Movies make me happy. In fact, they make me happy to the point that I dread watching them with other people. If I am watching a movie with you and if, during the very first scene—the hook, when something purposefully unexpected happens to draw us in and make us invested for the next two hours of our lives—you turn to me with a confused face and ask, “Why did that just happen?” then, while I might question why we are still friends,1 In these moments, I often fantasize about getting up from the couch and walking out of this person’s life. I’ll give you, through gritted teeth and obvious annoyance, one of the following answers:2 Wow, what an unnecessarily complicated sentence that was—like, it probably took a few readings to unpack that one. What’s worse, I recognized how convoluted it is while making some edits and then decided to use a footnote pointing it out, rather than simplifying the sentence. What is wrong with me?
- I don’t know [INSERT NAME]. I haven’t seen this movie either, so can we keep watching?
- Do you want me to ruin this whole movie for you? Should we look at Wikipedia’s plot summary and ruin this for you?3 A friend whom I’m very fond of does this; unknown to her, a little piece of my soul dies every time she does so.
- I don’t answer them and I rudely ignore their question.
But for some reason, people struggle holding their attention for two or more continuous and silent hours, especially if there isn’t an obvious goal that the movie’s plot is progressing towards—think Lost in Translation vs. The Lord of the Rings. So I’ve decided to show people where they can watch short films with the attention that they deserve. Specifically, good short films. Fortunately, the YouTube channel Omeleto provides an ample amount to choose from. The ultimate goal is to train the human race how to watch movies properly and learn to enjoy the ones that many people find “boring.”4 I imagine this transition takes place in a similar manner to how people refine their taste in alcohol: initially we were binge-drinking, keg-standing children and we learn to be someone who claims to taste the difference between a sparkling wine aged in a cherry barrel for a year as compared to one that was aged in French oak barrel for three years.
And thus, I bequeath onto you the short film Reception. It completely relies on realistic dialogue which produces emotional highs, lows, tension, relief, character investment, and eventual growth. This all takes place over the course of one awkward conversation with some rather impressive acting. All of this can be yours, for the low price of twenty-one concentrated minutes of your life. I hope you’ll take the time to watch it and then share it with your friends if you enjoyed it as much as I did.
Hey cutie