At The Movies
Yesterday, going to the movies became a net negative.
Yesterday, I went with my adult son and daughter to see Superman.
This is not a review of the movie.
It's a blow-by-blow, reality-based tour of the movie-going experience in 2025, in an American commercial movie theater.
What the hell, man?
It wasn't good.
This is not a one-time experience.
No.
It's been an ongoing developing story of why the general public is not attending theaters.
I've watched the decline over the past 15 years.
There is no single reason but a series of real issues primarily created by studio marketing and the people who attend.
Simply… the trailers stink, and the audience has no clue on how to behave in public.
This isn't just an old man rant.
My 30-something children, independently of me, brought up the whole disaster in the car on the way home.
Do you all remember…
Back in time, long ago, in a theater multiplex far, far away…
If the film turned out to be mediocre or less, the best part of the movie-going experience was seeing the trailers.
Now, the trailers are the worst part of the experience.
The worst you executives at film distribution.
They suck!
They tell the whole story.
There is no reason then to see the movie now.
They are marketed to exploit the lowest common denominator of the audience.
The ignorant.
Are toddlers the primary audience for all these films?
People who didn't get their preschool certificate?
Have to be led by the nose so they can be pickpocketed?
Just who watches these trailers and thinks, God almighty, I have to get to the theater to see that?
There's nothing like a remake of a remake where we swap out what was great about the past film and substitute lameness.
The lameness is what's going to make the film great.
Making our cultural icons lame is comedy.
It's funny... right?
The trailers are like a magician who performs a trick, explains how he did it, and then expects you to come back next week and pay to see the same trick again.
That's dumb.
It's no wonder there has been a consistent decline in box-office returns.
Then the audience.
Everyone is glued to their phones, including ignoring turning them off during the film, and is still glued to their social media screens.
You know, I like strawberry shakes, but I don't have a straw in my mouth every waking moment of the day.
Then the rocking and kicking.
Like toddlers in their seats, grown adults who can't keep their feet still kick the back of the chair in front of them.
Not just one person.
But a whole audience was kicking the chair in front of them.
No parent told these 20 to 30-year-olds to sit still in their entire lifetime so far?
You could see them all trembling in their seats.
What's that all about?
The audience knocks you in the back of the head as they pass by to their seats.
The stepping on your toes as they go to their seats.
Oh…
And the side issues of the cost of food and beverages being more than the ticket to the movie.
The cost of parking.
Yet…
Yet, the paramount issue that struck me to my heart…
The cost to humanity.
The cost to the soul.
The casual laughing at the bad guy and his behavior.
The laughing at casual torture.
Casual murder.
The laughing at casual evil.
Laughing at the wrong moment.
The entirely inappropriate laughter reveals the emptiness of the spirit.
My family all agreed before we even began to decompress from the experience of being at the movies.
It was our last time at the movie theater.
Society has left behind the golden halls of entertainment.
We are now all relegated to our own screens and sound systems at home.
There is still hope that the bar can be raised.
South Park got James Cameron to raise the bar once before.
The Cameron 'Bat-Signal' needs to sweep the skies once more.
We all can do better.
Peace
Daniel J Frey aka Toby