The cinema

I love going to the cinema. Depending on what's out I can go multiple times a week, sometimes even more than once a day. I'll go to see things that I fully anticipate to be not great, just because I love going to the cinema so much. Sorry to hear about the issue with the reserved seating for the OP, but I haven't sat in a screening that hasn't been completely free seating for well over a decade.

I wouldn't write it off as an experience on the whole just because you had one bad experience. You can always be just unlucky. I find 90% of cinema audiences are well behaved and know to stay quiet and not be inconsiderate dicks to the people around them. Although, as some posters have pointed out, you can potentially have a more easy time of it if you go at off-peak times - early in the day, late at night, or two or three weeks into a film's run. And, of course, some cinemas can tend to have a different type of crowd to others. But, I honestly can't say I've had a movie-going experience truly ruined for me in years due to people being idiots in the audience, and I'm pretty sensitive generally about the noise of people talking and munching.

The price of food is scandalous, no dispute there, but hasn't it always been this way? Personally, I don't always get food; I don't feel the need to eat a box of popcorn as big as my torso every single time. But I know that can be hard for a lot of people - munching on rubbish is an integral part of the experience for most.

I'll always defend the practice of seeing things on the big screen. In recent years I hear more and more from people how, despite how they love films, they don't go to the cinema anymore. Fair enough, but I do feel sorry for them. It's the only truly proper way to experience a film sometimes, hell, I'd even say all the time. Even so-so movies are improved and made more immersive by seeing them on a big-screen, with crisp picture and sound. And some films demand to be seen that way. Last years Mad Max, or Gravity are two examples of recent movies that just don't have the same impact if you watch them at home, no matter how good your set-up is. And, while I don't always absolutely love sitting in a jam packed screen, I do love that feeling of a communal watching experience that can come over a crowd when you're all sitting there in the dark, completely rapt in an absorbing film.

Degag wrote: »

It's probably just me but i can't make sense of this.... 3 what??!!

3 the phone network? 3plus or 3rewards or whatever they are calling it now. One of the rewards is on cinema tickets in IMC and Odeons

I go to the cinema sporadically but very rarely get the problems listed here by some with the exception of the odd twat using their phone. Typically a loud "Will ya cop on" sorts that out. If someone refused to move from a seat I had allocated I would go outside and get a member of staff to move them.

Same thing if someone dared to slap their legs up on my headrest they would be told in no uncertain terms to move them.

Finally you don't mention OP if you actually complained to the cinema about your experience. There is no point coming onto the internet and complaining to strangers about the poor service you received. You need to take it up at source with the people who matter and if they don't take what you are saying seriously and they are part of a much larger operation complain to head office. For all we know they could think they are doing a slap up job because no one has complained.

scdublin wrote: »

Something similar happened to me a few weeks ago and when I asked them to move they said "is it not just sit anywhere"? So I said nope, I booked these online and they begrudgingly moved. I also have a particular area that I sit in so I'd have gone out and got a member of staff if they refused to move. You bought them online in advance fair and square, no point putting up with it.

The thing I don't get is that anywhere that you can book a seat will always ask where you want to sit when you're buying the ticket (front, middle or back) so people have to know that there's assigned seating they're just being dicks. I went to a film recently where a couple were sitting in someone else's seats. When the real seat owners arrived they had to move. Instead of moving to their actual seats they sat in other assigned seats. They had to move 3 times in the end.

We were talking about cinema etiquette one day in work and one of the girls told us she takes her shoes off in the cinema so she can put her feet up on the seat in front. And genuinely seemed shocked that we thought this was wrong. "But sure I'm seeing a film I'm going to get comfortable." So some people don't give a **** as long as they're ok