David O. Russell Dreams

That sounds real creepy, don’t it? A dream I had last night had me and a group of friends going to the movies to watch what I’m guessing was a David O. Russell movie. I had the same uneasy feeling in my gut that I get when I’m getting ready to see a David O. Russell movie for the first time. Is it going to be more like the genius that is Flirting with Disaster and I Heart Huckabees or more like the horror that is American Hustle or Silver Linings Playbook?

We start having a conversation about Star Wars where I proclaim that I don’t understand how anyone watching the original film now can even take it halfway seriously. It’s a completely referential piece of self-indulgent filmwork much akin to Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy.

We are talking about this quite loudly even as the previews start up. It is then an usher comes back and tells me that I have to leave the theater for causing a disturbance. I tell him that it’s ridiculous, the movie hadn’t even started yet and that I will keep quiet. I stay.

The movie is pretty awful. All I see is Bradley Cooper’s stupid grinning mug — it’s almost like the Richard James’s mug on the kids in Aphex Twin’s Come to Daddy video but nowhere near as creepy. I fall asleep in fits during the movie. I also remember wondering why people insist in being quiet during movies. How boring is that?

Right before Thanksgiving, I had another dream where I was at a screening in some film club where I was also being shushed. I tend to talk during movies at home, but at a theater I’m always well behaved. So what does this all mean?