Althouse: "It’s a guerrilla campaign that is secretly filmed and features a cinema full of burly scary looking men..."

October 20, 2011

"It’s a guerrilla campaign that is secretly filmed and features a cinema full of burly scary looking men..."

"... with the only 2 seats in the place being sold to unsuspecting couples. As you’ll see from the video below most of the people who walk in pick up on the intimidating atmosphere and leave immediately rather than taking the last 2 seats in the theater...."

41 comments:

bagoh20 said...: I love it. Very interesting. It made me want a beer, and I remember the brand distinctly.; 10/20/11, 8:23 PM
Chip S. said...: It could just be the editing, of course, but I found it interesting that the black couples weren't as intimidated as whites were by a crowd that looked like it was there for a screening of Triumph of the Will.

That says something good, perhaps, about the general everyday experiences of ordinary African-Americans.; 10/20/11, 8:29 PM
Anonymous said...: What I found interesting was that of the couples who left, in nearly all cases, it was the men who didn't want to go in. The women generally hardly noticed.; 10/20/11, 8:40 PM
Rialby said...: "It was the men who didn't want to go in"

Damn straight. No man wants to be tested that much.; 10/20/11, 8:41 PM
Ann Althouse said...: The men feel the responsibility for protecting the women. The women feel they are protected.

That's my guess.; 10/20/11, 8:43 PM
Chip S. said...: The men feel the responsibility for protecting the women. The women feel they are protected.

Not the way the scene would play out in a Woody Allen movie.; 10/20/11, 8:45 PM
Pastafarian said...: Or the featured presentation was "Sex and the City Five: The Quickening", and the men were looking for any excuse to bail. That's my guess.; 10/20/11, 8:51 PM
m stone said...: Europeans may have different sensibilities in situations like this. This is Brussels.

Chip: not African Americans, but African Belgians, I believe; 10/20/11, 8:51 PM
Known Unknown said...: But it's a cinema ... my common experience of the movie theater environment is that no one really ever bothers anyone else ... so I would probably stick around for awhile.; 10/20/11, 8:56 PM
Titus said...: Who would of thought you would find those burly men in Brussels.

Tits.; 10/20/11, 8:58 PM
Chip S. said...: @m stone--Oh well, then. Nevermind.; 10/20/11, 8:59 PM
Automatic_Wing said...: Once you've got enough confidence to wear a pink polo shirt in public, the rest is child's play.; 10/20/11, 8:59 PM
rcocean said...: Here's my thought experiment. White American couples go to suburban cinema and find it full of tough looking black and Hispanic men and only two seats...; 10/20/11, 9:01 PM
Anonymous said...: Oh you must love The Danish. I love the Danish. I even love the Danish Biker dude, mystical and iconic though he is... I never fear the Danish biker dude. In fact, such dudes provide the necessary security for buying cannabis products in the secure environs of secure Christiana. They are much less scarier in a movie theater.

Does this deserve a Carlsbeg? The beer sucks, but there is a nice housing development brewing in their previous factory area in west of København, and it ain't in Valbym, which is good because nobody wants a Valby address. Beer is not so good, real estate is exceptional, and I always don my hat-- even if I am not wearing one-- when walking past the elephants.

Oh how I do miss Copenhagen! Even the bikers...

But I do not miss the Carlsberg. Sorry, my friend.; 10/20/11, 9:09 PM
edutcher said...: Wonder how that would work in this country in a state that allows concealed carry.

timmaguire42 said...

What I found interesting was that of the couples who left, in nearly all cases, it was the men who didn't want to go in. The women generally hardly noticed.

In "Rouging It", Mark Twain notes several incidents where women were less intimidated by road agents, gunslingers, etc., than a lot of men. In one vignette, one of the local roughs comes into a hotel bar looking for a fight and it's the owner's wife (IIRC) who routs him with a butcher knife.; 10/20/11, 9:14 PM
madAsHell said...: I'm never scared of bikers.....cuz..they think like me!!

Of course, I don't wear pink shirts.

w/v: dewify - "I want your woman." "Ummmm...no you don't!"; 10/20/11, 9:16 PM
rcocean said...: "Wonder how that would work in this country in a state that allows concealed carry."

Right, because when they start making crude and vulgar remarks to your girl, you're going to do what?

Blow them away like Dirty harry?; 10/20/11, 9:21 PM
bagoh20 said...: If it was 148 biker chicks, the women in the couples would be dragging the men out.; 10/20/11, 9:26 PM
Titus said...: What if the entire theater was filled with really nelly fags?; 10/20/11, 9:28 PM
edutcher said...: rcocean said...

"Wonder how that would work in this country in a state that allows concealed carry."

Right, because when they start making crude and vulgar remarks to your girl, you're going to do what?

Blow them away like Dirty harry?

Actually, Insta had a post along that line that the knowledge people were carrying tended to make them a lot more circumspect in their conduct.

The whole, "Touch my wife and I will defend her", ethos does come into play.

Or does rc think Halo Joe is right and that the bad guys are going to wait 5 or 20 minutes for the cops to show up?

bagoh20 said...

If it was 148 biker chicks, the women in the couples would be dragging the men out.

Before tax season started, they'd issue a call for people to work as tax examiners at the IRS. We always had a ball watching the biker girls file in - Harley t-shirts, piercings, highly imaginative tattoos on women that looked like they bench-pressed Harleys for relaxation.

If there were 148 biker chicks in there, the guys would be begging the women to get them out.; 10/20/11, 9:35 PM
Wince said...: If there was no fear of "rape...or a 200lb man telling you to submit," it had to because they passed the Obama Jobs Bill.; 10/20/11, 9:37 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: Of course it's the men who'd opt out. Who is the person responsible for physical defense if something happens? The men are saying, "This situation is wholly foreign to me. I have no idea how to evaluate it, but it doesn't look good based on the limited information I have. We're out of here."

Love it.; 10/20/11, 10:00 PM
Laurie said...: Interesting - made me wonder what my reaction would be... My first thought, well maybe my 2nd thought was ...what is the movie? Am curious how incongruous the movie feature was in comparison to the crowd...; 10/20/11, 10:06 PM
edutcher said...: And then there are those situations where opt out isn't an option.

Consider this vignette, courtesy of Insta.; 10/20/11, 10:08 PM
bagoh20 said...: Yea, my first reaction would be: what the hell movie did we walk into? I can't imagine any move that would attract that crowd.; 10/20/11, 10:24 PM
Stosh2 said...: Would love to see an American feminist get on an elevator with a couple of those guys. She'd be in therapy for all eternity if one asked her to have a cuppa.; 10/20/11, 10:27 PM
erictrimmer said...: Did anybody tell you that this is the private movie theater of the Satan's Helpers?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zN1UqK76Pe4; 10/20/11, 10:45 PM
rcocean said...: "Yea, my first reaction would be: what the hell movie did we walk into? I can't imagine any move that would attract that crowd."

The last movie the wife and I went to was "Midnight in Paris".

If I saw bikers at that movie, I'd walk out and ask if I was directed to the right cinema.; 10/20/11, 11:14 PM
William said...: What's the worst that could happen? People who are truly serious about the cinema are willing to risk assault and gang rape in exchange for the experience of sitting through a first run Nicholas Cage movie.; 10/20/11, 11:18 PM
Sprezzatura said...: To grease the skids re a hot Dane, I go w/ Elephant, w/ "phant" pronounced as "font."

Just sayin'; 10/20/11, 11:38 PM
buwaya said...: Thats not a scary crowd.
Out in Bakersfield these look like the guys who fix your car or operate the backhoe, or maybe run your servers. They take their kids, who love them, to the monster truck rally. They would save your life at the risk of their own, while everyone else is paralyzed.
Is this one of those class-hatred things ?; 10/21/11, 12:12 AM
Lucien said...: @edutcher --

Can't resist, are you sure that was Twain's "Rouging it",or could it have been Palin's "Roguing it"?; 10/21/11, 12:42 AM
rcocean said...: Off topic. When did tattoos become acceptable?

I've seen perfectly normal employable people - all under 40 - running around with visible tattoos.

The tattoos look gross, low class, and scream "trailer trash".
So why get them? Do some think they're sexy?; 10/21/11, 12:51 AM
buwaya said...: Tattoos are almost required in certain circles.

"The tattoos look gross, low class, and scream "trailer trash" - well, they may, until you get used to them.

I am very reluctant to pre-judge people as "trailer trash". Some of the best techs I've ever had looked like Bradburys Illustrated Man.; 10/21/11, 12:59 AM
Amexpat said...: Great commercial for a sub par beer.

Appropriately, "Planet of The Apes" was on the marquee.

Of course the guy is going to be more anxious in such a setting. Entering an arena of tough looking men with the only women, there's a primal fear that he's going to be challenged somehow. As one of the guys said, "this isn't what I paid for".; 10/21/11, 2:46 AM
Shanna said...: "The tattoos look gross, low class, and scream "trailer trash" - well, they may, until you get used to them.

Yeah, just about everybody my age and older seem to have them (except me). You get used to them and they don't look strange at all, definately not scary.; 10/21/11, 8:17 AM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: "This situation is wholly foreign to me. I have no idea how to evaluate it, but it doesn't look good based on the limited information I have. We're out of here."

Prudent self preservation....in a nutshell

Love it.; 10/21/11, 8:41 AM
ndspinelli said...: Superb! Now..that's reality tv..not the horseshit like Jersey Shore. And, Carlsberg is good beer. There's a idiosyncratic flick, In Bruges, set in Bruges, Belgium. There's a lot of beer drinking and it looks so tasty. It's like one big Belgium beer commercial; 10/21/11, 10:16 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: 1) Not feeling (or being) obligated to protect a woman - or having to change plans because of one's sensibilities - is one of the great reliefs of my post-divorce life.

2) Metrosexuals suck.

3) Those guys in the theatre? The men I work with.

4) I definitely would've wanted to see whatever attracted that crowd.

5) Going in and sitting down: The Macho Response.; 10/21/11, 11:09 AM
David-2 said...: Back in 1977 my wife was studying Classics in her last year as an undergraduate, and heard about the move Sebastian, where the dialog was in Latin. So we went to see it at an "art theatre" in Hollywood.

After we went in it took about 15 minutes before the penny finally dropped for me: she was the only woman in the entire, filled, auditorium.

Sebastian turned out to be a kind of soft-core homosexual porn movie. In Latin.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075177/; 10/21/11, 11:36 AM
Joaquin said...: Some of the best times I've had were in the North Lot at Oakland Raiders games. Trust me, those guys in the theater were fine. I agree that the guys that walked out were thinking about their girl friends/wives.; 10/21/11, 1:22 PM