travel

When it comes to movie consumption, there’s no truer democrat in America than the slightly inebriated airline passenger. You’ve observed it, I’m sure—how at a certain altitude, and after a certain number of Bloody Marys, every prejudice of class and gender begins to be dissolved; how in that strange and hurtling passivity the grandmother in the aisle seat will submit with a kind of rapture to The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, while the tattooed young man by the window gratefully dabs his eyes at the last frames of 27 Dresses.

—James Parker, Double-X Films

I actually watch a lot of rom-coms on airplanes. I suppose my interest is primarily sociological: What is this category of pop-culture telling women about love? Obviously I could also just ask my female friends but sometimes you want to get it from the primary source material. Also, occasionally they’re decent movies: “Four Christmases” had some amusing scenes.

For whatever reason, I don’t watch a lot of action movies in planes, or on the ground for that matter. Could be because video games leave that part of me pretty well-sated, and your average action movie just isn’t that interesting in a cultural studies sort of way.

And, once in a great while, I can actually watch a good movie on a plane. I saw “The History Boys” on an Alaska Airlines flight once, which is pretty astounding when you think about it. Not to give too much away, but the Wikipedia entry for the film uses “Modern pederasty” as one of its categories.

New aircraft design puts passengers face-to-face in rows for budget travel

“Having passengers face each other is not an ideal situation. ... But this will see increased revenue for the operator and more economical tickets for the passenger – so by keeping both happy, this concept makes an attractive alternative. Sure the passenger can choose a flight facing forward in a traditional seating position, but he or she will have to pay more for the luxury.”

[Design Q director Howard] Guy predicts that the design could see a 50 per cent increase in the number of passengers on board and a 30 per cent reduced cost per seat.

Personally, I’d probably be fine sitting this way and paying 30% less. For short flights, anyway. Staring at someone else’s face would get pretty old on the 14-hour trip to Seoul.