Tonight is the start of B-Fest 2015, the 24-hour B movie festival that I used to go to all the time. After the 2013 B-Fest I decided that I was done with the event for several reasons.
- I'm getting older, and the prospect of being a bitter, sleep-deprived old man listening to some woman screaming "What the FUCK!!" every time something weird happens on the screen was no longer as enticing as it once was.
- B-Fest is relying more and more on digital projection instead of film, obviously because it's much cheaper and more reliable. But then B-Fest turns into something that you can replicate at home, instead of being a place where you can see rare films that haven't made it onto DVD (The Blue Bird, the unspeakable Heironymous Merkin, etc.), and then why go if you can see all the films at home?
- The one main draw of going to B-Fest is hanging with a couple hundred people who are constantly throwing out comments at the movie, but in practice that turns out to be something like: everyone talks loudly until midnight; everyone does the audience participation bit of Plan 9; and then everyone falls asleep except the two guys in the back of the room loudly shouting unfunny jokes. Repeat.
- The people I want to hang out with when I watch bad movies are all nearby, so I thankfully don't have to go to a 24-hour festival to hang out with them.
I really miss not going anymore, but waking up well-rested on Saturday morning is a nice replacement prize.