Tonight “The Witches of Eastwick” was on Channel 71. Again. This is, by my count, the 6,179,263rd time “The Witches of Eastwick” has been shown on one channel or another on my TV in the last six weeks.
“The Witches of Eastwick” was an okay movie, but… oh, who’m I kidding. It was a peice of shit. For those who have never seen it, though if you have a TV I cannot imagine how that is possible, Jack Nicholson plays the Devil in human form and he shown up in a little town and starts banging these three hos, played by Susan Sarandon. Cher, and Michell Pfeiffer, and grants them wishes but they foil his plans in the end, whatever they were. Nicholson chews the scenery, Pfeiffer has terrible hair, and it’s stupid.
Why do they do this? From August thru October they showed “The Hunt for Red October” seven hundreds thousand times on 17 different channel, 30% of the showings being on Spike TV alone. “The Hunt for Red October” was a pretty good movie… the first eight or nine hundred times.
Recently I’ve also seen the Johnny Depp shitpile “Cry Baby” on at least 200 times. If even two people watched every broadcast that’s still more people than actually paid to see “Cry Baby” during its theatrical release.
I think the WE network has one movie in their archives - Dirty Dancing. Maybe A League of Their Own, also. It’s becoming a running joke in our household: “Look, honey! * Dirty Dancing * is on!!!” :rolleyes:
I wonder how they find schmucks to sponsor these gazillion showings of the same movies over and over again.
Sometimes they’ll be shown on multiple stations, though. I’m wondering if the distributors sometimes offer package deals on these things.
I can barely work up any meh about Witches. I’m just thankful that the decade of Trading Places is over. Now I can sit back and watch the All Kindergarten Cop, All the Time network.
I had thought at one time that I wanted to get cable since I wasn’t working 14 hour days anymore. I house sat at a house that had cable and the only movie that seemed to be on was Mannequin 3. I didn’t even know there WAS a Mannequin 3. I can’t imagine why they would make it sure lhy the first 2 would be enough for anyone. Anyway, over that weekend, it was on several channels several times a day. Personally, Beastmaster and witches of Eastwick would have been a relief. I have not gotten cable. Everytime I think about it I look at the listings and think do I WANT to pay to see this?
I use the term Beastmastered for any movie that is subject to this, in reference to the *Beast Master * movie that it was shown in a loop on many cable and local channels.
Yeah, but The Witches of Eastwick, Dirty Dancing, and A League of Their Own aren’t in that category. Those sponges have been wrung dry by virtue of their having been out for so long. A newer movie like Titanic, sure.
Stations like them because they’re cheap, familiar and available, perfect for holiday viewing when you’re competing against parties and holiday-specific programming.
I don’t think he meant THAT Titanic, I think he meant the Peter Gallagher/Catherine Zeta Jones one. I could be wrong, but that’s the one I always see playing 24/7 on at least three “LMW” clone channels.
Wow. My TV isn’t showing The Witches of Eastwick at all: I’ve checked all my channels, and it’s not on anywhere. On the other hand, it just showed me the first episode of Lost, which was spectacular. I can’t wait until the second episode is on later tonight!
Daniel
who loves his DVD subscription and lack of TV reception