Kings of the Road

On Sunday afternoon, Larry and I went to Bethesda’s Landmark Row Cinema to see Death at a Funeral. The hilarious new comedy from Frank Oz! New from the director of In and Out and Bowfinger! A delightful British Comedy! Golly jee, those British sure are uptight! And funny!

The movie was pretty funny-it took a while to get rolling, but there were some funny gags. It was mostly situational humor, as in the kind of situations that get worse and worse and you just cringe and feel uncomfortable. There were some really disgusting (bathroom) parts, too.

But who knew that the Bethesda Landmark Row Cinema doubles as a geriatric convention center? I think we were the only people in the theater below the age of 65. There were a lot of “Oh, my god” and “I can’t hear what they’re saying” comments. There was a woman who completely wiped out when she was trying to sit down–I think she missed the row, ricocheted off the seat and ended up on her back with her legs up in the air in the middle of the aisle. She was okay, but with no thanks to her friend, who was more interested in letting the fallen woman know that she dropped her jumbo-sized coke all down her back and now she was soaking wet. And of course, they were shouting at each other the whole time–”Your coke landed all over me!” and “Well, they shouldn’t turn the lights down so early!” and more of “My back is soaking wet!”

Then there was the woman next to me, poor thing. She couldn’t stop shaking the whole time, and I couldn’t help but wonder how hard it would be to watch a movie like that. I think it would give me a headache. But she was laughing, so I guess she was enjoying herself.

I’ve noticed that the elderly folks seem like this movie theater, but I’ve never seen so many there at once. Did we just pick a geriatric crowd pleaser to watch?