I love stupid comedies

I guarantee, I walked out of every single one of these movies happier than I ever have been as an adult.

The Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey stub is from the Merrit Square Mall "North" theatre on Merrit Island, FL. When visiting my grandparents there, going to this movie theatre was one of the only ways to keep from turning inside out as a result of sustained boredom. I look back on this with a wince of regret because adult me wishes I had spent more time talking with my grandfather before he passed away. But ten year old me lacked this perspective and, really, any emotional maturity, therefore spending an hour and a half with time traveling idiots who give Death a wedgie seemed far more appealing than spending even five minutes with my family. Ah, who am I kidding... put in the same situation today, I would still probably go see Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. I'm not that much more mature, and any mortality-linked perspectives will still lose out to my desire for cheap laughs and a projected movie show.

Understand, I was really into Bill & Ted. I ate their breakfast cereal, and used the cassette tape case that came with it to carry around my Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey soundtrack cassette (in 1991 it was probably sharing that 3-cassette space with the Ghostbuster's II and Back to the Future III soundtracks...)

Things are scarier in 3D?

These are the the 3D glasses that were handed to my dad and I upon purchase of two tickets to see 1991's Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (a title contradicted by New Nightmare, Freddy vs. Jason, and the upcoming Nightmare on Elm Street remake). My dad rarely would go out to see movies, but having grown up during what Wikipedia refers to as 3D's initial "revival" age, he was intrigued by the gimmick. And I needed someone over 18 to buy me (then 10 or 11) a ticket, so we both had an excuse to head down to CNN Center and experience Freddy in 3D.

Here's a detail of the glasses that shows the really specific directions which are presented as a rather stern warning:


Try reading the text with a voice in your head and give proper emphasis to the bold words. Kind of odd, right?

It's such a stupid movie, I even thought so then. Only about five minutes at the end are in 3D, and it mostly consists of crudely animated worm things that are anthropomorphizations of Freddy's evil... or something like that. I barely remember at this point, and I have little desire to revisit the movie. I don't think I saw a 3D movie again until Spy Kids 3D aka Headache Island vs. Steve Buscemi on a Flying Pig and also Ricardo Montalban is There.

The fact that James Cameron, et al are giving 3D another push is comical to the point of absurdity. Maybe this time things will pan out differently, and audiences will really embrace the gimmick, driving up movie studio profits and getting people back out to the theatre in droves. I think having a good 3D movie would certainly help things, but unless Avatar is as good as or better than Aliens or Terminator 2 (I don't have to see it to definitively say it won't be), 3D will go the way of... well 3D... and 3D before it.

Lest we forget what time does to pop culture, particularly something as whimsical and fickle as popular cinema, here are some more details from the glasses. Details that amuse me much more than any memories I have of seeing the movie that brought this relic into my life.





So before you spend too much of your day thinking about what Kanye West said or did, remember, today's star is tomorrow's Kid 'n' Play. But y'all knew that fame is fleeting, I just wanted an excuse to type "Kid 'n' Play." ... I bet Suburban Commando is as good as I remember it being...

All about me

These things were in my ticket collection for some reason. The back of the soccer "trading card" says I was #21 on the Lean Green Soccer Machine in 1991, played Right Forward (really? I remember being short, chubby and on defense for most of my soccer playing days?), was 10 years old, 4 ft 8, and 85 lbs.

I have no idea what the stain on the lunch card is...

Importance of Seeing Ernest

The only thing I can make out on this ticket is "Ernest." I think, it being a Cineplex Odeon stub, that it is either from Lenox Mall or from the theatre that was in CNN Center. I'm guessing it's either Ernest Scared Stupid or Ernest Goes to Jail.

Dinamation!

What kid doesn't love dinosaurs? What kid doesn't love the zoo? This must've been a great day: animatronic dinosaurs and gorillas. This was the closest I ever got to going to an actual Jurassic Park.

Why the name "Age of the Living Dinosaurs" though? "Age of the Dinosaurs" would be enough, but sounds too educational. I suppose calling it just "Living Dinosaurs" could get them in trouble for false advertising. "Age of the Living Dinosaurs" makes it sound like zombies are going to be involved. Has anyone made a dinosaur zombie movie yet? Don't.

Uncontrollable Urge

Most people probably don't know that I collect ticket stubs. I must have started when I was around eight years old or so. I'm not sure what spawned the habit, but I've pretty carefully held onto every tiny piece of paper detritus from each movie, sporting event, or concert I've been to since 1988. The only exception is Seattle's Landmark Theatres' ticket stubs, which are printed on flimsy receipt paper, and are hardly worth saving.

I've been meaning to scan these ticket stubs into a digital format before they fade away or disappear. For over a decade they collected in a little wicker basket in my bedroom, but I've since relocated them to Ziploc freezer bags in a shoebox. Somewhere in an attic in Atlanta, my earliest stubs are collected in a scrapbook.

Tonight while I was on the phone with my mom, she mentioned that her and my dad took me to a Devo concert in 1982. I immediately remembered a ticket stub: one that I found amongst my parents' things (and horded for my own collection) decades ago. This inspired me to finally get this idea going.



I have no memory of being at this concert (give me a break, I had just turned 2), but I'm told I enjoyed it. Thanks, Devo. With most stubs I will try and post some sort of memory, even if it's just who I was with and what I remember. Like when Jordan Smith and I saw Metallica in 1992 from a "pit" in the center of their circular stage at the Omni:



This is Jordan and I on Halloween (probably 1999). In the background you can see the aforementioned wicker basket as well as my discontinued Coca-Cola bottle and can collection, and an odd collection of posters that reflected my interests at the time.



I plan on randomly pulling a few ticket stubs a week and posting them here until I get bored with it, or I am told to stop. Of course, not everything I pull will have a personal story with it. For instance:




I never went to Lollapalooza. And I certainly would have remembered seeing Poison. I'm just such a packrat that at some point I found these ticket stubs on the ground, picked them up, and added them to my stockpile. Weird, right?

Speaking of weird, I was at this show: