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The theater was not
very crowded by around 9:20, but lines of people flooded the
place between 9:35 and 9:45. The theater ended up getting
somewhere around three-fourths filled. Among
trailers, Jackass was the first up and just with its warning
intro at the very beginning - cheers and claps from many
people were already going up. Laughs were constant throughout
the preview, with a few claps and cheers as the title burst
onto the screen. Similar thing happened at Welcome to
Collinwood when the few young moviegoers in the room showed
their vocal cords at the sight of the trailer. Jackass was
really the only preview that got evident responses. Call me
crazy, but I think this flick (Jackass) holds the chance to
soar for at least opening night's sake.
As for Rules of Attraction itself, it felt pretty clear
that just about everyone in the room was falling in love with
the film. Laughs would always come up and even though some
stretches were filled in by silence on the audience's part, it
seemed that everyone was very deeply attached to its story. A
couple scenes withdrew very memorable reactions that I will
not forget anytime soon, with applauses almost breaking out a
few times (almost as in, many people clapped but the overall
crowd didn't join) as well. You could also feel everyone's gut
turning at the last shot of the movie when it halts in
mid-sentence. Lots of, "wow!" from that. Walking out of the
auditorium, I heard comments from numerous moviegoers that it
was one of the best movies they've seen (whether that's this
year or in general, I did not know). Overall, Rules of
Attracted pretty well scored through-the-roof with this
audience and retrieved a very light applause at the ending
credits
In what was probably one of my biggest last-minute
decisions, it was maybe 11:53 at the time when I walked by
Punch-Drunk Love's theater and remembered that it had a
midnight show. I had attempted to go for the 9:40 or 10:30
show (on two screens) that night but even by 9:00 (when I got
there) they were already sold out (as well as the 8:00). So,
noticing that the 12:00 am show was not sold out yet, I took a
risk and went for it. Walking into the 424 seater auditorium
(the other room holds somewhere around 220 seats), almost all
seats had been taken by that point - luckily finding a seat
way in the back. It appeared to be a pack of moviegoers
familiar with P.T. Anderson's filmmaking - either that or I
just picked up weird vibes (a mostly young adult audience).
The show obviously sold out once the lights dimmed and as
we got featured our first trailer, Half Past Dead, lots of
giggles flowed the room (in what seemed like in a negative
sense) and even an applause broke out by about half the crowd,
but it looked like one of those clapping-just-for-fun deals,
as many were making fun of the flick. The response from the
audience led most patrons in the room to laughter as you can
imagine. Outside of that, no other trailers received obvious
reactions. Punch-Drunk Love itself was hugely accepted by the
crowd and it looked as though everyone there loved the film.
The movie received a nice applause afterwards, and walking out
I heard some comment on Boogie Nights in some form of a
contrast.
Attendance wise throughout the evening/night, Black Hawk
Down's limited release bow (was featured in the same two
auditoriums at this theater) is the best comparison I can
think of. Paul Thomas Anderson is looking for what could be a
gargantuan per-screen average and for a movie that sold itself
as a very strange film via its trailer spots, Anderson's fame
(I hear many people go "he did Boogie Nights") could be a
large factor of the film's success along with Adam Sandler
gaining praise for his performance which filmgoers are just
not used to. So I guess in a sense, alongside P.T. Anderson,
fans needed to see what all the fuss was about in relation to
Sandler. And at this show, folks seemed to adore Sandler's
performance. |
