If you read this column last week, my dismay over Masked and Anonymous should come as no surprise. What I didn't have space to mention, however, was that the misery commenced before the film even began. There I was at the Guild 45th, in theater two (my favorite), all set to enjoy the power and vainglory of Bob Dylan (my very favorite), when what to my wondering eyes should appear but a motherfucking BMW commercial. At a Landmark Theatre, no less.

I won't go into the whole thing about ads running before movies, except to say that like you, I find the whole idea infuriating. For a long time now, it's been a given that chain theaters show 15 minutes of TV commercials before the more sanctioned ad fare of movie trailers. But despite the foreknowledge that Fandango.com is going to assault me with its egregious stupidity, I still feel like someone has plopped a big, dirty finger in my drink every time. That's why I go to Landmark houses whenever possible. If there's anything more insulting than paying $8 to see an ad, please let me know.

Wait, I just thought of one: paying $8 to see an ad that doesn't even have the decency to admit it's an ad. Two years ago, BMW hired a gang of famous filmmakers--including Ang Lee, John Woo, David Fincher, Ridley Scott, Tony Scott, John Frankenheimer, Guy Ritchie, and Wong Kar-wai--to create The Hire, a series of high-budget "short films" starring Clive Owen (with a host of co-stars) as a driver who pilots a fleet of Beamers through perilous situations. These ads were originally produced for Internet download, but have since turned up on DVD, and now, on the big screen. And like all advertising, they constitute a crime against art--not because they aren't artfully made, but because they are. The spot I saw, directed by Joe Carnahan, is called Ticker. In it, Owen and his ride must evade a hail of gunfire to deliver a gutshot Don Cheadle and his mysterious, time-sensitive package to a military hospital.

Spoiler alert: They make it. Cheadle's package contains nothing short of a human heart, intended for the chest of an ailing benevolent dictator whose enemies want him dead. Cue moist reverie about democracy, then roll credits. The running time is five minutes. The moral is that BMWs are awesome, especially for saving the free world by outrunning helicopters and SUVs. The other moral is even more troubling. The cast and crew of The Hire are major artists, hired, one assumes, for their artistry, which they were only too happy to whore out in exchange for undoubtedly astronomical sums. It's hard to blame them, except when you see the ads. They look so much like "real" films that one has to wonder if the filmmakers weren't making a deeply cynical statement about the state of their art. Nowadays, it seems the only difference between a movie and a commercial is the running time.