We’re back! That’s right, the 5-movies-in-1-day extravaganza is over…and we survived.

For those of you that are trying to figure out what I am talking about…

On Saturday, February 21st, Neil (the Truth On Cinema Oscars Contest Winner) and I ventured out and joined hundreds of other passionate movie fans and experienced the 2009 AMC Best Picture Showcase. AMC shows every Oscar nominated Best Picture film back-to-back starting at 10:30am and ending at midnight. The films that were shown were 1) Milk, 2) The Reader, 3) The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, 4) Slumdog Millionaire, and 5) Frost/Nixon.

I have been wanting to attend this event ever since the very first one which was held 3 years ago. The idea of watching movies all day is exciting to me and well worth the pain of having a numb butt afterwords. Throughout the years that I have watched the Oscars, I have usually come away with knowing that I wouldn’t probably ever see any of the Best Picture nominees, nor have I ever gone into any of the Oscars having already seen them either.

It was an incredible experience. I felt like a rock star. I was given this pass that allowed me to have unlimited popcorn and it also allowed me to watch any movie I wanted to throughout the entire day. That proved very useful as Neil and I had already decided not to see The Reader after hearing and reading about the gratuitous nudity and sex scenes, so we took our “All Access Pass” and watched Taken instead. It felt very surreal to look at my phone for the time and realize that it was 2:30pm on a Saturday afternoon and I had already seen 2 full length feature films with 3 more to go. The idea of “reality” is totally screwed up and in a sense, it felt like a vacation, or a summer camp experience. As a matter of fact, when the last credits rolled for the last movie, Neil leaned over and said, “The summer vacation is over.”

As we arrived at 10:30am, we quickly realized that we were actually in the minority. I would venture to say that the median age of the attendees was about mid 40′s. Looking around, there was mostly couples my parents age and older, with a smattering of young movie geeks like myself mixed about. I eagerly looked around hoping I would see a familiar movie blogger face, but didn’t see anything or anyone that rung any bells. Neil and I were both wearing our Truth On Cinema t-shirts and I was secretly hoping that someone would stop me and ask me about it. We picked out pretty good seats, not too high, definitely not too low, just right in the middle. We sat next to an elderly couple named Maureen and, well, Neil affectionately called the husband “Langella”, I guess that was his default old guy name. They were a very sweet couple who held our seats when we left to see Taken.

Going into this event, I wondered whether or not other movie aficionados were as excited about this or as eager as I was, but in the end, it didn’t matter whether or not they were there, I just loved being around movie people. There were all sorts of characters there:

• You had the older teens group composed of 3 guys and 1 girl who I’m sure had more guy friends in high school that girl friends, who just loved The Dark Knight and thought it deserved every award EVER
• Then you had the “Sex and the City” ladies who considered this event as their “Girls’ Day” and who brought blankets and pillows and books to read in between films
• You had the Prime Timers, the older couples whose kids were all married and with kids of their own, and their cell phone pictures of their dogs and grand kids (though I think they talked more about their dog than their grand kids)
• And then you had the 3 guy group who all were VERY familiar with comic books and probably own a comic book hero suit that they would have worn but it’s being dry cleaned after they wore it to the NY Comic Con 2 weeks ago
• Then you had me, the passionate, over-zealous and over-opinionated movie blogger who characterizes people as he watches them, secretly wanting someone to notice his movie blog and spark up a lively conversation or debate over it

Like I said, it was an eclectic group, but like our souvenir movie booklet said, “guests like you, passionate about films, energize this program every year.” I love being around movie people, people who are as opinionated and intense about movies, people who would sacrifice an entire day to sit inside of a theater and eat the same popcorn that never seems to satisfy a craving, people who are willing to stand up in front of hundreds of people and loudly proclaim that they HATED a certain movie without fear of the “observationalist blogger” sitting 2 rows above her talking about how intense she is about that movie…those are my kind of people.

This post was mainly an overview of my experience and is not an exhaustive review, as I will review every movie we saw (except for Taken as Ryan has already done that, to me it was predictable, but a nice break from the emotional burden of all of the Best Picture nominees) each day of this week, but I hope it excites you for next year’s AMC Best Picture Showcase.

Monday I will start off with what I think should win the Best Picture award…an opinion that I’m sure will shock most of you.

Related posts:

1. Another Oscar Year, Another Fantastic AMC Best Picture Showcase