The Josh Innes Show - A Day At The Cinema

Episode Date: September 18, 2024

Well, this wasn't my intention, but here I am ranting about my experience at the movie theater. Jilly and I went to see "The Killers Game". I actually thought it was pretty entertaining. But, some things happened that make me call in to question how some people handle movie theater etiquette. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Alcohol and select markets. See app for details. Howdy, Jamokes. How are you? It's Josh. Good to chat with you folks again. Went to the movies last night because it's the $6 Tuesday at the Marcus Cinemas here, a local chain.

I guess more of a regional chain. They bought up all the movie theaters that I used to go to when I was a kid. So when I was younger, I lived in Springfield, Missouri for a couple years. My dad was on the radio there. And we used to go to this movie theater called the Warenberg Cinema. And that was like a big kind of regional chain of theaters. A lot of them in Missouri and in St. and Springfield, and other places in Missouri. And they had this epic intro. Back when movie theaters and their chains used to have the big intros before movies. And it was like this long, like, orchestral song. Like, ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba, Warenburg Theaters. And it would be like pitch black in there for like five minutes, it seemed like. I miss when movie theaters did that. Do you remember Cinemark?

So Cinemark owned like the chain of theaters. Like, Tinseltown was one of their big ones. And I think they still have a couple of Cinemark theaters in Houston. There's a Cinemark that's, is it off of 290? I think there's a Cinemark off 290. I think it's a Tinseltown. It may be closed now. I don't know.

I think that's where I saw the reboot of Nightmare on Elm Street, which was a terrible movie. But there was that one. And I want to say that there's also a Cinemark out in that town center type of deal that's out in the woodlands by the mall. So there's the mall in the woodlands, and then there's that whole little area that's like an outdoor shopping center that looks like a little downtown, like an old school downtown. And I want to say that there's a Cinemark theater in there as well. Actually, you know what? Come to think of it, I think the theater in the Memorial City Mall in Houston is also a Cinemark.

Not that any of this matters. I don't know that anybody's listening to this podcast like, boy, I'm really interested in hearing about theater chains. Other than our friend Demir, who runs the movie theater at the Marquis. Other than that, I don't think anybody would care about this. But when I was a kid in Baton Rouge, Tinseltown was a very popular movie theater, and it was a Cinemark, and their mascot was like this cat, and this cat would come on the screen before the shows and would sing and dance and stuff. I forgot what the hell his name was, like an MC Scat Cat or some shit. I forgot who he

was. But he would come on the screen and he would sing a song. And the song was, hey, let's party. Let's rock. We got tickets to Cinemark. Do, do, blue, do, and don't have the babies crying. There's tickets to the Cinemark. Something like that. Fun fact. I think somebody got murdered in the parking lot of the tinsel town in baton rouge and uh and then they eventually shut it down they bulldoze it to the ground and on its old old land is a top golf actually come to think of it i used to go to okay i'll get into other shit here in a second but when when I was younger, I used to go to Tinseltown a lot because my dad's friend, Claude, who was like an airbrush artist, would do characters like on Fridays and Saturdays over at Tinseltown. And he would just bring me with him.

Me and my buddies would go with him. And we'd go see movies for free and shit. And one day I was in there taking a leak. I was probably 14, 15 years old. And I swear this happened. I'm not making this up. This is not for dramatic effect. I'm not saying this because I'm trying to, you know,

just make the story more interesting. This is how I remembered it, okay? I'm in the urinal. It's a big bathroom. And it's got, like, the black and white checkered floors. Like, it looks like old school, like over the top old school Hollywood look, you know? And, um, that was the whole point of Tinseltown. And I'm in there taking a leak at the urinal and just some guy walks in and whispers, I'm going to kill you. And I was scared shitless.

I ran my ass out of there, like zip my dick into my shorts and I go, you know, I don't know if that actually happened, but that's how I remembered it. I mean, like, like why would that stick with me? 20 some odd years later? Like I didn't make it up. I'm in the bathroom. I'm taking a leak. I'm at the urinal. And the guy, uh, the guy says, I'm going to kill you. It's kind of like whistling when he walked in. He's like, yeah, I'm going, I'm going to kill you. And maybe he wasn't going to kill me. Maybe it was a goof. Maybe I was getting initiated into some weird gang. I don't fucking know. But that's how I remember it happening. It did happen that way. But as you can tell by listening to this podcast, I'm still alive.

I'm still here. But anyway, all that to tell you that it was $6 night at the movie theater last night. So everybody in town is at the movie theater, at these Marcus Cinemas, because on Tuesdays you get $6 movie tickets and free small popcorn and sody pop. So it's really a good deal. And speaking of, I've never seen this anywhere else. Maybe it's because I don't go to the movies a ton anymore.

The people of Missouri, way too many of them bring blankets and pillows to the movies. And I get that we're in big, fluffy, comfortable seats now, and it's like a different world than it was 15, 20 years ago when seats were really uncomfortable. Now it's recliners, and some of them are heated. And I get all that. But adult people should not be bringing blankets and pillows to the movie. We used to be a decent country. Men used to wear suits and fedoras to ball games and ladies used to wear big beautiful hats and dresses. Now dipshits go to the movie theater bringing their whole house with them. And by the way, and I say this

as someone who's on my phone a lot and like I'll find myself at ball games more so on my phone than watching the game. But that's okay because there's no rule at a ball game that says don't be on your phone. It's not dark at the ball game. Like it's understood that a baseball game is three hours and sometimes you're going to look at your phone and you're going to text and you're going to place bets and there's going to be a bunch of shit happening there is a rule at the cinema that says don't use your phone during the film i'd say there were four or five people in this theater last night i went to see the killers game which by the way batista the rasslers in it um i actually dug it apparently no one else in the world did because it made no money but it was just frivolous

shoot em up fun that I enjoyed very much and I would encourage you to go see it I liked it a lot like I liked it more than Beetlejuice real talk I liked Killers Game more than Beetlejuice Beetlejuice was a letdown to me I was expecting greatness it was fine Killers Game I

go in expecting nothing. I'm seeing shoot-em-ups and wacky shit and fun kills and all that. Really good, fun time. I'm not telling you it's the greatest movie I've ever seen. I'm not telling you that it was even really a good movie per se, but it was an enjoyable cinematic experience. So I would urge you to go see it. But even me, someone who's on my phone nonstop, like I'm the worst better and driver, I'm not proud of that, but I do that all the time. I'm on my phone nonstop.

Try to watch a TV show at home, nonstop on my phone. Jilly's bitching, why are you on your phone? Why are you on your phone? I am on my phone all the time, with the exception, dude, I shower with my phone. I get in the shower dude I shower with my phone I get in the shower and I scroll Twitter while I'm in the shower I have problems I don't know what to tell you this is just what I do like like I used to make fun of like I used to see like these these old fat women at the beach who would bring their phone into the ocean with them but they put it in like this

plastic zippy bag that they would wear around their neck. I'm like, who the fuck needs their phone that much? Then I look at myself and I'm like, Josh, you're literally in the shower, showering with your phone. You have no room to talk. But the one place I do not get on my phone, once the previews start, and I love previews. Everybody loves to go to the cinema. There's a new Terrifier coming out and I've never watched the Terrifier, but I've seen the memes and shit on Instagram, and I was always wondering where this clown's from. Well, apparently it's from the Terrifier,

and now I kind of want to watch the first two and then watch this new one, but I digress. So I'm in the theater, and like five, six, seven people, and it's not a huge theater. It's filled with people, but there's not a ton in there. It's one of the smaller theaters. And at least five or six people are on their phones. And even though they dim the screen, you see that they're on the phone. And in the row right in front of us, there was this woman. And it's one thing if like you check your phone. Like, oh, I got a text.

I'll check it really quick. Or maybe there's a situation at home where oh I got a text I'll check it really quick or maybe there's a situation at home where she's got a sick kid maybe she's got a kid that's dying in the hospital and to take her mind off of it she decided to spend an hour and 45 minutes on six dollar Tuesday at the Marcus cinema seeing Batista shoot a bunch of dopes maybe that's how she distracts herself from that. And maybe she was waiting for a message from somebody to say, hey, little Kara's dead, or she pulled through. I don't know. But all I know is that this woman spent the entire film on her phone. And look, I'm guilty of this. Some people would say, Josh, why do you go to a ball

game if you're literally going to be on your phone at the ball game the entire time your point's valid however there is no rule that states that when you go to the ball game you cannot have your phone like literally 10 times before a movie starts the fellow will come on the screen and say turn off your phone even that cat that we talked about from cinemark earlier in this show he would come on the fucking thing this is before cell phones were even a big deal and say silence your phones and don't talk yet what happens people talk like you hear people's conversations at the theater and of course you get the typical like commenting on the damn movie during the movie shut up and watch the film. Stop asking questions. But also, this woman.

So back to this woman who, by the way, brought a blanket to the cinema as well. So she brought the blanket. She had a little pillow. Had a little blanket. Her husband, I guess her husband, that poor soul, is sitting next to her. He's watching Batista shoot some motherfuckers. It's a good time. And she's sitting over there.

And I find myself distracted by it. Like in a Larry David way where I almost wanted to tap her on the shoulder and Larry David the situation. If this were like old school movie theaters where you could really just like reach two feet and touch someone and be like, hey, why are you on your phone? I may have. But since we're in a stadium seating and recliners, it was a more difficult move. But I really felt like tapping her on the shoulder and being like, ma'am, you've been on your phone the entirety of this movie. I have watched you check your Instagram. And by the way, I find it hard to believe that you have enough friends whose stories you need to check on Instagram. Therefore, you're just scrolling through and seeing what Taylor Swift

is up to on her story or what Neil Patrick Harris is up to on his story. Those people don't know you. They don't care about you. But she would go to her Instagram. She'd hit stories. Scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, stories, like, scroll, scroll. Then she'd get bored with Instagram and she'd go to Facebook. And then she'd start commenting on people's Facebook posts. Now it's more realistic that she knew a lot more people

on Facebook because Facebook is where sad souls go to act like they have a bunch of friends and where old people go to read onion stories and believe them. So she goes there, starts commenting. So I'm kind of watching Batista shoot some mofos. Then I look down and this basic down here is wrapped up in her blanket because, oh, my God, we're in the Arctic. It's the Arctic in the movie theater. My God, we must have a blanket. It's so cold. We're sitting out at Lambeau Field in subzero temperatures. It's the ice bowl.

We got to have a blanket at the movie theater. So she's scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, comment. Then she goes to her text messages where she gets into a long text conversation with somebody and they're going back and forth. Now this person never takes the time to go like, hey, Sally, are you at the movies? Maybe you should watch Bautista shoot these henchmen. But no, they just carry on a conversation. Then she's back to the Instagram stories. Scroll, scroll, like, like, scroll. But then I think the best thing this woman did

is then she goes to Amazon and she starts making Amazon purchases. And I'm stewing over this. I'm half watching the movie, but I'm so enraged by the idea that somebody would come to the cinema. Look, I'm a big movie theater guy. I respect the sanctity of the cinema. I grew up, that's all I used to do as a kid. My dad would bring me to work with him in Baton Rouge and we worked over in City Place. And we worked at 5555 Hilton Avenue, technically

it might have been Corporate Boulevard. I think it's technically the address of the movie theater. You could walk a couple of streets over and there's a whole shopping center with a Barnes & Noble where I used to sit my fat ass in that Barnes & Noble every day and read Leonard Maltin's movie review books and everything. That's how I learned about all these movies. Then I'd go to one of the little restaurants over there, and Dad would give me a couple of bucks to get some food. Then I would go see movies at the City Place Theater

back before it was overrun by hoods and gangbangers. Back when it was a safe place to go, I'd go to the City Place Theater, and in that theater I saw so many movies, like Rush Hour and Rush Hour 2 and Grease when it was re-released in 1997 or 1998 for its 20th anniversary. I sat in there and I did Grease Lightning with all the other Jim Oaks in there. I saw so many movies at that movie theater. Dumb and Dumber When Harry Met Lloyd in that movie theater. Varsity Blues in that movie theater.

Not Another Teen Movie in that movie theater. I've seen so many classics. When Freddie met Jason, it's not when Harry met Sally. Freddie versus Jason when Freddie met Jason. Hey, bitch, sometimes when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. But I saw Freddy vs. Jason in that movie.

I've seen so many movies in that movie theater. So I went to that theater. I respect movie theaters. And as you know, one of my weird quirks and hobbies, I'm into old school movie theaters. Whatever. I'm planning to go see Christmas Vacation at the Fabulous Fox Theater here in St. Louis.

Classic, you know, now it's a Broadway place. Old school cinema palace. And they're doing a showing of Christmas Vacation with Chevy Chase in attendance. He will be answering questions. So I will be attending. I love movies. I respect film. And I will be attending. I love movies.

I respect film. And I respect the people that make the films. And I respect the movie-going experience. Because that's what I grew up with. I love going to movies. I can't watch a movie at home. I suck because at home, I'll end up on my phone. But at the movies, there's an understood rule. There are rules that one must abide by when

you're in the cinema and one of them is put your fucking phone down and watch the film but karen here couldn't do that she couldn't be bothered to watch batista shoot all these anonymous henchmen and try to you know save the life of his lady couldn't do that she couldn't be bothered she couldn't be phased by that instead she had to order tampons or whatever the fuck she was ordering on amazon like god i guess i guess this can't wait 25 minutes until the movie's over i must go to Amazon and buy a crock pot. I have to. And I was so tempted. I was so tempted to tell this woman, like, I just wanted to know why. Like, I didn't want to admonish her for it. I didn't want to be someone that's like, hey,

ma'am, respect the movie. Like, I didn't want to be that person. I think you can do that to the talking person in the theater. Like, you could be like, hey, shut the fuck up. Like, when we went to see Beetlejuice, there was a group of kids that went to see the movie i say kids they're probably teenagers five or six of them sitting behind us and they would not stop fucking talking until right around the time the credits were over at the beginning of the movie and i said all right i'm not gonna say anything i don't want to be that guy because i've also been that teenage kid in the movie theater that the adults were probably furious over. So I get it. I try to put myself in that situation.

I don't want to be that guy that's the dude that's yelling at the young kids because I'm a 38 year old guy. I'm a couple of years away from really being an old guy. I don't want to be considered the old guy. I want to be the cool old guy that's like, hey, kids are having a good time at the theater. Let's put some cherry bombs in a fucking mailbox and let's get nuts i don't want people to view me as some sort of stodgy old bastard now if they would have kept talking during the cinema i would have might have told them to shut the fuck up but they didn't

they respected the sanctity of the motion picture house as they should but this woman wouldn't do that she spent the entire movie on her phone, Instagram, Facebook, emails, text messages, all curled up in a fucking blanket. Oh, and then Amazon, where she ordered some shit on Amazon. I watched her. She went in. It's in the cart. Order. it's in the cart order one of these days i think i'm gonna my guard will be let down and i will have no qualms with just larry daviding people the entire time like i will find myself i am a

social assassin it's like i'm like i want to know why just tell me why tell me why you even came to the movies today tell me why you decided to bring your fat ass in here with your little blankets and your sody pops. You spent the money on the ticket and the popcorn. Why did you come to this movie theater to sit? Like, that's the part that bothers me about shit. Not that they do it. It's like, I want to know why, like what made you decide like at this very moment that you're like, I'm going to go to the theater and I'm going to spend the entire time on my phone. It's the same that I feel about people that bring babies to the movies. I'll tell you about a time that really stood out to me. It goes back to the Cinemark.

I guess it would have been the Tinseltown on 290. I think in that same parking lot is like a Hooters and everything. In fact, I think the 290 Hooters may have caught on fire when me and Rich were doing a show there once. I think that was the Hooters. Like one day we're doing a Hooters broadcast and a fire starts and we had to leave and drive back to the station. I think that happened. I know that a fire happened somewhere. I think it was the 290 Hooters.

But that's neither here nor there. So I'm at the theater and the the the new uh nightmare on elm street 2010 nightmare on elm street the remake of it which was god awful totally not memorable kelly leak was uh playing the role of freddy everything about it sucked other than rooney mara who i find to be quite alluring although she seems like she'd be very weird and would hate me but both of the mara chicks pretty hot i I was watching some, uh, I was watching randomly yesterday. I'm watching chap aquatic. It popped up on prime. I had been watching some other thing, like a documentary about the rat pack, which by the way, all these guys in the rat pack seem like real cock bags, like real schmucks, but whatever other than Sammy Davis jr. He seemed kind of

likable, but the rest of them were just like mobsters and dipshits and everything. And they got their comeuppance eventually, but either way. so i'm watching this and it suggests chappaquiddick which i had actually seen at an old movie theater here in uh st louis called the tavoli which is now owned by a church so now it's a church but it used to be a classic you know a landmark type of theater uh like a river oaks type of theater over in the Del Mar Loop that we went to see this movie 10 years ago, me and Jilly did, just so I could say I went to this theater before we lived here. But I've turned Chappaquiddick on, and then Kate Mara, I think it was Kate Mara was in it. Was it Kate? No? Yeah, it was. Okay. So Kate Mara and Rooney Mara. And I think both

of them are alluring. Kate Mara was in the movie about the Marshall team playing the We Are Marshall with McConaughey and then Rooney Morrow's in the social network where she dumped Zuckerberg at the beginning of the movie. I find her to be alluring, whatever. How the hell did I get on? Oh, because Rooney Morrow was in Nightmare on Elm Street, the reboot, and it was terrible.

So I'm at this theater. I want to say me and Ben went to see the new Nightmare on Elm Street in 2010. It's before I knew Jelly, really. And we go, and these two women bring in an infant. Like this little infant is in a car seat. And they bring him into the movie, and this baby just keeps crying.

And look, I don't think your life should be over because you have a child. I'm not a believer in this. Like if you have a child, like you should still get to live your life. But there are certain things you are not allowed to do when you have an infant. You do lose some of those rights. And one of the rights you lose when you have an infant and you don't have anybody to watch that infant is you can't go to the cinema. There's no reason that a baby, an infant should be in the home of the motion pictures. You want to take a baby to the mall, put them in a stroller by all means. You want to take them to a ball game. Seems kind of stupid, but by all means. You want to go to

Walmart? I hesitate on this one, but if you want to go to a restaurant, which restaurant kind of falls into the movie theater category for me. Nobody wants to hear a child crying at a restaurant. They certainly don't want to hear them in a movie. You want to bring a child on a plane? That's also kind of dickish, but hey, you got to get from point a to point b so i'm not going to be as angry about that but you don't bring a baby to the cinema so i'm watching old fred krueger hack people up in their dreams all the while listening to this probably four month old baby cry the whole damn time i wanted to walk down there and ask them why are you doing this ma'am i want to tap her on the shoulder and be like, ma'am, look, I don't know if this pregnancy was planned. I don't know if you wanted this baby or not.

I'm not judging either way. Hey, do what you do. But like, help me understand. Walk me through this. made you decide that it was a good idea that on this here Saturday at two in the afternoon, you were going to just put the four-month-old baby in the car and say, you know what we're going to do today? We're going to see the new nightmare on Elm Street. What made you do that? Why did you make that decision? Also, I don't understand putting butter on popcorn. I'm just Seinfelding this now

But I think butter on popcorn is gross It's too rich and it makes it soggy I like the popcorn salt You gotta have the popcorn salt at the movie theater Also, this movie theater had Pepsi Pleasant surprise I like Pepsi So, really, I like Pepsi Zero

I try not to drink too much Sodipop Because it's all filled with shuggies But, you know, I'm not perfect. So I got a little sody pop to share with my lady last night. A little popcorn. God, nothing feels worse than when you have this giant bucket of popcorn and you're just like, Jesus, I feel compelled to eat this

whole thing. Because I could have gotten the free popcorn, which is a really small bag. And I'm thinking, well, I know I'm going to want more sody pop than this. I mean, I can't just drink a child sody pop at the cinema cinema. I'm an adult and I got another person. We're two adults here. We can't eat a child's popcorn and a child's sody pop, right? So then what you do is you get a special discount on the Tuesdays for the big popcorn and the big sody pop. It's only 12 bucks. So at the end of the day, you spent $24 for two movie tickets, a giant popcorn and a giant sody

pop, which isn't bad considering that when I went to see the Kevin Smith movie by myself on Friday, the 4.30 movie, which was fine, I ended up spending $37 to see the movie and get popcorn and sody pop on my own. So 24 for two people to get a big popcorn, a big sody pop, and two movie tickets actually isn't all that bad. But then you feel like you have to eat the whole damn thing. You sit there and you're like, should I eat this entire pop? I mean, like I paid for it. Why would I waste it? So like, it's almost like you're doing a food challenge, like a man versus food where you have to eat that

entire popcorn or you feel like you got hosed because you're not going to bring it home with you. What asshole brings the popcorn home? You know, so you just sit there and like, oh, and usually here's how I go. I don't pace myself well with the popcorn at the cinema. What I end up doing is during the wait for the previews to start, then the previews happening. I probably eat three fourths of the popcorn and drink three fourths of the soda while I watch the eight previews to start, then the previews happening. I probably eat three-fourths of the popcorn and drink three-fourths of the soda while I watch the eight previews. And then the previews I saw last night, none of them looked intriguing to me other than The Terrifier.

The rest of, like, I don't care about Captain America. I don't watch superhero movies or Megalopolis. That doesn't look interesting to me either. I forgot the one movie that I thought looked interesting. But there were literally eight previews. And I like previews, but you've got to give me something I want to see. And then you can't. And we've gotten into this discussion.

What you cannot do is play the whole damn movie in the preview. Like what happened with Beetlejuice. Real talk. Hashtag real talk. Beetlejuice put all the good Beetlejuice shit in the Beetlejuice real talk hashtag real talk Beetlejuice put all the good Beetlejuice shit in the Beetlejuice trailer and that's why I disliked it the good news is we got the Joker coming up the bad news is I have spent 27 minutes breaking down my experience at the movie theater last night so you're probably listening to this like what the fuck bro you're gonna talk about Jose Altuve getting tossed and getting hit in the foot and taken off his shoe and the bad umpires.

I can get into that. What about Dion being a wacko? I got thoughts on Dion as well, but here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to post this one now. So you guys have this one ready to go. I got to get a haircut today as well. I'm very busy. I'm going to Baton Rouge in New Orleans this weekend, going to see the Tigers and the Saints. I haven't had a Tiger Saints weekend in 100 years. It's a big deal for me. So I'm going to let you listen to this one. I'll pump out another one here soon as well. I love you guys.