Paraiso Perdido

by Crom

I remember when a candy bar cost 50 cents. I remember when you could buy penny candy and you could go with your friends to see a movie with your 5-dollar allowance. I remember when a date to the movies was economically sound, and didn’t require a 2nd mortgage on your house to foot the bill.

There used to be half a dozen odd theaters that were “cheap” theaters. They cost between a buck fifty and three dollars to see something there. They had shitty seats, the roof tiles looked like they’d seen water damage and were falling out of the roof, but it was 2 bucks a flick. And, we loved it. No matter how on the ropes you and your friends were it was conceivable you could scrape together the change to go see a movie at the cheap theater. Yeah, you couldn’t buy junior mints or popcorn… deal with it.

Last Thursday, April 18th I drove past the last remaining cheap theater to speak of. Southland Cineplex. The sign where movies had been posted since I was a kid read:

“Theater is now closed. Thank you for your patronage.”

I nearly crashed my car when I read that. I had assumed that it was the Fortress of Solitude. The last standing bastion of cheap movies, when the economic piracy of the other theaters crushed my pockets I could always skip down there and see something for 3 bucks. Now it was no more. Crushed into the earth with the rest of its cheap brethren it had finally needed to close down. A few days later, while telling someone else of the closure, they made an odd comment that ricocheted around my brainpan several times before coming to a halt in my process list. “Now northland will be the cheap theater, at 9 bucks”. It finally made sense to me. The rampant construction of other theaters around the city, in strategic locations was all a master plan to buck-up the public of Calgary and force them into the “cheap” theaters that were ipso facto not cheap AT ALL.

This has lead me to conclude one thing. Corporate empires have conspired against the average consumer to slowly raise the price of the established cheap theaters in a sinister plot to curveball higher prices into your budget without your notice. Now that Southland has been crushed there is only one theater that costs less then the now standard 12 dollars. This theater will no doubt attract business due to its “cheapness” yet it’s only 2 dollars cheaper. Not much of a deal if you ask me. The time has come people. Here and now we cast off the shackles of Corporate America; we must no longer feed the corporate machine our hard earned cash. REBEL. REBEL AGAINST YOUR MOVIE THEATER TODAY!!!

I refuse to attend any showing, any movie, and any extravaganza. Oh, they’ll send coupons to your house, free popcorn, 2 for 1; they’ll dangle the bait in front of you in the hopes you’re gullible enough to go back once more. Then the addiction will set in again “What could it hurt to go just to this one movie” And, then you’re BACK. Just another button on the cash register, punching in and shoveling cash into the machine. Another zombie, another praxis manifested in the average persons mind to keep them down and in financial hardship.

LET GO OF THE NEED TO BE ENTERTAINED.

Read a book.

Crom