5 Ways to Better Enjoy Movies
People say that movies are a dying art. They say that folks nowadays don’t have the ability to sit still and focus their attention on one thing for more than an hour.
I say pish posh.
The movie industry is very much alive and well, however, I would say that most people, both young and old, have largely lost the ability to watch movies and thus are incapable of enjoying them to the same degree that people once did.
When I say that they have lost the ability to watch movies I don’t mean they’re going blind. What I mean is that there are a host of things that one can do that will drastically increase the experience of watching a movie (or a show, honestly). And these things aren’t major lifestyle shifts. They’re really simple and easy and require the lowest amount of willpower.
So the next time you sit down to watch a movie, whether it’s in a crowded theater or in bed with your lover, try some of these out and see how much more you enjoy the film afterward.
- DON’T WATCH THE TRAILER
I used to love watching trailers for upcoming movies. They would get me so stoked and worked up for coming releases. Also, nowadays, trailers are so beautiful that they are almost a piece of art in themselves (I wouldn’t be opposed to some kind of award show that recognizes achievement in trailers).
At some point, however, in the peak of my trailer-watching enthusiasm, I noticed that none of the movies I was getting excited about by watching the trailer over and over were delivering as I’d hoped.
It couldn’t have been that these films were all bad, I mean this was in the time of such classics as Lady Bird, Call Me by Your Name, and The Big Sick: movies that all delivered on the hype.
Yet there was something off and I basically realized that my disappointment with movies coincided perfectly with my increased interest in trailers meaning only one thing: trailers were robbing me of the full film experience.
These trailers give away too much of the movie. They’re basically like a Tik Tok synopsis of the plot and all the characters, ultimately setting you up for disappointment.
I mean it is kind of like reading the spark notes of a book before you read the actual book: nothing is as new as it could have been, nothing hits you as hard as it should.
So, if you can help it, try and avoid watching trailers the next time you’re trying to decide on a film and see how it affects your experience. For me, the most enjoyable movies I’ve seen have been recommended to me by friends with little to no explanation of the plot and cast. It leaves everything to be discovered.
2. DON’T LOOK UP THE RATING
This one is similar to the trailer thing.
When I first got really into movies I would check everything out on IMDB before committing to it, and if it had a rating of 6.9 or below I wouldn’t even bother watching it. You can’t even imagine the beautiful films I was missing out on because of this policy.
First of all, ratings can be a helpful way to see how a movie performed and how the world has received it in general, but I think that it is much more helpful to look at after you’ve actually watched the movie.
One major symptom of preemptive rating checks is that it will influence your perception of the movie. If it is a poorly rated movie there’s a chance that you will subconsciously dislike it and vice versa.
Or, if you’re a contrarian/hipster, like many in the film community are, then you may say that you like movies that are poorly rated and hate on the ones with five stars, which is a form of overcorrecting in a way.
So to avoid all of these things, again, just try and go into a movie as blind as possible so that you can make up your own damn mind about your perception of it.
3. TURN OFF YOUR PHONE
Turning off your phone while watching a movie should be pretty obvious. There are countless studies out there that show that people can’t focus on more than one thing at a time and, on top of that, it takes a good amount of time to shift focus between different things.
Just turn it off. Hand yourself over to the movie and let yourself be taken away. Every frame of a given film is deliberate and important to the overall story, and by constantly checking your phone you increase the probability that you will miss something that you don’t want to miss.
It can also be incredibly distracting to other moviegoers when people are periodically opening and closing their phones.
I understand that in this day and age it is quite difficult to spend too much time disconnected but if you’re going to spend a couple of hours watching a movie you should try and get your money’s worth. That means giving all of your attention to what’s on the screen (the big one).
4. SEE IT IN THEATERS
Movies are made to be seen in theaters. Maybe not so much nowadays with the advent of straight to streaming (I have a lot to say about this later) but in general, movies are made to be seen on the big screen.
Seeing something in a theater versus in your living room or on a laptop is like the difference between seeing The Creation of Adam on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel versus as someone’s screen saver on their phone.
The sound is perfect, the image is as good as it’ll ever be, and it is completely dark allowing audience members to be privy to every last color correction, nuanced facial movement, or casting of shadow. In a theater is where you see masterpieces how they’re meant to be watched.
The most common resistance to the idea of watching a film in theaters is that it is too expensive. “Why would I drive to a theater and spend fifteen dollars on something that I could watch at home for free in a couple of weeks?”
I understand movies can be expensive, but you’re mostly getting your money’s worth. When you stop and think about all the things in a theater that are meant to enhance the cinematic experience you’ll quickly realize that it’s not that bad.
Plus, that money is directly contributing to the survival of the film industry which would truly be a devastating loss were it ever to close its doors for good.
5. HAVE A DISCUSSION ABOUT IT AFTERWARDS
One more practice I like to employ when watching movies is to have a discussion immediately after the credits roll while it’s still fresh in my mind. Sometimes that means getting a drink and talking about it or other times it’s just having a discussion right there on the couch before we open our phones and let the rest of the world creep back in.
This practice is a way of really breaking down a movie and getting to know it. There are so many things that maybe your friends might have caught that you didn’t, little plot points or moments of foreshadowing or, one of my favorites, theories.
The two hours of escaping the rest of the world (granted you follow my above advice) are nice but can come to a halting stop when we walk out of the theater and immediately let our minds go elsewhere.
When you talk about a movie afterward, whether it’s for five minutes or five hours, I guarantee that it will sink in more, allow you to remember and savor the art more, and just let the movie do what it was meant to do.
CONCLUSION
The next time you watch a movie I challenge you to try any number of the above points. None of them are big commitments but I promise the result will be very much worth the small sacrifice.
Yes, movies are dying in a sense, people are more reluctant to go to the theater or give their whole attention for two hours, but it doesn’t have to be that way. We are always free to return to the way movies are meant to be watched: just you and your eyes in front of a screen, letting the magic of the story sweep you away.
