Why watch a movie with friends?

It's that weekend when your brain is too fried to read your ethics homework, and your body is too tired to go out for all the riotous parties. Your pieces have been scattered to the winds over the week as you have relentlessly pursued competing claims for your happiness. The disunity of your week's experience has left you so fragmented that you don't even know what you want out of the night.... Then your buddie interrupts your blank stare (as you realize there is a facebook screen in front of you) and announces that some of the guys are watching a movie downstairs. What do you do?

1) Such a condition of fragmentation and overextension intrudes into my life often, but that was merely a starting point for what I'm focusing on. (I will treat the condition at a later date, probably in a post called "Why look for meaning in life?" I suspect my hypothesis will included something along the lines of self-preservation...). Last week, a few of the guys in my dorm offered to watch a movie. Being unable to do anything else do to my condition and liking the people (and being honored by the invitation), I decided to go. During the movie I analyzed away as usual. Some of the others, remarkably, did some homework during the movie. Immediately afterwards, as usual, everyone was about to pack up and go their different ways (to bed, to work, out, etc). I tried to start up a conversation to gather people's thoughts and judgments on the movie, hoping to learn from them. While I was very tired and so I couldn't generate as much thought power as I would have liked, we had a decent conversation, and then left each other (I later thought of much more I could have said).

I bring this (seemingly trivial) event up because it bothers me when a group of people (especially friends) just get together, watch a movie, and then immediately afterwards act as if we didn't just spend 2.5 hours digitally injesting a work of art (not to mention people who multi-task during movies). In my experience, we always leave immediately afterward or quickly shift back to talking about nothing. I think that this tendancy does not bode well for the value of the movie. Its as if the 2.5 hours of video has no possible significance for our lives; it becomes reduced to a mere distraction. Why, then, do people watch movies together? Is this reason or value worth investing time in?

2) I think that college kids generally watch moveis for companionship and subdued fun. Its a relaxing change-up to the fast balls of "normal" weekends that are over before they begin. Others might see a movie as quality time together. Significant others who watch a movie together might have additional motives, such as a desire for intimacy or cuddling.

Now all of these things are good things, and perhaps they add up to more than the "mere distraction" that I mentioned earlier. But for me, with all my heart's desire, I am not satisfied with an aimless companionship or meaningless fun, and I don't find rest in watching something with no relevance. In the case of intimacy or cuddling, the movie element seems superfluous. What I judge to be lacking is the meaning and shared judgment of that meaning. "We had the experience but missed the meaning" (T.S. Eliot, Dry Salvages). For me, if I am to continue doing something, it is very urgent to find the reason for why I am doing it and in what ways it contributes to the overall happiness of my life. I do not make 2.5 hour exceptions to distract myself. But perhaps I should...


3) I have already implicitly asked and posited hypothesises (somewhat out of sequence) on this topic. But here are some more interesting questions.

Is it good to expect this shared judgment of meaning from such an experience, or am I trying to hard? In other words, is distraction ever good?
What is the point of watching with others?
How can I find something for me in the movie and the experience of watching it with others?
Is it worth it?


4) Ok, so some few more quick comments in the way of further hypothesis (I feel I have not adequately asked the question in this post, but rather have just dictated my ideas. Please offer your ideas as well).

I think it is never bad to look for meaning from life experience, for I think meaning the anecdote to the condition of fragmentation discussed at the top of this post. That is, perceiving the meaning ties several isolated events into a quilt that is a vital comfort when life's dark winters set in. If meaning is objective and common to all, then it makes sense to share judgment on it. Some might say that there are some events too trivial to find meaning in, or else that the level of meaning most be understood to be proportional to the thing involved. I would like to hear this case better-- I see the benefit of such an idea being that I wouldn't trip over trifles. But the downside seems a severing of potential. It seems to me that the smallest things can be analogies, an up ("ana") word ("logos") pointing me to the Meaning of life. How can perceiving such Beauty in the small things obscure my view of reality (as some assert)? Isn't there a transcendent Order that is "really real," even more real than what we see?

The whole point of a companionship with others seems to be to point each others towards something good in caring for each others destinies. Is it a companionship if we don't talk about meaningful things? Isn't the duty of a companionship to help each other see the value of what we do together? Note: this is in no way shots against my friends, who often do talk about meaningful things, who are way smarter than me, and who probably think during movies but aren't accustomed to sharing their opinions as much.

I don't really have time now to address further that question of how to find something for me in the movie. Suffice it to say that I have been shown a great many themes that connect with my life and happiness, and it is now rather easy to find such things (although some would argue that its too easy, and I misread things).

Of course I think it worth it. I love movies. I hope you all join me in seeing them as holding serious proposals for truth and happiness.