😆🤣😅

Reading through this thread and I have to say, I don't miss any of this shit.

Maybe I'll try again in another 10 years.

Ive been to "Roast" screenings where they encourage people using their phones. Of course that doesn't apply for every type of movie but that's one example of having fun with the experience.

This sounds like some kind of Mad Lib.

I went to a 2PM weekday show of THE DAY THE EARTH BLEW UP: A LOONEY TUNES MOVIE and the house lights were on brightly throughout the trailers and promos, so I pulled out my newspaper (print, of course) and read it while waiting. The film itself started at 2:25 PM and the house lights remained on, washing out the screen. No one else among the three other people in the theater (all adults) reacted, so I got up from my seat and went out into the foyer area, where there were no human beings visible, so I shouted out, “Is there a manager here?” The girl behind the concession counter stuck her head up and asked, “Is there a problem?” I replied, “Yes, the house lights are on in Theater 12 and the movie’s already started.” She said, “I’m on it,” and she picked up a walkie-talkie. I headed back to the theater and waited. Five minutes later, the lights finally went out. Definitely a bad start for a movie.

That’s supposed to be automated. When they ran film there were cues placed on it to trigger the lights to go down, but sometimes they didn’t work. As a projectionist I always checked as soon as possible (staying by the projector during trailers if time allowed) to make sure the lights went down.

Apparently Minecraft audiences are quite rambunctious. What's sad is that if this is the kind of audience that they need to fill theaters, they will continue to make them and welcome the obnoxious nature with open arms.

I still haven’t been to a theater since 2019. The only reason is because of rude attendees. I refuse to let someone ruin my movie viewing experience.

Yeah it's too much of a gamble these days. Unless something 100% needs to be seen on a big screen - which is rare these days - then paying money to likely be aggravated and have the movie ruined isn't worth it. Also the convenience factor.

I won't be going back the theater until all other people in the audiences are muzzled and have their hands tied behind their backs.

I stopped going to concerts because they won't allow me to bring an electric cattle prod into the venue.

I walked into Black Bag during the previews and a guy was in the seat next to my seat. It wasn't reserved when I reserved my tickets just 25 minutes before, but l don't know if he just took a seat or decided to sit next to me. Either isn't great. I just sat a couple seats down and it was fine. If it was busier, I don't know what I would have done. What, sit in my actually seat right next to a stranger?!

Did you buy your ticket online?

Indeed I did. I'm an AMC A-List Member, used the app.

A similar thing happened when I went to see Freaky Tales (2025) earlier today.

There were only about (6) total tickets sold when I purchased mine, leaving most of the theater empty.

During the start of the film, a gentleman sat in the seat right behind mine and immediately starting blaring videos from his phone.

I ignored it for a few minutes until I started to get agitated, then turning around to ask him to turn off his phone, which he did.

"Projectionists" aren't even in the booth anymore. It's all automated.

Funny story you'll appreciate. My film festival does an annual "Spring Showcase" in April. Rather than go on full-festival mode, we just get one screen in the multiplex. I run the movies on our screen, the rest of the theater, the non-festival films, are automated. The projector right next to mine was showing the animated Super Mario Bros. movie. I was noticing that the magnifier lens (used on scope movies) was stuck, so it was actually shown letterboxed. So in my downtime (while our movies were playing), if the SMB playlist started up on the other projector, I would go over and manually drop the mag lens right before the feature started. Took like 2 seconds. I was chatting with the theater manager and told him about the broken lens, and he said he knew about it, although the past couple of days he'd received fewer complaints about it. I was like, "Yeah, because I've been dropping it in for you!!"

Like, they knew there was a problem and it could easily be solved by just having a person there when the movie starts, and they still didn't do it.

1. That's pretty lousy of them.

2. You have a film festival? Care to share more? I'd be glad to read about it!

And let me guess, the lens had to be dropped in for every showing because it changed itself back afterwards for the stupid commercials, which shouldn’t even be there?

It’s amazing the things customers will and won’t complain about. 30+ years ago people used to complain all the time about the previews being loud. The theater didn’t show ads then, but later put in slide projectors showing ads and lame trivia crap. We thought for sure people would raise hell about those, but it was basically crickets.

There are a lot of videos online of Teens and kids going absolutely bonkers crazy during screenings of Minecraft and there is like popcorn and trash all over the seats and floors.

Some opinions are interesting. Some are calling them disgusting pigs. Others are saying relax it's part of the communal experience, which seems to be lacking these days, and your keeping the theater staff busy and earning their pay.

What do they think it's a screening of Rocky Horror Picture Show?

I've worked for many of the local film festivals here in my city. Asian, Jewish, Latino, and LGBT+. I've been a programmer, production coordinator, lead projectionist, regular projectionist, etc. I'm mostly just doing the Asian film festival now, and they call me "lead" projectionist but I'm really not.

It's not a hard job to get. Just volunteer at a film festival (they always need the help), show even a fraction of competency, they'll make you a staff member before long.

Pretty much. The theater just has the masking opened all the way all the time (I know how much you love that). Flat movies are essentially shown window boxed, then the scope films have black bars on the sides AND top and bottom unless the mag is dropped. It's on a motor, but it's long since died.

But the good part about our event is that the artistic director and I are sticklers on film presentation, and he and I manually adjust the masking for each movie. It's a pain in the ass. We have to put an image on screen and freeze it. Someone goes behind the curtain, up a ladder, slinks across a narrow plank, then pulls a chain to adjust the masking in for flat films and out for scope. But we only do that for our festival movies, we can't touch the other movies showing at the theater.

Reason this is so archaic is that all the masking controls were attached to the 35mm projectors, which are long gone as you imagine. They haven't added the motorized controls back yet, and probably won't as the digital projectors are pretty old too. 2K. Maybe if they ever upgrade to 4K they'll add it. Maybe.

"It's astounding..."

So they're cutting corners even though they're also making money from showing commercials.
The scope format on digital is crippled anyways, big reason why I've simply given up on theaters. They should have made the frame natively 2.35 and side-masked 1.85 movies, or else used an anamorphic lens. But this proves digital was mainly to save money, not make the presentation better.

I generally have good experiences at my local theatre, but I had an odd experience the other day when I went to see Death of a Unicorn. Before the theatre lights went down, there were three squares on the screen. When the lights went down and the previews started, these three squares were still visible. I couldn't figure out what was causing them, as they were clearly a source of light, because they became most noticeable when that part of the film image was dark. Finally, I thought about the projection booth, so I turned around and could see the three windows at the back of the theatre (why three windows, don't you just need one for the projector to point out of) were lit up. I had to leave the theatre and tell an employee "The lights are on in the projection booth and it's casting an annoying glare on the screen." They went up and turned the lights off. Never had this happen before.

If I was sitting in front of these people who started throwing popcorn and soft drinks, somebody's ass would be beat. Mine or theirs.

I don't even have words for someone who would bring a live chicken to the theater.

Glad you went and said something, Crocker Jarmen. Maybe there are still staff in the projector booth, even in the digital age!

I frequently have to shut auditorium doors that let light blast onto the screen at our local AMC.

Auditoriums 5-16 on the main level are fine. When you open the door you go inside a bit further and then turn left or right to go around the seating. The door could be open the whole show and you won't see the hallway light.

Auditoriums 1-4 on the second level are another story. They each have two doors into the auditorium, like some sort of faux decompression chamber (or, if you will, the multi top hatch system on the Millennium Falcon) and it's a straight shot to both the seating and the screen. If those doors are open, there's a rectangle of light up and down across the entire right side of the screen.

I'm sure the staff are supposed to shut those doors when the show starts, but these auditoriums are for movies that are smaller and/or have been there a while, plus they're upstairs and some nights they have a skeleton crew, so they often get overlooked.

When I go into these auditoriums, I just shut both doors behind me right away now. This year alone, I had to get up and shut the doors for A Complete Unknown and I'm Still Here, and I just went ahead and shut them on my way in to The Brutalist and Mickey 17. All had been out a while, all were upstairs, all were during weekday matinees or weekday late shows, all auditoriums had the doors wide open, and all were ready to give the movie a bit of a night light.

I figure some day a staff person or fellow moviegoer may say something to me about it, that the doors are supposed to stay open until the movie starts. I'm glad to offer my rationale on how they basically never get shut unless I do it and if they press, I'll just shrug and keep watching the movie.

Same deal with me, I almost always have to close the doors when the movie starts in the few auditoriums where the door faces the screen (half of them have like a tunnel that curves into the auditorium, sort like when you're boarding a plane, where light leak isn't an issue).