We're back from break and rollin' out the new reviews for those with anxiety complexes at the video store. This week Justin reviews FREAKS and SCREAM 2 (yes, I'll probably get around to reviewing the first one sooner or later).

RECENT MOVIES I'VE SEEN THAT HAVE SUCKED

Mimic -- Mira Sorvino proves that blonds CAN be annoyingly dumb. Boogie Nights -- 2 1/2 hours of a movie about the porn film industry in which they never showed the porn but we did have to see one very ugly wanker. Yes, wanker is a code word.

The Movie-Going Experience: A Lesson In Hell
by Justin Olivetti

I love going to the movies. In our little college town (motto: "Even The Jones' Dog Has A Seat On The Town Council") we have a dollar theater -- $2.50 admission -- called the Guthrie that we college students go to regularly. It's a great Victorian-esque place, complete with bats that swoop across the screen (true) and new non-vynal seats that lean back. My friends and I go to see all the latest box-office rejections, including (lately) Spice World, Deep Rising, and Speed 2.

As wonderful as any movie going experience is -- from our antique theater to the most modern stadium-seating, digital surround sound, speakers in the floor, high-backed chairs with arm rests that come up supertheaters -- there are always factors that make you rue the fact you left the comfort of your home. Time to bitch, my friends:

(1) There are other people. This is not always a bad thing, but often other people can come in the forms of screaming babies, teenage girls in groups approaching fifty (and god, the giggling! the giggling!), and the ever-present Know It All who sits in back of you and predicts the movie from start to finish. This is why the ushers should be equipped with the latest Taser technology. Or there should be ejection seats.

(2) I have yet to figure out how to put a movie on pause in a theater. This is a huge problem when I, say, have to go pee five minutes into "Dances With Wolves" or "Titanic". I can't leave -- I have a guy gene that plants my butt in the seat and refuses to miss a second of the film, even if it is "Batman and Robin". In "Titanic", the first time that I saw it, my bladder felt as big as that friggin' iceberg they hit, and all that water on screen did not help things one bit.

(3) Now, I know that theaters have to employ handicapped and mentally retarded people as part of their EOE standards. I have no problem with this. But please, oh please, do not put them in charge of the projector! Doesn't it seem that when a movie gets screwed up -- the screen is split in half, the sound cuts out, you have to twist your head to see it at a 35-degree angle -- there's no one to spot it and fix it? And this always happens at the beginning of the film, when the projectionist should be there.

Well... enough is enough. I still like going to the movies and -- yes -- I will be seeing "Titanic" for the third time tomorrow night. But I will go to the bathroom first.