At the Oscars, award winning artists are provided unique platforms to thank their friends, families, inspirations and coworkers. Oftentimes, artists will use their platforms to not only thank those who got them on the Academy’s stage but also use their time before millions of viewers to speak on issues they care about.
This year, upon winning the Oscar for Best Director, Anora director Sean Baker used his platform to spread his love for movie theaters and emphasize the value of seeing movies on the big screen.
As more and more films are sent exclusively to streaming services, Baker speaks to an experience that is vital to culture, art and the ideal method of engaging with powerful stories.
Ever since the pandemic, theatergoing saw a major decline — but the duty of movie-lovers is to continue to see these films as they were made to be seen: on the big screen.
When Baker opened his speech by saying he would speak on something he was passionate about, I immediately expected him to, like many artists before him, speak on any variety of political issues. Instead, Baker began by saying, “We are all here tonight and watching this broadcast because we love movies. Where did we fall in love with the movies? At the movie theater.”
Baker continued: “Watching a film in the theater with an audience is an experience. We can laugh together, cry together, scream in fright together, perhaps sit in devastated silence together.”
He also noted the particularly powerful and unifying experience of seeing a film with any number of loved ones or random movie-goers.
Baker pledged, as a director, to continue to make movies for the big screen, and he encouraged other filmmakers to produce movies for theaters. He also encouraged parents to introduce their kids to movies in the theater.
As an oftentimes broke college student, it can be easy for me and my friends to neglect seeing films in theaters. Not only the price, but the inconvenience of driving to a theater can seem too steep; it becomes a barrier for entry in watching a movie at my local AMC.
However, seeing a movie in theaters is not only a fun experience, but one valuable to our culture and vital to experience an art form in the method the film’s creators made it for.
Over the past few years, some of my fondest memories are from theaters. I will never forget what it was like to be surrounded by screaming fans for Avengers: Endgame in theaters on opening weekend, being dumbstruck by the scale and storytelling of Dune: Part Two or laughing, crying and falling in love with Sean Baker’s Best Picture winner Anora in theaters this year.
Seeing movies in theaters is also hardly as unaffordable as it can seem. While individual movie tickets have risen in price, many theaters have developed rewards programs that trivialize the price point for movie-going.
Instead of having your parents pay for five streaming services which continue to rise in price, an A-List membership at AMC theaters can get you three free movies per week for only $20 a month. Birmingham also has some local, privately owned theaters to support, like Sidewalk Cinema at the Pizitz Food Hall downtown.
Whether you are a major film-buff with a Letterboxd account who made a pick-em bracket for the Oscars or just an average movie-goer seeing whatever major franchises or big stars have movies out, theaters need you. They need us to maintain a vital part of our culture and continue to experience art in its ideal form.
In short, save your money, elevate your experience and get back in theaters, Samford students!
Staff Writer
