You know, it gets less and less worth not waiting until things come out on DVD. Yesterday the kids and I went to the new Marquee Theatre in Toms River. Yeah, new is nice, but it wasn’t as nice as I was hoping. They claimed to have stadium seating, but it was actually somewhere in between regular seating and the stadium seating I’d gotten used to at the Clifton Commons. My view might not have been blocked by a tall guy in front of me, but his hair would stick up into the picture. I’m not sure if it was worth the extra dollar in ticket price and the extra driving (we could walk to the AMC Seacourt Plaza if we wanted).

But, we were at the movies, and that was good. The large popcorn was actually large, and we settled in for the 12:15 show of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Now here’s where my irritation really started. There was a commercial for an ABC “Family” show (about a frat house!). A long commercial recruiting for the National Guard. A commercial for laundry detergent. A commercial for fabric softener. A commercial for Yahoo. A commercial for Sprint. Another commercial for another ABC “Family” show (I wasn’t paying attention at this point, but it still seemed a bit unlike family fare.) Three previews. The movie actually started at 12:38. You know, when you spend over $40 to see a matinee, you shouldn’t have to watch commercials. I know I’m fighting a losing battle here in a day when even educational materials have corporate sponsors, and every entertainment concept is a movie, book, TV show, kids’ meal toy, sheet set, video game, breakfast cereal, etc., simultaneously. I hate tie-ins, I hate coupons that require the purchase of several items, I hate billboards, I hate supermarket checkout TVs. I hate being sold to all the time, and especially when I’ve already bought something. Leave me the F alone or I’ll F’in boycott your product. (Not quite infuriated enough to spell out the whole word, you can see!)

Now, the movie itself was enjoyable moreso than not. It did have the disclaimer at the end “Based on the book by J.K. Rowlings”, which was good because some of the editorial choices made it quite different from the book. I usually forget so much of a book after a while that I don’t see as many of the differences as some people do. (Notable exceptions: Dune, Ella Enchanted) However, a good deal of what was on the screen, visually, matched how I imagined it as I was reading it, so it triggered memories of what was supposed to happen next. When it didn’t, or it happened differently, it jarred. The screen adaptation might have to be changed for the next movie to keep it consistent with the changes made in this one.

I might go back and read the books in order again. Hubby is expecting his copy of Deathly Hallows to be delivered from Amazon today, and nobody else in the family is allowed to disturb him or touch the book until he’s finished. heh. I could use the opportunity to go back and refresh my memory. And one day we might do a movie marathon of the whole series. After they’re all out on DVD, so we can enjoy the experience of being entertained without feeling like marketing vultures are circling above us waiting to eat us up.