Muzman on 9/6/2011 at 16:22

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Didn't see this in the youtube thread (because I didn't even check! That's how devil-may-care I am.)

Recently a young lady was ejected from independent cinema the Alamo Drafthouse in Austin,Texas for texting during the film.
Later that evening she drunkenly called to complain and they turned it into an advert.
(http://youtu.be/1L3eeC2lJZs)

Pretty funny, but the popularity of the clip prompted this post collating their movie geek centric previous efforts.
(http://www.badassdigest.com/2011/06/07/an-epic-history-of-the-alamo-drafthouse-dont-talk-psas)

And they are cool.

It's also amusing for two other reasons, to me anyway. One that this cinema behaviour topic has come up before on various forums and often ends up in a huge dust up with people going on about "What if your house was burning down!/Your babysitter needed the insulin for your first born that only you carry!/you were Dr House and the only one who could save someone and couldn't be reached?!!!". Which is hilarious and kind of amazing in its implication that society wouldn't function without mobile liberalism at all times (the era before 1995-ish is some sort of conspiracy where humans were ruled by aliens who organised everything for us with their communications technology).

Also the fortunes of independent cinemas like that are worth keeping an eye on and this sort of situation only happens because cinemas like this are some of the only ones left not run by three underpaid teenagers and a lot of automated machinery, wherein anything goes.
If they can stay afloat for long enough they might be the only ones left once the crunch from being hand-in-glove with hollywood distribution and betting the farm on 3d, kills everyone else.

demagogue on 10/6/2011 at 01:29

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I've been there a hundred times. But then I went to college in Austin. It's got character, for sure.

I don't have much opinion on theatre texting. I don't really text as it is, but if I had to I probably wouldn't have thought to leave a movie theatre to do it or thought it would be intolerable (but I would have tried to keep it short & discreet too). But whatever. I honestly don't care enough to worry about it either way. If they kicked me out I'd probably roll my eyes and mutter, well that's a stupid rule, and know not to do it next time.

While I think I'm pretty in touch with a lot of the online reality, texting is one thing I never really saw the point... Much less why people would even want to do it while driving or in a theatre; which feeds back into why I feel it's not such a big deal -- possibly naive of me; as opposed to people that feel it everywhere like a cancer of society and find it so intolerable that they want to draw a line and kick people out. Maybe a generational or age thing, and it just not being around me.

Fafhrd on 10/6/2011 at 06:26

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The thing is, it's NEVER discreet. As soon as the phone screen comes on in a darkened theatre, everyone can see it. People try to cover it up by putting their hand over it so the light doesn't go upward, and it only results in shining the screen directly into the eyes of people in the row behind them. It's always distracting and it's always disruptive to the theatre going experience.

There's a reason why they have those 'Turn off your damn phone' cartoons before every movie.

Scots Taffer on 10/6/2011 at 07:35

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Not seeing any other vids either :(

demagogue on 10/6/2011 at 12:19

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See this is why I must be really out of touch with this. I guess I'm very lucky that the theatre I usually go to (and the kinds of movies I usually watch) just don't have this problem... There won't be many people to begin with, and they won't text. And I don't doubt if I even opened up my phone I'd immediately close it if the brightness was really noticeable as you say, and I believe you the way you describe it. (I always turn my cellphone off instictively going into places like theatres anyway).

BTW, looking at this from the other way; when I was in another part of DC I'd go to a theatre with a largely black audience. I guess a lot of people already knows this, but of course it's a circus and everybody's talking and laughing and shouting at the movie. The thing is, when you're there it's hard to feel like you can get on a moral highhorse and shout back at the entire audience, "would all of you please shut up so I can hear the movie!"

I got a real sense that this is very much a cultural kind of thing, and black theatres have had people talking in them probably for a century now and who am I to walk into one and be the single guy on a moral crusade to civilize the entire black-theatre-going population. (That said, you can see middle class-looking black folk that don't look comfortable with it either, not if they're used to suburban theatres.) But thinking back on this Austin rules, it makes me think like it's effectively putting up a sign "Black people are allowed in this theatre as long as you don't act black." They don't think like that; but it's very much a cultural attitude about what's right that not everybody shares. But maybe even this is changing, as more people & their tastes & mores are going middle-class.

Anyway, the texting thing is another case of cultural difference, those in & those out. But because it's a new thing I'm not sure it's been able to credibly elevate itself a "human right" in the way that that you can feel 'talking in a black theatre' is if you've ever spent more than a minute in one and didn't run away at the sight.