Summer is fast approaching and with it comes summer blockbusters — those movies you have to see the moment they come out. But you’re not the only one.

In fact, depending on where you’ll be this summer, hundreds of other people will be attending the midnight openers with you. This makes it imperative you properly plan for your midnight premiere. This can make the difference between a stressful, unpredictable movie theater visit and an epic one.

— Buy your ticket early. Purchase it online, and print it out to avoid the long ticket booth lines. Valley River Center and Gateway movie theater tickets can be purchased via Fandango and retrieved at kiosks just outside the regular box office.

— Get there early. This seems like a no-brainier, but when I say early, I mean early. Seats make the movie experience, and arriving an hour early to a screening might make all the difference. Nothing ruins a film like craning your neck from the front row.

— Do not buy theater snacks. They’re expensive and they require you to wait in line. If you don’t mind the expense, make sure you have a friend save your seat. A simple coat on a chair will not suffice at a midnight premiere.

— Bring friends. To avoid being squashed between people you don’t know, try to bring one or two friends with you. Not only can you share significant glances during pivotal scenes in the movie, but you’re also guaranteed a side to lean on.

— Be thoughtful about dressing up. I’m all for costumes at midnight premieres; if you want to wear your gold captain’s uniform when “Star Trek Into Darkness” comes out, I say go for it. But being comfortable and respectful to the people around you is more important than pretending the movie theater is really a fan convention. That means: 1) no tall wizard hats that block the people behind you, and 2) no capes that will bunch up when you’re trying to settle in.

— You don’t want to miss a second of this movie — why else would you be going to the first showing? Therefore, go to the bathroom beforehand! If you’ve brought drinks, or the movie is long, download RunPee, the app that tells you when the lulls are in a film, so you can run and refresh yourself.

I am a dedicated film and TV buff, and I find that it’s easier to convince people of my less-than-healthy obsession with these media if I am able to keep them up to date on the latest developments on the big and little screens. There’s little more satisfying than saying “I knew that MONTHS ago” when someone texts me that Martin Freeman’s wife, Amanda Abbington, is going to star in the next “Sherlock” series, or that Robert Downey Jr. may not be in the next “Avengers,” or that Joss Whedon’s “Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along-Blog” web series from 2008 is getting a sequel.

But it’s my hobby — nay, my job — to keep up with the goings-on of the cinema world. I’m constantly scouring the Internet for barely released news, and I’ve got quite the impressive folder of bookmarks to prove it. The following are my favorite places to discover breaking news about movies and television.

r/Movies – Where would I be without Reddit? This sub-forum of the larger conglomerate is full of diehard movie fans, all who are, like me, keeping a sharp eye out for any and all movie news, from Hollywood to more independent and lesser-known projects. Check here first for new developments.

Cracked – Where Reddit is your source for news, the TV and movies section of Cracked.com is your source of opinions. Cracked writers make amazing connections and develop brilliant new ideas about screen projects both new and old. How else would I have learned about these epic movie fan theories, or how the X-Men and Superman both are just rip-offs from earlier creations? Cracked will make you rethink everything you thought you knew about movies and TV.

Hollywood Reporter – It may just seem like your average, everyday entertainment news site, but HR has managed to get some scoops that made me grateful that I kept an eye on their content. Thanks, Hollywood Reporter, for letting me know that there will be a “Rocky” musical on Broadway next year. I also appreciate your nearly instantaneous reviews of just-out movies and episodes.

Screenrant – When all else fails, and you realize what you’re interested in may be too obscure or off the radar for traditional outlets, Screenrant.com is there for you. I bet you didn’t know that the 2012 British horror film “The Woman in Black” has started casting for a sequel, or that Bad Robot, J.J. Abrams’ production company, is thinking about making a TV adaptation of Stephen King’s novel “11/22/63.” Well, now you know. Go tell everyone.

Sidney Rittenberg first went to China as an American soldier during World War II but stayed after the war’s end. He spent 35 years in China, 16 of which were spent imprisoned after false accusations of being an American spy, and he is the first American ever allowed to join the Chinese Communist Party. His extraordinary life led to the 2011 documentary, “The Revolutionary,” about Rittenberg’s experiences in China.

The University of Oregon Center for Asian and Pacific Studies is screening this film, along with another Stourwater Pictures documentary “Fumiko Hayashida: The Woman Behind the Symbol,” Friday, May 3 at 6 p.m. in PLC 180. Following the screenings, Rittenberg and “The Revolutionary” filmmakers Irv Drasnin, Lucy Ostrander and Don Sellers will attend a panel discussion to talk about the project and Rittenberg’s life.

Rittenberg, now 91 years old, witnessed and participated in the Chinese communist and nationalist revolution of the 1930s and ’40s as a translator before Joseph Stalin accused him of being a spy, leading to Rittenberg’s imprisonment until Stalin’s death. It took filmmakers five years and 26 hours of interviews with Rittenberg to create “The Revolutionary.”

Drasnin has worked on PBS documentary TV shows “Frontline” and “The American Experience” and has garnered a Director’s Guild of America Award and a Writer’s Guild of America Award. Ostrander, who also directed and produced “Fumiko Hayashida,” was the first American student filmmaker to work with the China Film Co-Production Corportation with her 1984 documentary short “Witness to Revolution: The Story of Anna Louise Strong.” She has since worked on many Asia-focused documentaries. Cinematographer and editor Sellers worked on both “Fumiko Hayashida” and “The Revolutionary,” and has worked on PBS’s “Frontline” and “Discover.”

“Fumiko Hayashida” documents 97-year-old Fumiko Hayashida’s return to the central Idaho internment camp where she was confined during WWII.

The screenings, which were co-sponsored by the College of Arts and Sciences, Oregon Humanities Center, School of Journalism and Communication, UO Libraries, Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures, Cinema Studies, Judaic Studies, Asian Studies, Department of International Studies and the Chinese Flagship Program, are free to attend, though seating is limited.

Whatever you are studying, there is definitely an awesome documentary to bolster your knowledge.

Digital Arts – “Helvetica” (2007)

Everything you wanted to know about the most powerful typeface in printing history.

Business – “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” (2005)

A snazzy guide of what not to do when you achieve success.

Chemistry – “Chemistry: A Volatile History” (2010)

Let the BBC walk you through the history of the universe’s elements.

Journalism – “Breakfast with Hunter” (2003)

All information that can be obtained about the king of gonzo journalism, Hunter S. Thompson, is good information.

Law – “The Thin Blue Line” (1988)

Go through the investigations and court proceedings that led to the wrongful imprisonment of Randall Dale Adams.

Gender Studies – “Southern Comfort” (2001)

Follows the last year of Robert Eads’ life, a transgendered man.

Environmental Studies – “Who Killed the Electric Car?” (2006)

Develop a better understanding of the environmental, social and political context of the electric car.

Zachary Prichard had only been in Eugene for one week when a white Toyota Scion pulled up next to him at a red light at the intersection of East 18th Avenue and Chambers Street. Perched on his bicycle to the right of the car, he couldn’t see through its tinted windows. The light turned green. He and the Scion moved forward. Yet, without signalling, the car turned into him, throwing him over the vehicle and destroying his bike in the process.

He was wearing a helmet but sustained injury to his dominant left hand, his shoulder and his right leg in addition to multiple abrasions on his arms and deep-muscle bruising.

That was in September 2011. Prichard, now a fourth-year University of Oregon student, had to postpone his graduation until this fall when his recovery from the collision made it impossible for him to attend classes for a term.

“One mistake has changed my life,” the Clatsop Community College transfer student said.

The swarms of bicyclists on Eugene roads are an expected sight for experienced commuters. The art of sharing the road is one appreciated by most travelers, from drivers to pedestrians and bicyclists. But collisions are inevitable, and with the dedicated community of bicyclists based in town, the odds of those collisions involving a biker are greater than you might expect — and the repercussions for post-collision bikers are something not considered until the accident occurs.

Eugene has 81 miles of bike lanes running alongside roadways. Bicycle and motor vehicle collisions made up less than two percent of traffic crashes (PDF) in Oregon in 2011 (the most recent set of data available). Though the number of accidents involving bicycles increased 5.71 percent since 2010, only 1.5 percent of these collisions were fatal to the bicyclist.

They suffered injury, however, in 95 percent of 2011 car-bike collisions, and these injuries — caused by a split-second event — may take years to overcome.

Prichard hasn’t been able to settle with insurance yet; he’s still waiting on an MRI and x-rays to check his shoulder. It still pops when he extends it a certain way, causing pain and making it impossible for him to complete some tasks.

“One of the reasons I’m afraid for all these people around me who bike everywhere, who rely on that as their main mode of transportation,” he said, “is that they don’t respect it — they don’t know how precious it is to be able to ride alongside a car and have that mutual safety.”

According to him, the car came away from the incident with a coin-sized dent.

“I had a month of recovery,” he said. “I have a screwed up shoulder. My bike was destroyed. They have a dent.”

Bicyclists and drivers alike are able to share the road through cautiousness, attentiveness and obeying the laws. This allows thousands of Eugene residents to get safely to their destinations every day. But a single error can change an individual’s life.

According to the Oregon Department of Transportation (PDF), the most common reasons for a collision between bikers and drivers are failure to yield right-of-way and disregarding traffic signals. Inattention and improper change of traffic lanes are also culprits on the driver’s part, while riding on the wrong side of the road leads bicyclists to their collision statistics.

When the UO Health Center deals with victims of traffic accidents, Shannon Millington said she deals most often with bicyclist/car collisions. As manager of the Physical Therapy/Sports Medicine Department, she estimates the health center sees 10 to 20 car-versus-bike incidents a year, a number greater than any place she has worked at in the past; she has been a physical therapist for 12 years, while at the UO for eight.

She suspects the reason for this is the sheer number of bicyclists in such a concentrated area on and around the UO campus. The injuries she sees from these cases range from minor bruising to serious fractures and breaks requiring long-term recovery.

“What’s going to make those injuries worse is velocity,” she said. “If you get more momentum, that’s going to have a bigger potential for injury. And, of course, was the cyclist wearing a helmet?”

UO admissions operations manager and Eugene Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee member Susan Stumpf, was wearing a helmet when she was struck by an SUV on East 15th Avenue and High Street in March 2010. When the car did not yield right-of-way, she ended up on the pavement with a concussion and a full-body sprain. Paramedics let her leave the scene, though she had to have her concussion diagnosed a few days later. She was unable to work for three weeks after that, but the recovery period was much longer — she only started having consistent pain-free days last fall.

“I probably would have been dead if I hadn’t worn my helmet,” she said.

She has been using her bike as her primary mode of transportation for 10 years, but she admits this incident has made her more cautious on the road.

“I pretend that I can’t be seen,” she said. “My number one advice is to be predictable.”

Some instinctual reactions before and during a collision can help lessen the level of injury, according to Millington: slowing down as much as possible, going limp upon impact and moving with the momentum of the accident to absorb some of the force.

“You’re the vulnerable person,” she said. “Even if you’re following all the rules and doing everything right, the physical vulnerability of not being protected by a car, a vehicle — you’re going to lose in that incident. When that car hits you, you’re the one that’s going to suffer.”

Such was the case when senior Brian Wells was hit by a car earlier this month as he headed home on Alder Street on his bike around 9:30 p.m. He took as much precaution as he could as a cyclist riding at night in the rain: He wore a helmet, headlight, tail light and bright clothes when a driver failed to yield right-of-way at an intersection, and he ran into the side of the car. The car, driver and bike were unharmed, but Wells suffered from a sprained knee and required crutches for two days after.

He doesn’t see the incident as one to lament, however.

“These experiences don’t have to be negative experiences,” he said.

The driver gave him a ride home after the collision and delivered his bike back to him, contacting him the next day to wish him well.

“It could have been so much worse,” he said. “It was an honest mistake, and honest mistakes can still hurt people, but it was as good as it could have been.”

Still, this experience has solidified for Wells his personal code of safety while riding a bike.

“Be very clear in your intentions — drivers can’t read your mind,” he said. “Don’t abuse your right-of-way, and be nice to drivers. If you’re driving, you would want a bicyclist to do those things for you. It’s the Golden Rule.”

All modes of transportation hold individual dangers, but drivers and bicyclists alike might have trouble grasping the seriousness of an accident until after becoming a victim of one.

Prichard has seen doctors and specialists for his injuries about 10 times so far and anticipates several more in his future. His recovery, even after 19 months, is an ongoing process.

“Every day, my shoulder pops and cracks a bit,” he said. “(The accident) took me out of my education for a whole term. This is not the future I wanted to go down. It has changed what’s going to be happening in my life.”

Would sharks be embarrassed if they knew we could totally see their dorsal fins above the water? Comedian Louis C.K. thinks so, and it really makes you wonder.

Then again, a lot of Louis’ jokes in his newest HBO comedy special “Oh My God” make you wonder. Are, perhaps, people with nut allergies more expendable than the rest of us? Why on earth would a woman, under any circumstances, go on a date with any man, ever? Why can’t we make penguins, seals, walruses and sea lions one species so we can stop being confused at zoos?

Louis will not disappoint old fans of his work with this hour-long set, and, like previous specials, he will have the show available for download on his website in September for $5. That’s not to say that “Oh My God” is the funniest of his shows — it’s not. “Hilarious” in 2010 and “Chewed Up” in 2008 remain on the top-tier of Louis C.K. comedy, but that in no way makes “Oh My God” not worth the watch. Though C.K. said in a teaser about his April 13 show that he expected some people to watch and say, “Oh my god, that’s just awful,” the jokes were far from his more offensive ones. If anything, the set is tame in comparison to his rigorous masturbation jokes of comedy-past. He strayed away from his usual self-shaming tones of getting older and fatter, and even avoided, for the most part, jokes detailing his annoyance with his children. These are Louis C.K. comedy staples many fans will look forward to in his new special and be disappointed not to find.

Instead, C.K. focuses heavily on more observational comedy rather than personal, drawing offensive conclusions about vague groups of people, like individuals under 45 years of age and actively-dating men, rather than pointing out specifics. His jokes won’t make your skin crawl with reluctant agreement, but you’ll laugh all the same.

“Oh My God” may be an inappropriate title, but consistently funny stand-up comedians shouldn’t be judged by their shows’ monikers anyway.

My grade: B+

Today marks day two of the five-day Cinema Pacific Film Festival, now in its fourth year of delivering hand-picked films centered on Pacific Rim countries. This year, Mexico and Singapore are the primary focus with the festival screening 16 films, both short and feature length, in addition to lectures and discussions by filmmakers, artists and professors.

Director and screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga, best known for writing 2006′s “Babel” and 2003′s “21 Grams,” is showcased in this year’s festival. Yesterday, Arriaga screened “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada,” a 2005 Western about the death of a Mexican immigrant in Texas. The film was directed by and starred actor Tommy Lee Jones, and Arriaga wrote the screenplay.

Still to come, Arriaga will accompany the screening of “The Burning Plain,” his 2008 drama about the intertwining lives of two families in New Mexico, Thursday at 9:15 p.m. at the Bijou Art Cinemas. Arriaga will also give two free talks, “The U.S.-Mexico Border Through the Eyes of a Writer” at 4 p.m. today at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, and he will discuss screenwriting and directing at 7 p.m. on Friday, April 19 at Oak Hill School.

“It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity,” festival Publicity Coordinator Stacey Green said. But Arriaga isn’t the only filmmaker showing quality work at this year’s festival, according to Green.

Also in attendance is guest filmmaker Brian Lindstrom, hosting the screening of his 2013 documentary “Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse.” The film analyzes the events leading up to and after the controversial death of James Chasse, a Portland man with schizophrenia who died after injuries sustained during his arrest by Portland police in 2006. The Bijou will hold two screenings on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. and 9:15 p.m.

The film festival will also host the Adrenaline Film Project, an intense filmmaking competition and workshop that occurs over the course of three days, culminating in the screening of the final products Saturday, April 20 at 9:30 p.m. in PLC 180. The film writing, shooting and editing began yesterday, and student and community filmmakers are working to win the Kalb Jury Award provided by Ben Kalb Productions or the viewer’s choice award, where audience members vote for their favorite film, after Saturday’s screening.

Other films featured include Portland filmmaker Steve Doughton’s hosting of his film “Buoy,” a drama focusing on an 80-minute phone conversation between a pregnant woman and her estranged brother; the documentary film “Canicula” about the Totonac people of Veracruz, Mexico; “Singapore Dreaming,” a narrative film following a Singaporean man who wins the lottery; along with many others.

The festival ends at 4 p.m. Sunday at the Bijou with the screening of the documentary “Inori,” which delves into the lives of the aging residents of a remote Japanese town.

Eugene cable and satellite options are not only lacking but expensive, making busting out cash to the few monopolies in town a painful endeavor. But the Internet provides a multitude of alternatives to watch your favorite shows and movies — legally — without going through those two options.

The first, and most obvious, is Netflix. Eight dollars a month gets you unlimited streaming on six devices, and two can stream at the same time. This means you can split the cost with a friend and not interrupt one another’s viewing. Unlike cable and satellite, Netflix can be played on a TV, computer, tablet or smartphone. And a fast enough Internet connection allows for better quality streaming. Additionally, some content is only accessible through Netflix like the new political drama “House of Cards” starring Kevin Spacey and the upcoming season of “Arrested Development.”

Another option is Hulu. As far as paid streaming goes, this provides a lot of the same content as Netflix. But it also offers free content. A quick search of your favorite current television show reveals Hulu will often have the latest episode or two free for watching with a brief commercial break.

This is true of many television network sites as well: MTV, Fox, NBC, Lifetime, ABC and other major networks air episodes of their shows online the day after a new episode airs.

Every genre of film has a website streaming free movies. In the mood for a documentary? Try out TopDocumentaryFilms.com — this site locates documentaries hosted all over the web, many from YouTube, and puts them into one place for convenient viewing.

Many films are either out of the public domain, or their creators want them made available for free. RetroFilmVault.com and PublicDomainFlix.com are two such sites to find works in the public domain.

Crackle is similar to Netflix and Hulu but with fewer options and more commercials. But again, it’s free. Crackle offers both films and TV shows, though it is generally lacking in just-released content.

If you love old movies, look no further than BNWmovies.com, where black-and-white films reside for your viewing pleasure. Films are streamed complete with a retro TV box frame.

While several power-players in the TV industry are behind in providing online content to a cableless audience (HBO’s HBO GO is only available to those with a cable or satellite HBO subscription), iTunes and Amazon provide the service of filling in the gaps to your film and TV library with content you can’t find otherwise. With the number of alternatives to channel subscriptions growing, cable and satellite are not longer a requirement to enjoy TV.

With the return of “Arrested Development” on May 26 on Netflix, the concept of the prematurely-cancelled show has come to the forefront of the minds of television fanatics everywhere.

“Arrested Development,” a comedy surrounding the legally struggling and severely dysfunctional upper-middle-class Bluth family, was cancelled and pulled from Fox in 2006 due to poor ratings after a three-season run due. The insanely funny and fast-witted show was cancelled entirely before its natural ending point, a consensus felt by the cult following accumulated after its finale. Fans, along with the enthusiasm of the cast and crew, pushed for the show’s revival, and, unlike many shows cancelled before it, a new season and movie were put into production.

But this is far from the first show cancelled before its time. “Futurama” and “Family Guy” were both cancelled and then brought back. One wonders why the “five-year mission” pledged at the beginning of every episode in “Star Trek: The Original Series” was cut off at three years. But at least “Star Trek” got a decent handful of films along with a plethora of spinoffs. Other unfairly cancelled shows didn’t get that much.

Director Joss Whedon’s space-western drama, “Firefly,” reached only 14 episodes before it got the boot, but that wasn’t too soon for the show to garner its own cult-following. It won a number of awards, including an Emmy for outstanding special visual effects for a series, two Saturn Awards and five SyFy awards, one of which was Best Series. Fox cancelled the series in 2002 due to low ratings.

NBC’s “Freaks and Geeks” saw only 18 episodes before the dramatic high school comedy, set in the 1980s, was pulled. Sure, the actors went on to explosively successful careers after their start — James Franco, Seth Rogen and Jason Segel, most notably — but the squandered potential lies heavy in the hearts of TV buffs the world over.

The Internet presence of fandom cults is quickly becoming a source of research for networks looking to revive old favorites. Sure, some series are long gone, good only for the few remembered hours we had with them, but a simple cancellation no longer means a permanent death for strong enough followings.

All films based on real events, people or processes are going to have inaccuracies (sometimes severe ones), but some are more loyal to reality than others. Here are some films that are both entertaining and educational to help with furthering your academic career.

Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970): a refreshingly accurate portrayal of the attack on Pearl Harbor and the events leading up to it.

The King’s Speech (2010): learning about the complexities of the English royal family and patriarchy is just a by-product of this great film. It’s also a quick way to remember names and lineages.

Forrest Gump (1994): a cohesive culmination of the major events and cultural evolutions of the 1950s through the 1980s.

Goodfellas (1990): the film, based on the nonfiction book “Wiseguy” by Nicholas Pileggi, manages to brilliantly portray actual events involving the New York crime family, the Luccheses.

J. Edgar (2011): Clint Eastwood directs this fantastic look at the major themes and life of J. Edgar Hoover, the first director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Milk (2008): This film, while victim to the occasional historical inaccuracy, gives an important look at the overall attitude toward the LGBTQ community in 1970s America.