Finally got out to see The Kingdom of Heaven at one of the local second-run theaters. Once upon a time it was Edwards Woodbridge. Never a flagship theater, it was getting pretty run down by the time they sold it off. I think the last movie I saw there was Star Wars: Episode I three or four months after it came out.
The real shock was that the theater was in great shape. Certainly much better shape than last time, back when the carpet was ragged and stained, some of the seats were ready to fall apart, etc. One of the new owners (there’ve been at least three, I think) put in new carpet, new tiles, new paint, fixed the seats… and is still offering $2 matinees. Even the film was in decent shape. The focus was a bit off on the right side of the screen, but it wasn’t nearly as scratched as I’d expect it to be after 2 1/2 months.
How was it? I haven’t had any recommendations either way for it.
On a similar note, if you (and alenxa) have not yet seen the Fantastic Four movie, do you want to?
Quite good, actually, even if the second half was a bit more reminiscent of the siege of Minas Tirith than it should have been.
As for Fantastic 4… maybe. Katie actually suggested it since we were both up early enough this morning to catch a lunchtime matinee. (We had brunch — yes, brunch — with Pavana and Marisa.) I’d been kind of interested in seeing it at a matinee price, but the reviews have been terrible — with one exception, which was Peter David, who admits he has a vested interest since he wrote the novelization. But apparently while most of the adults in the audience he saw it with hated it, the kids loved it.
I spent most of the drive home trying to decide whether it mas likely to be worth seeing. Then I looked at the movie times, and there was Kingdom of Heaven, which we’d decided to see too late to actually catch it in a first-run theater.