I went to see Hot Fuzz yesterday, and though I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, I had to scoff at the first twenty minutes or so of my theater experience.
I sat down. My eyes and ears filled up, not with Disney Channel music and a silly trivia question about movies that any spout.com user would laugh at, but with a CarMax commercial. That's right. Splayed out before me was a commercial for a reseller of cars. After that, another commercial came on. It was for a local restaurant. Then I learned about Adam Sandler's upcoming movie, "I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry" which almost made me barf. Almost. And then it was another commercial. And another. And another.
When did this start happening? I can remember going to the movies and sitting down to watch fifteen minutes' worth of trailers before the feature, and I know I've seen commercials before movies before. But when I went yesterday, it just seemed more excessive than it has in the past.
And before you comment about how trailers are just advertisements, let me remind you that they're ads you want to see because they're advertising products you care about.
This other stuff is getting out of hand. I didn't pay $6.50 to watch vain attempts by some CEO to get me to buy a car from his business. I paid for a matinee ticket to Hot Fuzz. Honestly, I guess what I'm really so pissed off about is that fact that I get enough advertising at home when I'm watching cable or going online. Why the hell do I need to pay for somebody to get me to spend my hard-earned cash at their business or on their product?
But here's the real funny part. At one point, an ad came up that said something to the effect of "Get your ad displayed in front of a different blockbuster every Friday! Call <insert 800 number> today!" WHAT!!! An advertisement for advertisement! How much farther can we go?