Okay—that is normal and appropriate, then, and the annoyed patrons were out of line. I didn’t have the whole story.
For the other comments above: I don’t have kids of my own, but I do have kids in my life. Any serious threats against a kid is unacceptable, whether in my charge or not. I think “I’m gonna kill that kid if…” is actually a threat to the responsible adult, but since I have not spawned apparently my opinion is worthless. I just think it’s obviously, recognizably hyperbole, even to the miscreant child.
I have been known to throw popcorn to make the point.
[sup]Of course given the prices they charge that is an expensive way to solve the problem so I usually just grab a bucket out of the trash can and get the ‘free’ refill.[/sup]
As (bad) luck would have it, this situation cropped up for me tonight. Went to the 9:20 showing of X-Men with a group of friends, and saw immediately that someone in the front section had brought their toddler with them. (Seriously, who does this? The kid couldn’t have been more than 3 years old, and you bring her to a show that starts past most kids’ bedtimes and features some fairly serious violence to boot? Come on.)
As if on cue, just as the theater was showing the little “turn off your cell phones and please remove disruptive children from the theater” clip, the kid started yelping and loudly calling for Daddy, etc. Someone in my row yelled, “Sounds like a disruptive child!” to general chuckling etc. Dad pretended not to hear. Kid continued squealing and yelping.
The movie started. Kid continues to squeal, yelp, and be generally disruptive throughout the pre-credit sequence. Someone in the row behind me yelled, “Take out your kid!” but Dad again pretended not to hear.
The credits came up. I decided, fuck this, I’m going for it, got out of my seat, went down and told the guy, “Take your kid out of here or I’m getting an usher.” He pretended not to hear me. I shrugged and said, “OK” and went to get the usher. As I was talking to the usher - who was fully prepared to go in with me to remove this guy, by the way, to the theater’s credit - Bad Dad finally came out, with a struggling, screaming toddler under his arm. I thanked him, thanked the usher, went back to the movie. My friends told me later that when the guy finally got up to leave, several people applauded.
And, it took me a good 15-20 minutes to settle back down and enjoy the movie after that happened, because I really hate confrontations. But I was seriously looking forward to X-Men and didn’t want it to be ruined.
I’m glad I stumbled into this thread because this is a pet peeve of mine.
I’m going to the movies less and less because of cell phone users but when I retired I started going during the week where there’s less people, especially on Tues nights when the pop corn is free.
Sometimes I’ve been the only one in the theater but I saw
Fast Five a few weeks ago on a Sat night. It had been raining and I was cooped up in the house and wanted to get out somewhere.
The cells phones were crazy that night. Usually, if you get the usher and he tells them to stop they start up again as soon as he leaves.
This happened that night but the person didn’t know there was a security guard standing in the back.
She was up front and kept waiving her cell because she knew someone behind her complained. The guard removed the entire family from the theater. Never saw that before and he stayed there the rest of the movie.
But now they will increase the price of tickets to pay for security.
I’ve had some real experiences with talkers to. I kept looking at this couple sitting next to me as they talked thru the entire movie. When
it was over the woman said you got a problem and I said not now the movie is over. She gave me some shit.
This lady was about 65 and so was her husband who said wanna fight? I laughed at him and starting yelling, USHER, USHER as loud as I could. Man, they jumped up and ran off while I just laughed myself silly. The guy was 65, had a bad limp. All I had to do was
kick him in the leg.
But actually the movies have been so bad lately, I haven’t been back since and the only movies I’ve seen since Christmas were
the Adjustment Bureau and Fast Five.
There was one other experience I had when a couple had their cells
on during the movie. I never say anything during the previews but once the movie starts and they still have them on I’ll say something.
So I sat down behind this couple and said really loud for everyone to hear me that they should turn their cells off and if they
didn’t I would make it as bad for them as they were making for me.
They were nice and turned them off right away. Afterward, the gal
left right away she was so embarrased but the guy gave me a lot of shit.
I just laughed at him, gave him the finger and walked out but man,
they’re really making some bad movies lately.
Love to see more Spy Games, Good Sheperd, The Departed, etc, not all this alien and vampire crap. LOL
This was my last run in with a dolt at the movie theatre.
A friend and I went to see a movie. The theatre was pratically empty. Two other people were there. My friend and I went to take our seats roughly in the middle of the theatre. A couple walks in sits directly behind us and Mr. Man proceeds to put his feet on the back of my chair, feeling the jolts as he’s rustling around.
I turned back and said “Either your fucking with me on purpose or are you really are that dense”
Dazed look on his face while my friend and I moved over a couple of seats.
We went to a movie yesterday and the loutish behavior was almost surreal. People were eating like it was going out of style—nachos, you name it. One guy kept leaving and coming back with beer, in a glass no less. I’ve never seen a bigger bunch of entitled, gluttonous chumps in my life. Granted, this was one of those dinner & drafthouse type of theaters, but still. It was all I could do to force down my quesadilla and Sweetwater 420.
I was at a movie recently where a family with young children (not appropriate age for the movie) were sitting down front and making some noise (not all that bad, actually) and theater personnel showed up about a third of the way into the film to give them the boot.
Slightly more annoying, actually, was the dimwit across the way who kept taking/making cellphone calls with the lighted screen waving around in my peripheral vision. He of course did not attract any security attention.
I liked the part about how she only used her phone to find her way in the dark theatre (first clue - that means the movie has already started and you’re bothering people, Princess), and then goes on to say that she texts all the time, in all thee-ay-ters. Sheesh.
Ibanez, you’ve bummed me out. I was holding on to faint hope that people actually weren’t that stupid and clueless, but now you’ve blown away my last hope.
Do the movie theaters no longer employ any ushers, where you go to tell them that somebody is distracting, and then the usher tells them “Be quiet or leave”? Maybe they should start offering some jobs…
