We all have the stories, a few hours of escapism ruined by talking, cell phones or screaming babies. In fact, the AMC pre-movie trailer always makes people laugh with the screaming baby being snatched out of the theater. Now AT&T has clever commercials about how a cell phone ring can ruin a moment, a movie or a critical moment in time.
In my experience, the ringing has stopped, but the texting has picked up. Sit at the top of a stadium theater and count the flashes of blue lights from people texting during the movie. Due to budget tightening, our movie going has been cut back dramatically. When we plunk down $10 each or $20 total- a trip to Aldi for groceries- for a movie, we want to watch the movie, not play musical chairs to escape audible commentary or that pesky blue light interrupting the movie.
On Friday night we went to a 5pm show for the Watchmen. I changed seats to avoid someone who couldn't put down his phone. The girl next to us was playing on her I-Phone. During the movie, at least seven people answered text messages during the movie even though there is a sign with big letters which says " A Single Text Can Ruin a Movie." Didn't these folks pay $10 each for the movie? Why not sit at home and pretend you're at the movies texting your friends? Save yourself $10.
Is it dreaded young people? Are "kids these days" just rude and inconsiderate? Or has society as whole retreated into the world of me? It doesn't matter. It will be a long time, probably until Wolverine in May, before I actually pay money to see a movie again. I just can't see spending that kind of money only to spend the time hopping from seat to seat to try to get an unobstructed view.
I do have a new plan for when we do go back to the theatre, the next cell phone we see will involve a trip to the manager and my insistence that I saw someone recording the movie. After all, there are all these strange lights and no one would be texting now would they?
The nice thing is that DVDs come out so quick after a film's release, it is possible to avoid the theater and stay in the loop. In ten years, with improved electronic delivery, first run films might bypass theaters all together and be sent to your email. Bring back the days of pay-per-view cable and imagine viewing parties in basements with cheap popcorn and limited distractions. In fact, most movies we watch on blu-ray have better sound and picture are cheaper than two tickets to the actual film. Theaters need to watch out and work harder on improving the experience or die hard film fans like myself will be turning to netflix and amazon.com for cutting edge film delivery without the distractions.
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