My Time With Moviepass – A Retrospective

As I mentioned at the tail end of last week’s post, my time with Moviepass has unfortunately and finally drawn to a close with the removal of the only theater near me that supports E-Ticketing.  Given that the service has funded what has to be the lion’s share of hot (and cold) takes I’ve dropped on here, I want to take this week to dole out some high-school-yearbook-style superlatives to the 30 films I have listed in the app’s history.  If you want, you can also consider this a year in review, since I’ve had Moviepass for about 14 months now, but I make no claims about the exhaustiveness of my moviegoing over that span.  First, some statistics:

Total Movies Seen: 30 (I think – I swear I also saw Justice League using Moviepass, but it doesn’t show up in my history.  Given my Justice League experience, though, that’s probably for the best).

2018 Best Picture Nominees Seen: 3 (Lady Bird, The Shape of Water, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri)

2018 Oscar-Nominated Pictures Seen: 6 (I, Tonya, The Disaster Artist, and all of the 2018 Oscar-Nominated Animated Shorts, in addition to the three films above).

Comic-Book Movies Seen: 5 (Wonder Woman, Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Deadpool 2)

Horror Movies Seen: 3 (IT, Hereditary, A Quiet Place)

Comedies Seen: 2 (Game Night, Blockers)

Action Movies Seen: 3 (American Assassin, Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Skyscraper)

Heist Movies Seen: 2 (Logan Lucky, Ocean’s 8).

Animated Movies Seen: 1 (Incredibles 2).

Remakes/Sequels/Franchise Films Seen: 12 (too many to list)

Documentaries: 1 (Won’t You Be My Neighbor – I really wish this number were higher).

Movies in Which Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson Fights a Skyscraper: 1 (Skyscraper).

Obviously, there are also a number of other movies that I saw that don’t really fit into any of these categories.  And now, a few superlatives:

Strongest Movie Month: It looks like there were two months during which I saw 4 movies: September 2017 (Wonder Woman, IT, American Assassin, Kingsman: The Golden Circle) and April 2018 (Love, Simon, A Quiet Place, Blockers, Avengers: Infinity War).  Timewise, the September boom was likely more a function of my newfound love for the service than anything else, and furthermore, American Assassin was very not great, whereas April 2018 had a couple of pleasant surprises (Love, Simon, Blockers) in addition to some of the year’s harder hitters (A Quiet Place, Avengers), so it’s gotta be April 2018 here.

April of this year was a great month for movies.

Weakest Movie Month: Numerically, this was a four-way tie between October 2017 (Boo! A Madea Halloween, which I only reserved a ticket for to see if the app was still working – I think the service was on the fritz in some way around this time), March 2018 (Game Night), August 2018 (BlacKkKlansman) and September 2018 (Searching).  I’m not counting August 2017, during which I only saw Logan Lucky, considering that I didn’t even have Moviepass for that whole month.  Either way, the clear winner of Weakest Movie Month has to be October 2017.

Maybe the creepiest character in any of the movies I’ve seen with Moviepass, and that includes the multiple horror movies in the mix.

Last Movie Seen: With a title that perhaps signals the rough fortunes ahead for me and Moviepass: Bad Times at the El Royale has this honor.

Take notes: if you’re stuck outside in the rain, at least you can look cool while getting soaked.

First Movie: Not really due to anything other than luck (pun intended), Logan Lucky was the film that kicked off my passionate Moviepass romance.  It was pretty good, if not strongly derivative of the Ocean’s franchise.

“I am in-car-cer-a-ted.”

Worst Movie: I’m not gonna give this to Boo! A Madea Halloween, given that I didn’t actually see it and that doesn’t seem fair.  I’m also too lazy to look up which of these movies has the worst Rotten Tomatoes score, but I also don’t really think I need to do that.  American Assassin takes this one by a healthy margin.

This poor guy – his franchise never had a chance.

Best Movie: This is a much more difficult choice.  I’m not gonna go with The Shape of Water, because I’m not a joiner, and frankly I think it’s an overrated movie as it is.  Flying in the face of serious film critics everywhere, I’m gonna go with Avengers: Infinity War instead, simply because it sticks out as the most enjoyable filmgoing experience on this list.  It’s a cinematic achievement in little more than cramming a billion characters into a movie and creating some truly bananas special effects, but it certainly lived up to the massive amounts of hype surrounding it, and had a truly jaw-dropping ending.

Three of Earth’s mightiest heroes – and Wong.

Most Unique Movie:  This is also a tight race.  Searching and A Quiet Place are the two clear finalists, but I think I’ll have to go with A Quiet Place for nerdy aspiring screenwriter reasons.

Sorry, guy.  If it makes you feel any better, your movie was probably the more impressive technical achievement.

Most Surprising Movie: In this category, the movies that stick out are Blockers, Game Night, and Won’t You Be My Neighbor, probably because they’re all films in genres that I don’t typically seek out or enjoy, but I think Won’t You Be My Neighbor takes it in the end.  Sorry, comedies – I’m not willing to cross Mr. Rogers.

Fred Rogers and his main man Daniel.

Most Underwhelming Movie: This is this post’s hot take, and I’ve nestled it at the end for those brave enough to find it.  They’re far from the worst on the list, but I have to say that I expected so much more from both The Shape of Water and Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, Missouri.  If I have to bestow this honor to only one of these films, I’d go with Shape, because the acting showcased in Three Billboards is downright incredible, but I think I overhyped both of these movies too much.  In other words, it’s my fault.

One of the many blue-green saturated shots from The Shape of Water.  Admittedly, the film’s sometimes out-of-control use of color was probably my single favorite thing about it.

For those out there doing the math, 30 movies over 14 months is a little over two a month, and given that the service cost me $9.99 a month over the duration of that time, yeah, I definitely took Moviepass for a spin financially.  The business model still makes absolutely no sense to me, but I hope somebody figures out something similarly priced (but in some way economically viable) soon.

Time to change the blog’s sidebar!