If someone invites me to the theater or over to their house to watch the latest critically acclaimed masterpiece that doesn’t feature dwarves, elves, and Andy Serkis, I’m probably going to take a pass to watch a cable chopped version of Alien:Resurrection. Why? Because bad movies are where I live.
I’m not a big movie person to begin with. I like movie trivia, but I was voted least likely to sit through one (if such a vote ever took place). I’m no end of frustration to my friends because when they ask if I’ve seen a movie, nine times out of ten I haven’t. That tenth time, the movie is probably horrible and I’ve seen it a dozen times. The only reason I’ve seen some of the more popular/critically acclaimed/so-cool-I-can’t-believe-you-haven’t-seen-it movies in the past couple of decades (Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, American Beauty, Clerks, Fight Club, the list goes one) is because somebody MADE me.
This isn’t a recent phenomenon. I can remember being little and my beloved Papa making me watch The Princess Bride. I had absolutely no interest in seeing it. My attitude was not unlike Fred Savage’s in the film. By the end, I was hooked and wanted to watch it again. And again.
While most people’s guilty pleasures are the crappy movies I live on, mine are the opposite. Two of my favorite films are Delicatessen and My Dinner With Andre. At first glance, Delicatessen is right up my alley. It’s a black comedy. Why is it a guilty pleasure? It’s French. It’s a foreign film. I have to read subtitles. Just the fact that it’s from another country should automatically put it out of my league.
And My Dinner With Andre? It’s two guys sitting and talking for pretty much the whole film. That’s it. It contains nothing the movies on my shelves have going for them.
But this isn’t about the good. It’s about the bad.
Horror movies are my favorite. Naturally, I love the greats like Halloween, Psycho, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Jaws, Alien, Friday the 13th, and so forth. But I also love their sequels. I’ve been known to waste afternoons watching Friday the 13th movies that I even I think are crap just because I’m still watching Jason Voorhees and that beats anything else playing at the moment.
The SyFy channel was made for me. Those B-movie concepts are my cup of tea. I’ve been known to cancel plans for Pterodactyl, Sharktopus, and Mega Piranha. I can put those on and enjoy without being expected to think. If it’s possible to less than think, then that’s what I do watching those movies.
With Halloween approaching, my TV should soon be glutted with horrible delights, if I’ve got any luck at all. Between SyFy and AMC, I should get more than my fill of both the good and the bad. It’s something I look forward to all year.
And am always disappointed when they put the best stuff on at 3AM so they can show Constantine and Return to the House on Haunted Hill.
Some bad even I won’t touch.
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