In 1978 I saw Star Wars for the first time (I know a whole year after the initial release) and it was wonderful. HOWEVER, since we were 3 children unaccompanied by adults, for some reason (I really mean that as we were very quiet and shy to be left alone at this theater) the teenage staff decided to have some fun at our expense. My cousin's baseball cap was taken off his head and the two guys working there were playing "catch" with it. I was yelled at for being in the pinball machine area while the movie was playing (I was looking for the bathroom which was actually in the next lounge area). My brother was ignored at the concession stand.
When our parents arrived to pick us up and we told them what happened, they spoke with the just-on-duty manager who was of no help.
I didn't go to that theater for another 3 years. As much as I wanted to get into the whole Star Wars fan thing, I couldn't shake that experience and just wanted to forget I saw the movie at that wretched theater.
Have any of you had the type of experience that just ruins a potentially great film for you?

The Shawshank Redemption -- great film, although my experience in the theater went badly. My girlfriend at the time got up to use the restroom. When she returned, she decided to surprise me with a little "oral fun." Apparently this was executed with great skill, but I can't know for sure since she accidentally sat in the wrong row and serviced some random dude!

Virtually any movie I saw at a dumpy theater in the city where I went to college was a bad experience. Not a presentation went through in which the sound didn't crash at least once and the film went out of focus. That, and the staff couldn't have been less commited to their jobs. One that really stands out is Black Hawk Down, which had multiple sound losses.

Dude! Is this for real? What happened afterwards?

Finding Nemo- Print had some scratches on it, lens was broken so they coudn't focus it very well at all, framing was too high (so a black frame line was on the bottom), house lights never went completely down (and went all the way back up at the end credits) AND the whole theatre was too damn small!!

Are you being for real?? Even if you are not, I am laughing my ass off because I could see that happening.

this is groucho again. guess he fooled you two.

I was kind of digging Vanilla Sky, but I remeber having bad 9/11 panic attacks at the time, so I went for the "release" of seeing a movie. For some reason, that day in January, I had retraced my steps and determined that my first panic attack happened on December 5. Well at some point in the movie, Tom Cruise says a line to the effect of(but exact date) "And my life forever changed on December 5th)" and I thought I was going insane. I was so convinced it was all going to be wrong, I left as soon as he got his face back and never have seen or cared to see the ending.

And "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" was a great watch, but a tough experience, since I went to the ghetto theatre and the brothers had the cellphone bridgade out in force. Even though it was subtitled, it was tough to watch a movie with the echoes of "I'm watchin a movie, yo, what are you doin?"

Eyes Wide Shut: middle aged guy sitting next to me talked to his wife the entire time. Wouldn't stop, even after being asked to repeatedly, then loudly, then threatening to beat him.

There I am the biggest Kubrick fan in the world, I've waited 12 years for his next film, I'm so stoked, and this ass hole talks all the way through then pops out of his seat as soon as the credits roll, proclaims "that sucked", and leaves. What a cock sucker. I hope all his children die violent deaths while he's forced to watch.

Went to see Kill Bill opening night and had a couple with a screaming; not crying; screaming baby. The baby starting up about ten seconds into the movie, and after 10 minutes or so everyone in the theater started yelling at them to get the kid the hell outta there. Ther started yelling back and refused to leave. Someone went and got the manager who went up and argued with them for about 5 minutes straight. They still refused to leave. The baby kept screaming, the audience kept yelling at the parents and the parents kept yelling back for another 15 minutes or so. Finally the manager comes back with a policeman who stands around for another 5 minutes or so and finally makes them leave. Totally ruined the movie for us. Afterwards we went looking for the manager to ask for some free passes but no one was left in the lobby but 1 usher. We ended up going back during a weeknight when there were a lot less people and finally got to enjoy it.

Way of the Gun

I really like this movie. But when I saw it the first time there was a person in the audience who kept yelling things out at the screen. He was mentally disturbed. Several times audience members kept telling him to be quiet. At one point this guy got up to his face grabbed his arm and screamed at the top of his lungs "Shut The **** Up. I'm gonna hit you man!!" This happened during the final gunfight in the movie.

Violent movie. Violent audience.

Dude - that was your date?! Well, next time you see her, be sure to thank her for me, willya?

I was a very pregnant 8 months when I went to see Titanic. I get there early, get my huge pop (drinking for two), large popcorn and I get a end seat in case I need to get up. So these two latecomers come to my aisle, I have to get my gigantic self up to let them in, the woman walks past my drink in the holder and knocks it to the floor.

I sat there thinking that they would offer to pay for my drink, get me another and I sat, and sat, and sat. They never did offer to replace my drink and I waited the entire 3 hours for them to do so. Not to mention that I became quite uncomfortable after about 2 hours.

It kind of tainted my feelings for the movie.

LOTR: TTT

Some lady who was sitting next to me brought her toddler to the movie. Who brings their 4 year old kid to a movie like that - especially one that's pushing 3 hours long? Needless to say, the brat was playing with my shoelaces during the whole movie.

God I dont know what it is, but that story pisses me off more than any I've read(though the others are certainly justified in their feelings). Its crap like this that kills my faith in common sense and decency that people have become stupid enough to even make you get up(unless there were absolutely NO seats left) but then not replacing your drink takes the cake. Bastards.

Too many to list.

One that stands out in my mind though is 'Scary Movie 2'. I took my girlfriend at the time to see it, it had been out awhile and the theatre wasn't that packed. Infront of us was two black couples. Everytime one of the Wayne brothers would do something funny, one of the black males in the front would either (1) stand up and shout something or (2) just shout and laugh as loud as possible. He'd scream stuff "Yeah, you go brother" and other things. I was just amazed at how loud and rude he was being.

No, I don't mean this as a racist post. I'd be pissed if it was a white person. I just found it odd, that he would only do it when the Wayne brothers was doin' something. Ruined the movie and I don't wanna see it ever again.

Both times I saw X2 weren't very good experiences. The first time I was feeling down, and decided to go to a movie to distract me. Feeling down ended up distracting me from the movie... oh well.

Then a few monthes later, a couple of my friends decided to go see it at the second run. In the theatre were the 6 of us, sitting in the middle row, like 4th from the back. Across the aisle from us was a family, two adults, and 3 kids under 4. In front of us were about 5 ghetto kids. Next to the ghetto kids was a guy that was just a fan of the movie... I ended up feeling very sorry for him.

The kids from the family were of course acting up (cept for the baby who slept) talking, jumping around, rolling down the aisle, almost getting stepped on, etc. They were the good audience members.

The ghetto kids sitting in front of us, were about the worst people I had ever attended a movie with. They were talking throughout the entire movie, they were throwing candy at eachother, they were just being distracting. We tried asking them to be quiet... they weren't. We asked again, no go. Even when my friend told them to "shut the **** up," they continued being annoying as all hell. After a while, they did somewhat settle down, because the guys in their group left for a while (I'd assume to get high). At this point, it was about halfway through the movie, and the girls that were left behind had no clue what was going on. So they asked the guy sitting next to them what was happening. He tried explaining, but they weren't paying attention, so he told them to just watch the movie. About 5 minutes later they asked him what was happening again... he had the same response. This repeated a coupl,e times throughout the remainder of the movie. Finally with about 5 minutes left, the guys come back, and take the girls away. While walking out of the theatre, they're trying to act all cool by taking out their lighters, and holding them up... but no. As we were leaving, the windows of the theatre had frosted up, so my friend wrote in big letters "I HATE FAT GHETTO CHICKS"... it about summed up the night.