Film, Interrupted
There are some things which “normal” tourists would never think of doing, but which I find a great experience when traveling overseas. One of them is going to a foreign supermarket, which I already touched on. My friend K and I are always going to supermarkets when we have travelled together. Things are a little different, products are different, it really adds to the cultural experience. Well, another of these things I like to do is going to the cinema. It sounds standard enough, but oh no! Everyone does it a little different.
As a child in Peru, we used to get a short documentary before the main feature. In Puerto Rico they have a full 30 minutes of commercials… and people come early to watch them. In Spain your seats are assigned and an usher has to seat you, never mind that you could easily find the seats yourself. And so it was time to find out what the Maltese movie experience was like.
We headed for a US-style multiplex in the trendy area of Paceville. This is an area with a cinema, a bowling alley, a little beach, nightclubs, etc. I had strolled through it at night before and found the teenage crowd with their latest fashion trends and mobile phones, but during the daytime it is tamer. So in we went to see “Lady in the Water,” the latest installment from M. Night Shyamalan’s spooky paranormal movies with a message. I had been wanting to see it for a while. At first everything seemed pretty normal (except for the men’s bathroom that had only urinals). There was no usher, even though the seats are numbered. There were a couple of ads, and the movie started. About an hour later, in a tense and crucial moment, where Malta was the furthest from my mind…. the screen went blank, and the lights went up. There was no warning or apology. Great! The reel is ruined! We’ll never know what happens! I looked around and everyone seemed pretty calm. The group of teenagers got up and left, some people stretched. I turned to M in confussion, and he simply stated: “intermission.”
Intermission?? The movie was not even two hours long! We had been sitting there for less than an hour! I got over my initial shock, and realized this was one of those cultural quirks I would have to get used to. M went on to say that the Maltese find it strange *not* to have an intermission. That they feel movies go on for too long without one.
After that some advertisements came on screen. Special deals on mobile phone plans. The details were yelled out in Maltese but written out in English. I asked if this was a way to get both the Maltese and the foreigners at once, but M had not even noticed. As I mentioned in the posting about language, bilingualism here is quite fluid and people barely notice it. A few more ads for a gym and restaurants, and the movie came back.
I have to say, the intermission killed this movie. Where in the first “act” I had been completely engrossed in the plot, I was never able to get into it during the second “half.” It was like being woken up in the middle of the night by a ringing phone, and not really going back into deep sleep again. I wonder if I will miss the intermission one day.
