A Year at the Movies: One Man's Filmgoing Odyssey

If you're a fan of MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000, if you like to go to the movies just a little TOO much, or if you find the phrase "a lake of urine on the men's room floor" funny, 'cause it's true, you need to read this book. Kevin Murphy, the voice behind the wise-crackin' gumball machine with soul, Tom Servo, for more than a decade on MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000, has finally come forward to reveal the man behind the puppet. With A YEAR AT THE MOVIES, Kevin Murphy reveals himself to be: a.) a movie nut (of course), b.) a little bit of a curmudgeon, unafraid to voice his opinion, c.) an excellent writer, capable of capturing on the page the minutiae of any given experience in a way that truly makes the reader a part of it all, and d.) an avid hater of Adam Sandler and Rob Schneider and everything they stand for. In A YEAR AT THE MOVIES, Kevin Murphy sets out to watch a movie in a theater with an audience every single day, for a whole year, and then write about the experience. And Kevin isn't just satisfied with going to the local cinemaplex down at the mall. Sure, that's part of the experience, but so is finding and tracking down the world's smallest theater, the world's only theater made completely of ice and snow, the art house theaters, the foreign theaters, IMAX theaters, theaters at the Cannes Film Festival, etc. Every part of the movie-going experience is lived, breathed and sometimes humorously, sometimes poignantly dissected on these pages. If you're fan of movies, if you're a fan of life experience (and, ironically enough, that's what most movie-goers are chasing), you've got to get this wonderfully funny, and surprisingly affecting book.Kevin Murphy is a true fellow citizen of celluloid and patron of popcorn, and if you're like me, you'll see enough of yourself reflected in these pages to make you feel like you were along for the whole crazy ride.

The book is about the whole moviegoing adventure. He is not just talking about the movies, like the first Harry Potter flick, or just about the stars, like Jackie Chan, but everything. The theater, the audience, the food, the seats! He goes to film festivals in France and Finland, drive-ins in the desert, theaters in the South Pacific, Italy and in Australia. He talks about films from Hong Kong and films from before the invention of sound. He talks about the smallest commercial movie theater, where the owner sells the tickets out of his bedroom window, to the multiplex, the sing-along film, the club cinema and the cinema grill. He deals with the food, even trying to live on popcorn, individual pizzas and shrink-wrapped sandwiches for a week. He deals with movies in the park, movies in the museums and movies in Hollywood! He deals with the people too. The critics, the fanboys, the kids and the people who work AT the movies.It is funny, yet has serious points. One whole chapter is on September 11. It so happens I was reading this while on the bus to the Pentagon. This chapter was so powerful that I started to cry.The book reminds me of the greatest movie I ever saw. Star Wars. My family saw it when it first came out in a drive-in theater. My brother and I sat on top of the car, a station-wagon, and watched this great sci-fi flick on a background of real stars. AND it will never happen again. Drive-ins are few and far between. The movie itself has been CHANGED and even cars are different. I don't trust any of this tiny models to hold up my own weight (or even that of my brother's young kids).Each chapter is a week, with the list of the films he saw and where he saw them (which makes a nice list of movies you might wish to rent or buy in the future).Flip open the book, get a bucket of butter-flavored popcorn and ENJOY!

As Kevin Murphy recounts his movie-a-day filmgoing year, I was afraid the story might start to drag somewhat, or that he would feel the need to review every film he saw. Instead, I got drawn into a book that, while relatively long (about 350 pages), was still intelligible, and enjoyable both in small doses and in longer, more concentrated, readings.Murphy divides his epic, sensibly, into 52 week-long essays. The films he sees that week inform the topic of his essays, but seldom *are* the topic. Instead, we get interesting, and highly personal, looks at all different aspects of the filmgoing experience, ranging from travelogues to Italy, Finland, or Australia, to a few hours working at a multiplex theater, to meditations on genres like kung fu, fantasy, or horror films. There are also insightful and well-informed meditations on the state of American filmgoing, the impact of the multiplex and the near-demise of arthouse cinemas, and a useful chapter on the difference between film reviewers and film critics. There's an awful lot in this book, and it's nearly all good stuff.Kevin Murphy clearly knows and loves films, and he is a fine writer. A comparison with the two books by his former MST3K colleague Michael J. Nelson (who makes a brief cameo in this book) might be in order: I found both of Mike's books really funny, but frankly haven't found myself in a big hurry (yet?) to go back and re-read them. Kevin's, on the other hand, isn't intentionally funny "humor writing," but still has a lot of entertaining stories, asides, and turns of phrases. And I could see myself re-reading it a lot more easily.I waited impatiently to get a copy of this book (in part -- I'm obliged to say it -- because I loved Tom Servo), and it definitely paid off the wait. Film fans and MST fans both will, I think, come to the same conclusion.

Kevin Murphy takes up the plight of movie goers everywhere (and travels nearly everywhere to do it) in his romp around the globe to see a movie every day for a year. The book is a humorous look at one of America's favorite past-times, excellently told by someone who loves movies and wants to lead the charge for movie makers to remember the audience and forget the Hollywood formulas.The satire is first rate and the story-telling is superb. It really puts you in the seat next to the author. My particular favorite centers around taking a nephew to his first movie ever while smuggling an entire Thanksgiving dinner into the theater at the same time. Kevin Murphy has a wonderful first book and it was a delight to read. Recommended for movie fans everywhere.