Comments on: Mobile phones, movies and etiquette

By: Johnathan Pearce

Johnathan Pearce — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 10:25:03 +0000

The movies are full of ghastly people and the screens now aren’t that much bigger than you could buy for your own home if you were so inclined.

I used to think that I was a bit of a curmugeon until I started to read Verity’s comments on this blog!

I agree with her about some of the advantages of watching a big tv at home, though. You cannot serve alcohol in most UK cinemas, as far as I know, and it is nice to be able to slump out on a long sofa and pause the film when you want and fast-forward past any trailers and suchlike.

By: Verity

Verity — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 00:06:51 +0000

Nick M – You think people go to the movies or the theatre to mix? Wot?

The movies are full of ghastly people and the screens now aren’t that much bigger than you could buy for your own home if you were so inclined. And at home, you can hit freeze and go and fix drinks at will (that’s why comedies are always funnier towards the end) and you don’t have to be brought out of the story by people behind you popping their gum, chatting on their mobiles and chatting to one another in normal voices. Why anyone would step inside a cinema is a mystery.

With the theatre, that’s more problematic. And for the ballet, I am sorry, but ushers should be allowed to shoot to kill, but using silencers. And the bodies should not be removed until after the dancers had taken their last bows.

By: Nick M

Nick M — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 23:26:13 +0000

Andrew Ian Dodge,

How sad.

If you are happy never to mix, what are you doing on the web?

By: Julian Taylor

Julian Taylor — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 23:22:20 +0000

I recall visiting someone in hospital in Israel a few years ago. At the entrance they had warnings to switch off your mobile phone, accompanied by a clear very polite warning that anyone using a mobile phone beyond that point would have the handset confiscated and destroyed.

Very authoritarian but that’s all you need in cinemas or theatres.

Sharing a darkened room with a bunch of strangers…yeah my idea of a good time.

You spend your whole life living in a room with the curtains drawn and the lights off – wtf is new about that?

By: Andrew Ian Dodge

Andrew Ian Dodge — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 23:13:05 +0000

Sharing a darkened room with a bunch of strangers…yeah my idea of a good time. Wait until it comes out on DVD, get to keep the film if you wish and do whatever the hell you want in your own damn house. Going to the movies is never fun…always a disappointment thank god for DVDs and satillite.

By: Johnathan

Johnathan — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 21:48:20 +0000

Nick M makes a good point about the shared experience of watching a film in a big cinema. I would add that I occasionally like to watch rugby and football matches down the pub with my friends rather than sit at home.

By: triticale

triticale — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 21:46:42 +0000

Jamming cell phones by broadcasting signal on in the cellular frequency band is illegal in the US under Federal law; the Communications Act of 1934 as amended. It also constitutes trespass on the cellular providers’ lease of spectrum. As a cellular optimization specialist I sincerely hope Uncle Whiskers prosecutes jammers to the full extent of the law.

I have no problem with Faraday cage structures. The architecture of cellular communications is such that at any time a cellular phone is in communication with more than one site sector, at least in any location busy enough to support a cinema.

By: Bombadil

Bombadil — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 21:17:33 +0000

Nick M:

I agree that going to the cinema used to be about getting out and having fun. Now it is about straining to hear the dialogue issuing from the 30 speakers scattered about the theater over the noise of chewing, candy wrappers, and other patrons chatting with each other.

Also, never underestimate the drawing power of a quality home theater setup to the fairer sex … you just have to show the right movies

By: Nick M

Nick M — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 20:50:59 +0000

No, Bombadil!
Going to the cinema is about getting out and having fun. It’s about a shared experience. Would you like to be the only person in a club, restaurant or bar? I’ve got 42″ of monitors right in front of me, Dolby surround and a DVD rewriter, but I still like to go out. I still love the anticipation when the feature is about to start and (most) people hush. You don’t get that at home.

And it’s also absolutely u/s for a date. I’m sure you seduced Goldberry by saying “Come back to mine, my screen is very wide, very wide indeed”.

By: Bombadil

Bombadil — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 19:05:37 +0000

The solution is a good home theater system. As these get cheaper (you can put something pretty damn acceptable together for less than $2000 now, complete package) they will provide an incentive for theater owners to come up with innovative solutions to the problem of obnoxious patrons.

Nifty thing, that invisible hand.

By: Sigivald

Sigivald — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 18:46:16 +0000

People have every “right”, so to speak, to take a phone into the theatre with them.

The impolite bastardry comes with using it in the theatre for anything but an emergency (and in that case, one should still leave the theatre ASAP while dealing with the call).

People who are on call for work or for family medical conditions (I know people in both groups) should hardly be constrained from ever seeing a film simply because you’re (quite justly) irritated at people talking up a storm out of sheer impoliteness and bastardry.

The solution, especially from a libertarian perspective, is not bans, but shaming. Not enough of that going around anymore.

By: Nick M

Nick M — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 16:50:27 +0000

I’m with Verity on this, though I suspect that she may not be entirely serious about executing the miscreants, life with heavy labour and no chance of parole should be sufficient, especially if they are compelled to listen to the Nokia Tune played from an old 3310 all day, forever.

I also despise people in cinemas talking or eating noisly. I especially hate inane plot-related conversations, “So is he a goodie or a baddy, him there in the glasses?”.