Just finished watching Contact, along with the audio commentary by Robert Zemeckis (director) and Steve Starkey (producer). Damn, that is some amazing stuff! Watching commentary tracks, I learn so much about how the movie was made, the reasons and ideas behind all sorts of aspects of the production, what life was like on the sets when shots were filmed, etc etc etc. I think I buy these things almost as much for all the commentaries and other extra shit as I do for the movies themselves. lol.

So much subtlety, so many things put into the production, the set decorations, costume choices, lighting decisions, reasons behind the director's decisions of when to pan, when to push in, and when to cut away. I just find it all so incredible that they would take such pains to perfect things that 99.9% of the viewers will never notice or care about. Like the recurring painting on Ellie's wall in the background, an almost exact replica of the image of the quad-star solar system she would later discover on her journey. Subliminal foreshadowing I never noticed -- and probably never would have -- until it was explicitly pointed out. But it was there, along with about a zillion other little touches ya never even think about when watching. It's hard not to marvel at the sheer genius -- the attention to detail they put into movies. Of course, Contact is hardly just any movie. :)

One thing I've found I sort of enjoy doing is to get a DVD movie, watch the movie first, of course, then watch some or all of the special features (depending on how many there are). Then the next day, watch the movie again with commentary. If there is more than one commentary track, then I leave it for a week or two, and then come back and watch another commentary track. It proves to be a most enjoyable use of my time (which might be one reason I've gotten so little done on improving this web page [bashful grin]).

Back. Had to leave for a second there. Then got distracted. Anyway...

Some people have recommended Netflicks as a good place to go to satiatie those DVD cravings. I'm presently hesitant to go with such a service. While I've heard the service is great and everything, it just doesn't seem to fit my nature. Paying a flat rate of $20 bucks a month to watch as many movies as the postal service can keep up with does sound intriguing, and maybe it's good for some people.

But I'm this way: If there is a movie, I really, really like, I'd rather just buy and keep it. I might want to come back and watch a week, a month, a year from now. Like I sometimes do with my old cds. I make it a policy never to sell my old cds, because every once in a great while, I just want to go back and listen to something I bought 10 years ago. Maybe it was something I liked, listened to incessantly for six months, and then I just got tired of it and put it away. But when I go back to listen to it, I can reclaim that part of my life. Sometimes an old song will even conjure up memories I had forgotten existed.

And maybe it's just this thing where I'd rather own something than pay a bunch of money just to have to send it back. (see also)

If it's a movie I'm just curious about, or want to watch just once or twice and then never see it again, the video store down street is much more amicable to my impatient, temperamental tastes.

Anyway, I'm definately babbling. It's a lazy day, so I think I'll take a nap now.