You might have wondered why I never post any movie reviews. Of course, its more likely that you may not have wondered anything like that, since this is not a movie blog. In fact, you might wonder now whether you were supposed to wonder about it, and wonder why I am bringing this up.
Rest assured, I am not going to start writing movie reviews. But I will now proceed to tell you why. When you know the answer, you’ll realize what a narrow escape you’ve had.
The thing is, I seem to watch movies much more infrequently than most people I know. Usually, by the time I get around to watching a movie, they have been elevated to Ancient Classics. Which of course means that all the reviews have been written long ago and no one is interested in them anymore.
Or if I do watch a movie on the day it’s released, the whole experience is such a novelty to me that I end up actually liking the movie. This happened with Saawariya, and I still like the Broadway-show like sets and the music. Though, of course, if I’d written a review exhorting people to go watch Saawariya, I’d have been lynched by now.
Watching desi movies in theaters comes with its own kind of issues, which I’ve blogged about before. But even in the movies that are widely shown, I dawdle to the theater after weeks.
You’d think I would at least watch movies at home, but I haven’t got around to doing that either. Netflix regularly sends me postcards promising free trial subscriptions, and I keep telling myself it sounds like a great idea. But eventually, the postcards go into the recycle bin. By some mysterious and unexplained law of nature, I will always take a look at the card the day after the offer expires, and this has no relation to how long the card has been sitting around.
The other day I was in the library and actually strayed into the DVD section. My usual mode in the library these days is (i) Go to Random shelf (say Fiction G-K), (ii) Grab Books till you cannot carry any more (iii) Checkout (iv) Run. So I applied the same technique to the DVDs.
I saw “Robin Hood” in large letters and thought to myself, wasn’t this nominated for Oscars and Grammies and so on? Of course, it’s somewhat old, I told myself, but I don’t remember watching it anyway, so let me grab it. Then I saw “Pirates of the Caribbean” and grabbed that too. I would have grabbed some more, but my books were already reaching up to my shoulders and I could have won myself an Intermediate Juggling certificate right then.
I came home very satisfied with myself and popped “Robin Hood” in the DVD player. I then sat down to watch.
What do you think happened?
(To be continued)
Sujatha
shyam
Anonymous
John Rennie
Can’t wait to read what happened next!
And don’t worry, here is someone who possibly watches even fewer movies than you do! I content myself with reading reviews, so that I can spout knowledgeably about them! I see all these ads for Netflix, have heard people talk about it, but have no idea how it operates. They have not sent me anything in the mail, though – I am not sure if I’m to be offended about this, am I such a nobody in their view?
They know we’re friends – so they’ve given up on you
OMG I the kevin costner one, the only thing good about that was that the Bryan Adams gaana ‘Everything I do’ was in the OST.
I remember that song too, that was all you could hear everywhere at one time..
I’ll tell you what happened! You ended up watching Robin Hood: Men in Tights. And I actually like that movie. Right? :p
Wrong, but that was an interesting guess. You will get an Honorary Mention
It was a DVD of porn in the ‘Robin Hood’ case?
I got it from the library, remember? The librarian will probably have apoplexy if she hears this
I would have gone with the accidentally grabbed Men in Tights movie as well. Or it was the Disney version? Anyways, both are better than the Kevin Costner one.
Now I really want to know what happens next…
You were on the right track
Although, I must protest, I have never accidentally grabbed any Men in Tights 
Yeah, when I grab Men in Tights, it’s never accidental either…
I remember watching the Errol Flynn version as a kid in an afternoon matinee one summer in Boston in the 70s. Unfortunately, we got there early so we saw the final sword fight first and then the whole movie from the beginning. Still good though. There was a Disney-type live version featuring kids that came out around the same time- I think it was a trend at the time. I saw the Sean Connery/Audrey Hepburn (Robin and Marian) one about their “later life” on TV with commercials – good acting.
Thanks. I hadn’t thought about these movies for years.
Does it bring back good memories?
I ended up seeing the Errol Flynn version too. It was nice, and you could consider watching it again to see what you think of it now..