The rules of the at-home double- or triple-feature are as plentiful as the snacks the host intends to serve. There might be bathroom breaks, or moments to check text messages, and everyone might want to stretch a leg halfway through a film.
But seeing the cinema on the big screen, in a quiet, no-phones, no-distractions setting, like a movie theatre, is a treat, and pushing into the wee smalls in order to take in eight movies, over 24 hours, is something of a triumph, or, surely, a personal best for most cinephiles.
Ready for the octuple-feature? So is AMC, which is ready to show all eight films nominated for a Best Picture Oscar, in a row, on Saturday, Feb. 21.
The place? There's just one spot listed for Los Angeles: Orange 30 w/IMAX.
If you feel like that might be a mite too much movie goodness, hang tight: There's a two-day event, with four movies screening at a participating AMC cinema on Saturday, Feb. 14 and four more screening on Saturday, Feb. 21. ("The Grand Budapest Hotel," "Whiplash," "Birdman," and "Selma" are the Feb. 14 quartet and "Boyhood," "The Theory of Everything," "The Imitation Game," and "American Sniper" screen on Feb. 21.)
The theaters going the two-day route are more plentiful, with Covina 17 and Citywalk Stadium 19 among the nine venues that have signed on to participate. A two-day pass, by the by, will save you five bucks.
The AMC Best Picture Showcase is something of a rite of late-winter movie love, at least over the last few years. But if you push through the 24-hour marathon the day ahead of the Academy Awards telecast, make sure you have your jammies, and the perfect at-home snacks, at the ready when you return to your catch, eight movie laters, to watch which one wins.
