Tuesday, June 07, 2011
Oh my god, YES
I'd be a delighted patron of any movie theatre that tossed people out for talking or texting.
My favorite part: "I've texted in all the other theatres in Austin and no one cared"...yea knucklehead, no one tossed you out maybe, but every single person in the theatre was silently hoping you'd be struck by popcorn poisoning and never be able to set foot in a theatre again without breaking into hives!
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35 comments:
Like, you know, I'm glad you, like, feel like a, you know, customer! ROFLOL!!!
I'da kicked them out, too!
I have been known to kick the back of a seat when someone starts talking on their phone in the theater, especially when the movie is playing!
I love how she said she'd go somewhere where people are polite. Because she was being so courteous in her response. (Not to mention, how about getting to the theater before they dim the lights so you can get to your seat so you know where it is should you have to vacate during the film. Problem solved.)
Ha ha ha. Thanks for the laugh. Though I do feel guilty laughing because I don't necessarily think the theater's response to this was entirely called for.
Couldn't agree with you more.
I paid over $90 to see a play at the beginning of which, it was announced that all cell phones needed to be turned off.
Five minutes into the play, a woman three over from me started texting. I oh so rudely reached across my friends, plucked the offending phone from the woman's hands before she could stop me and since I was sitting on an aisle seat, sent it sailing down the carpet toward the stage.
Not a sound was uttered but I did receive several polite pats on the back for that one.
It shouldn't anymore, but it still does amaze me how selfish and self-indulgent so many are and the younger crowd isn't any better than the elder. It's become an entitlement mentality where people think they're obviously entitled to do what they want with no thought to anyone else.
One of many reasons I wish I lived in Austin!
I know I'm in the minority, but texting doesn't bother me. At least, not if it isn't constant. I sort of feel sorry for all the medical people on call who might not be able to attend the theater, live or cinema, otherwise. I know that these are not the people causing the problems, but I always make that tiny allowance in my head.
TALKING is inexcusable, no matter what. Step outside.
WVS: fonon. As in, phone on. I couldn't make that up.
I run a cinema and if people talk, text or refuse to turn their phones off, if I happen to step in and see it, they're out.
Everybody pays the same $$ to see the movie. They don't want to listen to your crap.
I mean, like, how could people watch a whole movie back, like, when in the old days when there wasn't any f**!# texting or like cell phones or f**!# anything to do but concentrate on the movie, like that's so boring and I'm like so important rules don't apply to me, ass*****!
I just went to an Alamo Drafthouse (San Antonio) for the first time on Sunday. There No texting/talking message is the best I've ever seen. Damn funny.
Awesome place. Movies, beer, wine, good food. Saw X-Men, and they played FunnyOrDie X-Men spoofs beforehand and some of the old school comics.
If you're ever in Austin or San Antonio, and you're in a movie mood, get you to the drafthouse.
I haven't been to a movie in so long it never occurred to me that people might text during one. I don't think I better ever go to one again. I'm not fit to be in public if it's cool to text in movie theaters. Well, maybe I can go to that theater!
Hallelujah! This drives me nuts!
This list comes from a movie review duo from the UK: the "Wittertainment Code of Conduct", i.e. rules for cinemagoers:
1. No eating - of anything harder than a soft roll with no filling. No-one wants to hear you crunch, chew or masticate in any way. Nachos cause special offence and are of the Devil.
2. No slurping - of drinks. You've already drunk a 5-litre flagon of pop, you really don't need the melting ice, too. You are not six years old.
3. No rustling - of super-high-density-Rustle-o-matic, extra rustle bags. No foraging of any kind. If you're going to need it during the film, get it out beforehand.
4. No irresponsible parenting - your five-year-old does not want to come to see the latest 12A certificate. You are using the cinema as a babysitter. Your child's moaning, whinging and crying is your fault and a profound annoyance to everyone else. Your interrupted sleep, caused by your child's nightmares, is also your fault and serves you right.
5. No hobbies - this includes knitting, drug-dealing, model aeroplane assembly, fighting, having sex and updating Facebook.
6. No talking - you're in a cinema. You have come here to watch, not to discuss or engage or participate or explain or whatever. More importantly, no-one in the cinema has paid £8.50 to hear your director's commentary on the movie. Just sit down and shut up.
7. No mobile phone usage. At all. Not even in flight mode - this isn't an aeroplane, it's a cinema. Even if you're not yapping, you're still creating light pollution. Put your thumbs away. N.B. includes Blackberries, Palm Pilots, iPads, whatever.
8. No kicking of seats - the area of floor directly in front of your seat is yours and is there to put your legs in. The back of the seat in front of you belongs to someone else. Do not touch, interfere with, or otherwise invade their space with your feet, knees or other bodily appendages.
9. No arriving late - like Woody Allen in Annie Hall, you're supposed to watch movies from the very beginning to the very end. If you turn up late, tough. Go see something else. The Sorrow and the Pity perhaps.
10. No shoe removal - you are not in your own front room. Nor are you in Japan. Unless you are, in which case, carry on. A cinema is a public space; keep your bodily odours to yourself.
:-D
I so want to fly to Austin right now and go feel like a customer at the Alamo Drafthouse. O yeah!
I especially like how they transcribed her mangled words. Reglear? She's from Texas, maybe related to W.
Ugghh, I hate texters mostly because their phone light is so blinding in a dark theater. And of course, as soon as they pull it out, it draws your eye.
@Laurel: It's never been those people causing the problems, from what I've seen. They generally leave their phones on vibrate and step out of the theater to check any messages they get, rather than blinding everybody else with their tiny square of light.
That was AWESOME! XD
I read they plan to play that clip, uncensored, before all their R-rated films.
Okay, yeah, good for the Alamo Drafthouse and all... but is anyone else thinking how wildly inappropriate it is for a business to be sharing, online, a customer's call? That really isn't professional...
With three young 'uns, my wife and I don't get to the movies much...well, ever. But years ago, we went to see "Girl, Interrupted," and the (adult) couple sitting right behind us were talking through the whole,thing. Finally we're near the end -- the really intense scene where Angelina Jolie confronts Winona Rider in the creepy basement -- and I just couldn't take it. I turned around and said (very loudly), "Would you please stop that?"
"Stop what?" she said.
"Talking through the whole f---ing movie!"
That did shut them up until the end. When the lights came up, the husband said to me, "If you want peace and quiet, you should watch the movie at home."
I said, "I think you have it backwards, sir. If you want to yammer like an idiot for two hours, you stay home.
Sheesh!
@nightsmusic:
Didn't Samuel L. Jackson once pause during a stage performance and tell a patron to "hang up the damn phone?"
I'm not surprised to see the number of people willing to respond to a rude behavior with a far worse one. Kicking the back of someone's seat or snatching their phone is the type of reaction I expect from Jr. High Students.
Stephanie McGee:
"Thanks for the laugh. Though I do feel guilty laughing because I don't necessarily think the theater's response to this was entirely called for."
According to the theater management, they'd asked her to stop texting twice prior to escorting her out.
I love her eloquent and frequent use of the "F" word. We could all learn a lot from that.
@michael seese
I can't remember who did that, but you may be right.
@m. Caliban, I'm way too old to worry about whether or not you can fix stupid and I no longer have the patience for it I might have once had. She got what she deserved and the rest of us watched a wonderful play in peace. Thats a win-win as far as I'm concerned.
The Magnited States of America.
I want to go to there.
That’s the reason I only go to Alamo Drafthouse (South) to see films and nowhere else – this theater does mean business. I’ve never seen anyone texting or talking in the theater, and I’m glad to know that the Drafthouse is willing to enforce the rules. I love the new PSA – really, it’s such classic Austin humor. How tragic, to be jettisoned from a movie because you can’t keep your hands off your phone. I mean, really? Someone can't keep their mitts off their phone for two hours?
Now for the gratuitous proud Austinite props: Alamo Drafthouse is much loved because the seats are nice and roomy, and the previews are just freakin’ weird. The menu is awesome, and there’s a huge selection of wine and beer. If you visit, this should be your first port of call. The Alamo Drafthouse South is the best, simply because the one downtown means valet parking or driving around tediously looking for a parking garage.
God Bless my glorious home state.
Seriously.
(in a side note...the last time I took my mother to see a movie was District 9. I was very excited. I enjoy watching other people enjoy movies almost as much as I do watching the movie myself.
Two women behind me spent the ENTIRE MOVIE talking about 1. their kid or 2. how gross the movie was.
Finally, when they started squeeling during one of the more emotional scenes during the movie (that involved the MC pulling pieces of his skin off. It was kinda gross) I turned around and asked them, politely and without profanity, to SHUT THE FUCK UP and let everyone else enjoy the movie.
They glared at me like I had just asked them to preform sexual favors in public.)
(So yeah. God bless my home state. Next time I'm in Austin, I'm goin' there.)
Am I the only one who sees the irony in someone named christwriter making that last comment? Oh, and I love it, by the way. ;)
The only thing I'd be worried about is being thrown out of this theater for laughing at the actual movie. I have a very loud laugh, and if something tickles me, I can't suppress it. This is why, by the way, I don't often go to the theater to see funny movies.
That said, it's about time someone did something like this, and I find their usage of the message hilarious. Now I know where to go the next time I'm in Austin (provided it's not a funny movie. ;) )
Oh, and I so wish I could do something like this with my college students! Maybe I'll just play this message the first class . . .
P.S. Her Sharkness will be pleased to know that Alamo Drafthouse is opening a theater in NYC this year. :)
OMG yes she is!
@Caliban
I wasn't talking about their response to her texting. I was talking about this video, with the voice mail. I agree wholeheartedly with whoever said it was not entirely professional.
The theater management can do whatever they want when a patron is on their premises. That's not my beef with this whole thing.
What they should do is open text-friendly movie theaters. All the texters can go there together. Just imagine scene-by-scene tweeter reports.
I live about 45 minutes from Austin, and I know where I'm going for my next Date Night with my husband. AWESOME.
Thanks for sharing this!
@Halcyon
The Alamo Drafthouse South has groovy new bowling lanes in the same center. The bowling center is so groovy; they've outfitted the place so that it has a retro feel, and martinis and mixed drinks are also served there -- it's totally Mad Men. A lot of couples make a night of going bowling firs, then on to dinner and a movie afterward. :)
Why is it we can manage to stop smoking almost everywhere but we still can't get people to turn off their cell phones? Is the punishment for smoking in a hospital so heinous that it takes effect? Can we apply that to texting in the movies. I recently tattled on a texter in a movie in Long Island and was delighted to see the manager come in several times to check on her after his first trip. Maybe the tide is turning.
I love you, Alamo Drafthouse.
This lady is clearly from 'Merrika, where as the Alamo Drafthouse is located within the United States.
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