Cinematical

Durrr... maybe theaters should stop being so damn greedy... Who wants to spend $10 for ONE ticket and then $8 for popcorn and a drink. If you're keeping track, that's $18 for one adult to see a freaking movie and have some snacks. Sure, your mileage may vary, but the point is that theaters are GREEDY. People can get more entertainment for much less elsewhere.

Oh, and forcing paying moviegoers to watch TV commercials before the film is also incredibly obnoxious.

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How about lowering the prices and some original movies, that would get me back.

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Some ideas for theaters:
-give me leg room, I do not enjoy sitting down for 2 hours with my knees rubbing the back of the chair behind me
-put forth more effort to make sure idiots are promptly removed from theaters - this is a huge reason I avoid theaters, I do not want to endure people fucking about while I am trying to watch a movie
-if you are going to charge that much for food make it worth it, that or lower food prices
-stop with the fucking commercials

And I suppose films worth watching would help get me into the theater but that is not the fault of the theaters. Honestly, who the fuck want to watch Basic Instinct 2, Bad News Bears, Herbie, anything by Uwe Boll, and anything with Lohan or Paris Hilton in it?

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Try infra-red headsets ("Variety" reported to be used for "Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man" about 1979 or 1980)? Some enhanced imaging? (2 1/2 D)? More "educational" films, i.e., "The Will Rogers Follies" or more Shakespeare? To help with curriculas, like more "excellant adventures"?

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Okay, I work at a theater and just would like to clear up some things:

1. We do not set box office prices, so we make all our money at the concession stand. The bigger the theater, the more money you will end up shelling out. I don't like it either but that's the way it works.

2. It gets harder and harder to keep track of annoying patrons, though I do have to say that at least for the theater that I work at, we try our best to get rid of them because hey, its annoying having kids running amok among the halls and acting like idiots. Plus the sooner we get rid of them the less angry customers we have to deal with. My advice is, do not hesitate to complain and get the idiots thrown out, but if a staff member goes in the theater and stands there to see what's going on and there doesn't appear to be a problem, then nothing will get done. We can't just barge in there and throw someone out because someone was accused of doing something, we actually (most of the time, I'm sure there are special circumstances to this) have to witness them messing around.
(You have to understand, if it's a big theater, there usually isn't enough staff to deal with all the troublemakers that come through our doors during hours. We do the best we can with what we have, but I know what we have isn't enough. And yes, I do agree that it is a problem and it is annoying, just want you guys to be a bit more understanding.)

3. The projectionists have no choice in the matter about putting ads on. We hate them too, believe me. Why would I want to put on ads when I could put on a trailer I've been dying to see? But you see, there are actually people who check these things. Yes, they go to the theaters and check to make sure we're complying with any ads/trailer requests. And they give us hell if we don't. So it is either put the ads on, or be fined or something else for not doing so.
(Again, I agree that ads are pointless, and at my theater we put one or two on the print. This I think is a fair number, but there are theaters out there that put 5-10 minutes of ads on, and that does get rather tiresome. So I do see where you guys are coming from with this, and I know it's really annoying.)

Ultimately I think the problem starts at Hollywood and them not putting out a good product. Yes, theaters do have their problems, but who's going to bother to even go to one if all the movies suck or they're sequels or just a rehash of some other movie concept? (Like Disney's The Wild being such a total ripoff of Madagascar - do we really need another one? Or do we really need a sequel to Garfield?)

So there are my two cents. Sorry it's long but I think the theater gets a bad rap sometimes. Not many understand what goes on behind the scenes or how hectic it is working in such a place.

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Well we go to a theatre in Los Angeles - pay premium prices for tickets but
No late seating
No screaming Kids
Special adult nights (You can take a drink in)
Courteous ushers and staff always available

You get what you pay for at the ArcLight.

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The prices are not the theaters fault. Hollywood forces them to pay outlandish prices for their movies and also does not give them a choice of films to screen. Example they will tell you in order to show The Inside Man, you also have to purchase Basic Instinct 2, and Larry the Cable guy. Thats just an example. The only thing to do is boycott until hollywood lowers their prices. I am all for what Mark Cuban is pushing. I would pay 15 dollars for a DVD before I ever walked in the crappy United Artist Theater and it's even crappier sound system and pay 8 dollars to see a movie. Also, most of the theaters around here have completely done away with the student admission thing. Is anyone else experiencing this?

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