I just installed mplayer and whenever i use the command to open a file all i get is coding on the terminal and weird lines toward the top of the screen. it looks like it is trying to open something but cant quite do it. also i got the codec from the site so maybe that is it. how do i install those?

Hi pasalacqua128,
information on installing codecs for mplayer.
You may not need to do this, however. Have you installed mplayer from source? If so, you may need to check, if you enabled codecs in your configuration. (you do need to install those codecs separatelly nevertheless, but it will save you a headache or two to know that they need to be enabled as well)
Also, if you installed mplayer from RPMs, make sure you are not using native Redhat (or Fedora for that matter) RPMs, because redhat seems to be focused on keeping multimedia capabilities from you these days (fear of copyright). Use freshrpms in that case.

Also, it may be useful to see the "coding on the terminal". Mplayer is very good at giving hints of what is wrong. If you post them here, I will be glad to assist you.

Good luck,
- drowstar

Or use the official MPlayer RPMs (US mirror).

Me too.