Diary of a BNAT Survivor, Part Two

When we last left my BNAT Diary, I had returned to Metropolis with the loud crazy 1980s soundtrack, feeling hungry but not too tired.

12:05 am: For reasons I cannot understand now, I order a steak sandwich. At midnight. I forgot that I'm not the kind of person who can munch steak sandwiches and fries with impunity in the middle of the night. Fortunately I am the kind of person who keeps antacids in her purse. (Note to Alamo: It would be really super-cool to offer cold cereal and milk after, say, 10 pm.)

12:15 am: Metropolis ends and Harry compares False Evil Maria to Sarah Palin. "So far this BNAT seems fairly rebellious." (This turns out to be a hint.)

12:16 am: A few clips from the first half-hour of the 3D movie Monsters vs. Aliens. On with the glasses. The director, Conrad Vernon, is here to set up the scenes. When he tells us that the U.S. President is voiced by Stephen Colbert, the audience applauds loudly.

1:15 am: We're advised not to take off our glasses, as the next movie is the My Bloody Valentine remake, in 3D. The director tells us they just finished this cut last Wednesday, and we're the first audience to see it. The whole movie, not excerpts.

I'm not a big fan of horror movies designed to make you jump out of your seat, but if you're going to watch that kind of film, cheesy 3D is the way to go. Eyeballs popping out at you, and pickaxes, and flying debris -- much more entertaining than I would have expected.

2:45 am: The director returns with actresses Jaime King and Megan Boone for a Q&A. Ms. King is attending all of Butt-Numb-a-Thon; her husband is a regular attendee, and she's never had time to do it until this year.

3:00 am: Sleepytime for me, I can tell. Hoping that Jarod's prediction is wrong and the next movie is something vintage that I've seen or can see later on DVD.

3:10 am: It's I Love You, Man, starring Paul Rudd. I don't understand how Jason figured that out. (On Monday night, when I learn it's the SXSW opening-night film, light dawns.) Paul Rudd is always keeping me from sleep ... I stayed up until 3 am enjoying him at the Role Models screening at Fantastic Fest (photo on right).

3:12 am: A video intro before the film features Paul Rudd, Jason Biggs, and etc. all saying hi and wishing Harry a happy birthday. Did Paul Rudd just LICK the camera lens?

3:45 am: Hey. Didn't I say earlier this week that I'd seen quite enough barfing in movies this year?

I Love You, Man has a fairly contrived storyline, but is very funny. Funnier than Role Models, in my opinion. Funnier than Forgetting Sarah Marshall, except for that hilarious bit with the Dracula puppet musical.

5:00 am: As the credits roll, Alamo hands out bottles of Miller High Life and invites us to perform the act in the film that caused my 3:45 am comment. I'm a good sport and manage to drink about a third of the bottle, slowly (to avoid the pitfall encountered in that scene), then hand it off to a neighbor to chug. Not as bad as I would have guessed.

5:08 am: I was surprisingly alert during I Love You, Man ("Funny enough to keep a 40-year-old wussygirl awake at 4 am!" --Jette Kernion, Cinematical), but I'm about to drop.

5:10 am: Next film will be Sam Fuller's White Dog. Damn it, I've been wanting to see this for years. Fortunately, Harry notes that Criterion just released the movie on DVD. Good. If I fall asleep, there's a way to watch it later.

5:12 am: Attempt to rearrange the blanket to make it more cushiony. I need a bigger pillow to sit on. Ow.

5:13 am: Trailers before White Dog: Beastmaster 2, CHOMPS, and an vintage movie-theater ad for "Texas-Size Concessions." Also, a faded-pink trailer for The Secret of Magic Island, which includes "a villainous space-age monkey."

5:50 am: zzzzzzz

6:00 am: Ow. There's a reason it's called BNAT. Out to the lobby intending to nap on a comfy ottoman, but end up outside on the patio, chit-chatting with Tiffany Sullivan. I run into Jarod, who is on his way out ... sick child at home. Poor guy.

6:20 am: Bathroom, to change various items of clothing, brush teeth, and freshen up before the movie ends and a lot of other women crowd the sinks with the same idea.

6:30 am: Back in the theater just as an intro is starting onscreen -- a guy I don't know telling me we're about to see two scenes from Push, in which he co-stars with Dakota Fanning. A whole line of aquariums exploding under someone's psychic power. Maybe it's because I'm tired, but Fanning seems way too perky. (The guy in the intro and movie is Chris Evans, perhaps best known from the Fantastic Four movies.)

6:50 am: A few scenes from the movie Knowing. Director Alex Proyas does a quick video intro. Nic Cage, weird number stuff, crazy over-the-top action scene with subway trains. Why does Proyas's name sound familiar? (Later, I remember he directed Dark City.) When can we start ordering breakfast?

6:55 am: Harry tells us we're going to see the first 22 minutes of Watchmen, since the whole film isn't ready yet (and we'd probably all be sued just for watching it at this point). Except wait, that's not the next thing we're going to see. Oops.

6:56 am: More clips, this time from Observe and Report, a Seth Rogen film. Seth Rogen and director Jody Hill (The Foot Fist Way) do a video intro. Rogen is not having a good hair day. "Happy birthday Harry, I want you inside me."

6:57 am: It's more like an extended trailer. His hair is even worse in this movie than in the intro. And is that Anna Faris? Why doesn't the trailer mention that it's Anna Faris? She's just as funny as Seth Rogen and her hair is much cuter.

7:00 am: I'd like a whole movie now. Apparently not, Harry says there's been a slight schedule change. And ... here's McG, come to show us some bits from Terminator: Salvation that he claims "no one has yet seen."

7:05 am: McG reveals that he actually has the whole movie with him as a DVD, but Warner won't let him show it. Why are you telling us this? That's kind of mean. The audience is not happy. He's lucky someone doesn't mug him and grab the DVD.

7:10 am: McG says Jackie Earle Haley is in the audience, and Haley waves a bit, but I can't really see him. I'm not sure why he's here, but cooool.

7:12 am: The Terminator: Salvation excerpt is also like an extended trailer, with some unfinished effects. It's hard for me to engage with most trailers -- you don't get an sense of the rhythm of the film, you just get the bits that someone else thinks are cool, and I'm always fretful that the damn thing is going to spoil the movie. Not to mention that I liked the first Terminator movie but have had no real desire for sequels.

7:13 am: McG says he doesn't want to hear any flak about what he's calling himself these days, and warns Ain't It Cool readers that "I read every post --" on the site, "every fucking post." He also introduces us to a Warners rep in the theater, probably to show us why he can't play his DVD of the entire film. He tells us he's sticking around for the Watchmen excerpt, he wants to see it too.

7:20 am: They are calling someone named "Rorschach" up to the stage. Is this another one of those AICN guys with the crazy nicknames? Impossible to tell who it is with the baseball cap on. Now they're calling him "Jackie." He was involved with the film in some way. He's telling us that on the set of Watchmen, Zach Snyder was carrying around the comic book more often than he carried the script ... assuring us that the movie is faithful to its source.

7:30 am: I don't like the little comic-book touches -- actions that slow down and freeze, slo-mo blood, that kind of thing -- just like I disliked that in 300.

7:45 am: Despite the aforementioned comic-book flourishes, I'm hooked. Excellent credit sequence that sets things up nicely for those of us who haven't read the graphic novel.

7:46 am: I obviously need sleep. The guy in the baseball cap is Jackie Earle Haley, who is playing Rorschach in the film. (In my defense, I've never read Watchmem and everyone looks the same in a baseball cap from the back of a theater.) He does a quick Q&A, and you can tell everyone else is sleep-deprived too by the quality of the questions. I'd love to interview him sometime. When I'm well rested.

8:10 am: Harry announces the last movie. Wait, how can there be one more movie for four hours, unless it's -- oh, no -- "fitting in with our revolutionary theme of the day --" don't tell me --

8:11 am: It's Che. Which I have as a screener DVD at home, although I haven't seen it yet. The movie is more than four hours long and subtitled. Still, this is the one chance to see this particular cut of the film in Austin on a big screen.

8:15 am: Trailers start, but my handwriting is now so bad that I have no idea what the first one was (I'm fairly sure Latvian Revolution is not a movie); then a trailer for Amin and a Pop-Tarts commercial, and a long trailer for Mission Thunderbolt. We can order breakfast now, which is probably why we're seeing a Pop-Tarts ad.

9:00 am: This may not have been the best timeslot for Che. It is difficult to read subtitles while eating breakfast, especially if you're using the empty folding chair next to you as your table. The movie looks fabulous, though. Gonna stick with it.

9:20 am: zzzzzz

9:30 am: zzzzzzzzz

9:40 am: Crap, I have no idea what's going on in the movie now. But I estimate we should have an intermission around 10:15, and then I can take a break.

10:15 am: No intermission yet? Dear God.

10:25 am: GAAAAAAH.

10:35 am: Intermission. Barely functioning. The guy next to me tells me that there's a special short video planned after intermission and before the second half, so I shouldn't go far. I cherish the faint hope that maybe we're only watching the first half, then we'll watch something rousing like The Spirit or The Road or Teen Wolf or anything that isn't four hours long and subtitled and talky.

10:40 am: Nearly all the out-of-town film critic guys I was hoping to chat with after BNAT have left, because they've seen the movie before or like me, have a screener. They left an entire empty row mid-theater. This means that probably nothing else will show but Che, because I bet Tim would have dropped them a hint otherwise.

10:45 am: The special video is a birthday greeting for Harry from Richard Garriott out in space. Che starts back up again. Lots of empty seats now.

10:55 am: I pay my bill for breakfast in cash, grab my blanket roll, and slip out of the theater for the last time. I stop on the way out to chat with Tiffany and a couple of other people. Even Harry isn't in there watching right now. I feel terribly guilty about leaving BNAT early, but Che Guevara conquered me.

11:15 am: Home. I unload the car and tell my husband some of the highlights. Not sure I'm coherent. My butt is killing me, I may not be able to sit still for a movie for days.

11:45 am: zzzzzzzmmmmmmmmmmmmilovemybedzzzzzmove,catzzz

Epilogue:

8:30 pm: My husband tells me he's going to see JCVD with a friend. I've seen the movie already (Fantastic Fest) and I hope he has a good time.

9:10 pm: I change my mind and go with them to Alamo Village for JCVD, one of my favorite movies of 2008. Now this is a good movie to end a marathon of film watching.

Finally, for an entirely different take on Butt-Numb-a-Thon, including some photos of the Ten Commandments and Jackie Earle Haley, I recommend reading this travelogue from out-of-town BNAT attendees Brian and Eric.