King Kong was great), as we did with a number of other ‘chick flicks’ that are now available on DVD.
On the weekend, VanRamblings will post a list of highly recommendable films released in 2005 now available for sale or rental on video and DVD.

After a dearth of good movies all year long, the pre-Oscar Christmas season rolls around and all of a sudden we’re inundated with Oscar-worthy fare. And it was ever thus.
From Brokeback Mountain to Capote, from King Kong to A History of Violence, there are enough great films playing at multiplexes across North America to sate even the most demanding of moviegoers. For the true movie lover, this time of year is nothing less than cinematic nirvana.
At the moment, the leading contender for Best Picture come Oscar time, Sunday March 5th, would be Brokeback Mountain, director Ang Lee’s epic return to form. Winner of Best Picture nods by both the prestigious New York and Los Angeles Film Critics Associations (not to mention, similar status conferred by the Boston and San Francisco Film Critics), and roping in 7 Golden Globe nominations on Tuesday — including Best Dramatic Picture and Best Actor honours for Heath Ledger and Best Director for Ang Lee — Brokeback Mountain is the early film to beat, and one of the must-see films of the holiday season. Opening this week at The Park Theatre, Brokeback Mountain will go into wide release at Christmas time.
Next up for Oscar consideration: Peter Jackson’s King Kong, a loving remake of the 1933 Faye Wray original, an epic special effects film that tugs at the heart while offering pulse-quickening entertainment. An almost perfect amalgam of Titanic and Raiders of the Lost Ark, King Kong will emerge the box office champion this Christmas season, which is fitting since it is first-rate entertainment for the whole family.
When it comes to niche films, Capote is the must-see film of the holiday season, if only for Philip Seymour Hoffman’s transforming performance as the title character. Both of George Clooney’s low-budget and well-received entries — Good Night, and Good Luck, and Syriana — continue to do well at the box office, and will garner Oscar support come Tuesday January 31st, the day the Oscar nominations are announced.
VanRamblings’ favourite film this year is Fernando Mereilles’ The Constant Gardener, a thriller, a moving love story and an indictment of the pharmaceutical industry. Now that Steven Spielberg’s prestige Christmas pic, Munich, has been savaged by many of the leading critics — along with an overall less than enthusiastic reception for Memoirs of a Geisha, Terrence Malick’s The New World, and the Weinstein brothers’ presentation of Mrs. Henderson Presents — The Constant Gardener would seem back in serious contention for an Oscar nod, perhaps to emerge as this year’s sleeper Best Picture.
The Johnny Cash bio, Walk The Line, would appear guaranteed to emerge as one of the five Oscar Best Picture nominations — with Best Actor and Best Actress nods assured for Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon.
David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence is almost every critics’ second pick for Best Picture, with William Hurt and Maria Bello getting the nod for Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress from the New York film critics fraternity.
Other possible contenders for Best Picture consideration, and worthwhile fare to catch the next time you visit your local multiplex or favourite art house cinema: Woody Allen’s latest flick, Matchpoint; Transamerica, starring Felicity Huffman, sure to be nominated in the Best Actress category; and Tommy Lee Jones’ The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, opening soon. Pride and Prejudice may have a shot at Best Picture, as well.
So far, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe hasn’t been seen on the critics Best Picture radar, but given its potential for box office gold and its probable status as counterpoint to the “gay cowboy epic” that is garnering so much attention, Hollywood may yet find a place for Narnia come Oscar time.
As to the remaining movie fare available this holiday season — Fun With Dick and Jane, Rumor Has It, The Producers (now seemingly out of Best Picture contention), Rent, The Ringer, The Family Stone (reportedly just awful), Cheaper By The Dozen 2, and Casanova — there’ll be enough cinema available this Christmas season to suit almost every taste.
You’ll want to savour this Christmas season’s multiplex offerings, in particular, because VanRamblings is predicting the slow, inexorable decline of the theatre exhibition business, as the major film studios move to “day and date” — making their films available to you for viewing with your home theatre setup on the same day the new blockbuster opens at your local multiplex. The move to home theatre as the primary viewing model is inevitable, and will in all likelihood arrive (much) sooner than later.

With the 77th annual Academy Awards nearing, and not having posted regularly for almost three months now (heck, I’ve been busy), perhaps now is as good a time as any to post VanRamblings’ very own Academy Awards.
In alphabetical order, VanRamblings’ five Best Pictures nominees for 2004 demand your attention, touch the heart, and seek to cause a fundamental shift in how you see the role of film in contemporary culture …

• Closer: One of the best written, most well-acted and best directed films of 2004. If you don’t fall in love with Natalie Portman, appreciate the music of Patrick Marber’s script and Mike Nichols’ peerless cinematic composition of this tour-de-force work, TV may be right up your alley as the medium of choice.
• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: With tour-de-force performances from Jim Carrey (yes, Jim Carrey) and the always exquisite Kate Winslet, and a knock it out of the ballpark script by Charlie Kaufman (not to mention, outstanding direction by Michel Gondry), it’s nothing short of criminal that Sunshine will not be one of the Best Picture contenders on Sunday night.
• Man on Fire: Simply because there was no more honest relationship captured onscreen in 2004 than that which exists within this film between Dakota Fanning and Denzel Washington.
• Metallica - Some Kind of Monster: Riveting and endlessly fascinating, Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky’s documentary look at America’s pre-eminent heavy metal group ranks as one of the must-see films of 2004.
• Million Dollar Baby: Lean, spare and unlike any other Hollywood film released in 2004, this is the movie that should win the Best Picture Oscar, simply because it’s the only worthy contender among the nominated films.