Top Ten Most Memorable Movie Experiences - Part 1

Sometimes when I see a movie, I can't remember anything about it the following week. That's probably why I've kept a journal with a list of all the movies I've seen in the theater since 1999. The following ten movies are ones that I remember mostly due to the whole experience of going to see them, though I did enjoy most of the actual movies too. 

I had to make this in two parts because it was too long and didn't fit when I tried to post them all together. Blogspot is so annoying sometimes! Sorry for all the extra space at the bottom - I can't seem to delete it. 

In chronological order:

1.  My Girl !!SPOILERS!!  (November 1991) - It was either Thanksgiving or the day after when I saw this with my mom and brother. It instantly became one of my favorite movies (until another tearjerker replaced it six years later). What made watching it memorable was that it was the first movie I remember not just crying during, but actually bawling my eyes out. I don't have the best memory in the world, but I don't remember ever crying during a movie before. And everytime I would wipe my tears away and be able to see the screen again, I'd start crying all over again, like when Vada comes down to Thomas J's funeral and says, "Where are his glasses? Put on his glasses! He can't see without his glasses!" Yeah, that started the waterworks again! Then I'd composed myself again, and the next scene would be Vada telling Thomas J's mother that he would be all right because her mother would take care of him. :::sobs::: I'm sure my eyes were red and puffy when we left the theater! That movie is really, really sad!

2.  Aladdin  (December 1992) - Not my favorite animated Disney movie, but what makes the experience of seeing this one so memorable was that I was going to see A Muppet Christmas Carol with my dad and brother. We had paid for our tickets and were seated with our popcorn, candy, and pop in the nearly crowded theater waiting for the movie to start. Instead, a manager came in and told us that they were having technical difficulties with the film and that everyone could either get their money back or go see another movie that was about to start. Since we were already at the movies (and I'm sure we were there in the first place to get out of our mom's hair), we decided to see another movie and that turned out to be Aladdin. Nothing like that has ever happened to me since. And in case you were wondering, we did see A Muppet Christmas Carol the following week.

3.  Jurassic Park (Summer 1993) - I was wanting to see this when the promos were out and after my brother had seen it with his friends and was telling me how great it was, that only fueled my desire to see it more and my mom took me to see it. Wow, what an experience on the big screen, especially seeing it for the first time. Now that I've seen the movie SO MANY TIMES that while I still love it, I'm not scared anymore because I know when all the scary dinosaurs are going to jump out and attack. (Though I still get nervous when the T-rex attack the kids in the jeep). But the first time you see this movie? Especially when you're a 12 year-old? It is the scariest thing in the world! And not only for me, but my mom too! I think she scared me more than the dinosaurs because she would leap in the air and grab my arm, which startled me a great deal! The scene that freaked me out the most was when "Newman" (heh) gets attacked by that little dinosaur that seemed cute and chirpy at first, then it flares out its clown collar and starts to hiss, and I'm like, "Oh, shit!" That scared the bejesus out of me!

4.  Independence Day (July 3, 1996) - This was one of the first movies that I saw on opening day. (I've now seen many movies on their opening day, that it isn't even a big deal anymore). ID4 was deemed the biggest movie since, well, I don't know, Star Wars, maybe? It was being promoted everywhere and everyone was going to see it. I mean, who doesn't want to see a movie about aliens taking over the world, especially with the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air starring in it? Well, it turned out that was the week my friend Emily, and her family were visiting  after she had moved out East a few years earlier. So Emily and I called our friend Jill and on the afternoon of July 3, 1996 my mom drove us to West Ridge 8 Theaters. We (okay, I) was so anal about getting good seats (I HATE sitting in the damn front row), so I insisted that we leave one hour early to get good seats. Well, we were the first ones there when my mom dropped us off (I guess it would probably have been more crowded at night), but it was all good because the three of us just sat and chatted and caught up on old times. Good thing we did get there early, because the theater was packed! It made for an awesome viewing experience too; the audience really got into it. Ah, there's nothing like a huge blockbuster on the Fourth of July!

5. The Fifth Element (July 1997) - This is not one of my favorite movies and I've never seen it in its entirety, but seeing it was definitely a memorable experience because I saw it in a small town in France. (I was on a tour of the country with my high school French club). I've lost my journal that I kept while I was on the trip, so I don't remember what part of France this was in, but a group of four or five of us decided it would be fun to see a movie at the cinema while in another country. (Oh, how young and stupid we were...) One of my friends assured us (from one of her friends who had been to France before) that the movie would be dubbed in English, or, at the very least, there would be English subtitles. Wrong! But before the movie started, we bought our tickets and walked into the theater. Now I don't know if this is because we were in a small town, or all theaters in France are like this, but the first thing I noticed was that all of the seats were on level ground, not the slope you see here in the States. It could be that we were just in old theater and they hadn't renovated yet, who knows. We watched the previews - all in French, of course. Most of them were for American movies; I remember one was for Men in Black and it was really weird hearing Will Smith's voice dubbed in French especially since it didn't sound like him at all. Actually it was weird to hear all the English-speaking movie stars dubbed with another voice. After the previews, the lights came on again and an employee came in wearing a box around his neck that held boxes of candies that he was selling - kind of like you see at a baseball game. I wasn't planning on buying any refreshments, so I really hadn't noticed there wasn't a concession stand. Again, I don't know if it's like this in all French/European theaters, or this was just a rare case. So the movie starts and the entire thing is in French and there are no subtitles to be found. Keep in mind we have had only one or two years of French so of course we have no clue what is happening. (And when I did see the movie a couple years later, I still had no idea what was going on!) We were so bored - a couple of my friends ended up falling asleep. Finally, in the middle of the movie, someone suggested we leave, so we did. When we returned to the hotel we were staying at, our French teacher was pissed at us because we came back after the curfew and hadn't told her where we were going. Whoops.