Writes Esther Zuckerman, in "The ‘Wicked’ Practice of Taking Pictures of the Movie Screen/Why are so many people snapping photos and taking videos at the movies? Will this trend ever go away?" (NYT).
Eh. What's so great about sitting next to other people in cold darkness? If you can't get caught up in the silliness of a new blockbuster-style movie that's attracting a lot of young people, just stay home and stream something. What's the point of trying to fine-tune your environment by controlling young people? You seem to want to absorb their life force, but that energy — that "awe" — is supposed to emanate quietly and politely for your enjoyment. Forget it. Forget the whole thing. You have crossed the line. You have grown old. Old can be good too. It can be great. But don't expect kids to join you in the delightful pleasures of oldness. They'll get there in their own time. They're somewhere else now. Somewhere you don't like.
I have no idea who Esther Zuckerman is or how old she is. But how old would you guess? Not so old that she knows she's old but old enough to think her values are best and can inspire the young. I checked and see that she graduated from Yale in 2012. I'm guessing she's about 33.
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81 comments:
"Sitting in awe beside other people in a cool, dark theater watching cinema is incredibly special."
One of the creepiest things I've ever read.
I'm glad I grew up watching movies like Smokey and the Bandit, Star Wars, Rocky, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Risky Business, etc. in the theater. Those were the days.
Not to mention the great theater experience of seeing some self-absorbed *sshole holding their phone up with a nice bright screen for everybody behind them to see, while she's capturing that special influencing moment. Yeah. That special, used-to-be-dark theater.
"Why are so many people snapping photos and taking videos at the movies?" Also happens at classical music concerts now, right after the audience has been asked politely by musicians to put away devices.
A little surprised by Althouse's take here, defending rude and inconsiderate behavior.
We always went to drive-ins because my parent hated walk-in theaters. She said she didn't want to be blamed for someone else's fart. Only she said "poopie" not fart.
We had wonderful drive-ins in socal but they weren't much of a communal experience.
Just more reason for me to never step inside another movie theater.
I think there's an ongoing shift between "movies as storytelling" and "movies as fireworks." You have movies like the Avatar series that make a billion dollars, but no one particularly remembers other than for technology/vfx, and I think that's because audiences look at them sort of the way they look at fireworks displays. Fireworks are great! But I don't think about them all that much after they're done. I might take a video, though, to show other people this great fireworks display I went to.
Theater going became less attractive in the 90s when audience members started engaging in MST3k style running commentary during the film
More red meat for the permanently aggrieved class of people who find everything in society a huge inconvenience on their morals and delicate sensibilities.
The cinema is one thing. It is another during a live performance and the “yes, you are the asshole” holds up their cellphone above their heads, blocking the view others, so that you don’t see the live performance but the image of it being displayed on their phone. The jumbo-tron becomes the better experience.
"What's so great about sitting next to other people in cold darkness?"
This is New York City we're talking here. I am guessing that movie theaters are among the few public spaces left where there aren't any violent homeless lunatics or criminal "migrants". Hold up your phone to take a picture on the sidewalk and someone will snatch it, or stick a gun in your face.
"They'll get there" or "they'll get theirs" work, but not "They'll get their."
I seem to recall some woman writer being briefly famous after quipping to the effect that she had long thought that movies were the greatest artform, but then she grew up. I feel like that sometimes.
Mrs. Bar and I are old and retired. We still enjoy going to the movies three or four times a year. We go to the matinees, when there are few people, and no kids.
I saw Barbie with a guy and his grandkids. The 11 year old girl was absorbed; the 8 year old boy not so much. Fortunately or not the girl in front was playing a video game and the boy watched that.
"Sitting in awe beside other people in a cool, dark theater watching cinema is incredibly special...."
For most movies, I agree. But we saw "The Straight Story" in the cinema in Fitchburg, and it was incomparable. It's a slow moving story, but the cinematography is stunning, taking in the Great Plains and its challenge from an old guy on a lawnmower in style. It's also a great memory of our Dad's visit that summer.
I wonder where Esther stands on making out during "Schindler's List."
I blame Rocky Horror.
The one exception that proves the rule is The Rocky Horror Picture Show. I remember attending the midnight showings where you could not hear the actors on the screen talking because the audience was yelling out the lines. And they were led by MCs who were audience members dressed up as specific characters from the film.
Our local theater has "Flashback" theater nights, where they play old movies. It's a hoot watching something like Big Trouble in Little China on the big screen.
I used to think that Miss Anthropy was just a cute pseudonym. Now it seems like a prudent philosophy for life.
There are movies that I want to be a group experience. Wicked and Barbie are examples. 95% of movies are not in this category.
This is a very perceptive comment. Thank you for taking the time.
No Howard, it is more of an affront to theology and geometry.
Now that we're retired and have plenty of time, my wife and I don't go to movies. I haven't seen any ads or trailers in years that even tempt me.
Your view of cities seems weirdly dystopian and fearful.
Wife and I go to the theater a lot. Sometimes twice a week and on occasion twice in one day, and we have never seen a single person taking pictures or videos of any movie.
If you missed Death Of Stalin, you missed out.
NY Times writers don't seem to realize that they are the NPCs in this.
The economics of the film industry since the 60s have been built around persuading the public to leave their comfortable homes and pay money to sit in a large room with strangers to watch the product.
Once that goes away, we will be a more atomized society.
Perhaps that's inevitable. But the films being made will change.
Say goodbye to national cultural event films.
Is that not a copyright violation? A few lawsuits, a few cancelled service contracts ought to restore some "awe" where it belongs.
Tommy Wiseau's masterpiece "The Room" also has midnight showings with audience participation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEohs_Q-_9Q
Two anecdotes.
About 40 yrs ago spouse and I were living in downtown Baltimore (she was in grad school at Johns Hopkins). We went to the major downtown movie palace to see some movie (don't remember which). Place was packed, and it was large. Like I said: Movie palace, the old-fashioned kind. Throughout the entire movie, and I mean from the popcorn ads to the final credits, the aisles were full of people walking about, talking to each other, talking to people in the seats, just having a grand party in that room. Very social. Very loudly social. The entire time. I grew up in the San Fernando Valley (LA) and had never seen anything like it. Diverse audience, you might say.
Separately, and this would be about 45 years ago, while we were both undergraduates, she was studying Classics, and had heard about a movie then showing that was a historical drama about St Sebastian and, interestingly, all the dialogue was in Latin! She was quite interested. So we drove to Hollywood where it was showing in a small theatre. And after a terrific dinner at the GOAT walk-up hamburger stand - Tommy's in Hollywood (now called "Original Tommy's" but they didn't have to call it "Original" then, it was the one-and-only) - we went to the theatre, sat down, and waited for it to start. Place was crowded and getting full. After about 5 minutes she turned to me and said "You know, I'm the only woman in this place!" And when we saw the movie, we knew why. Sebastiane at wikipedia>
What's so great about sitting next to other people in cold darkness?
It greatly exceeds the experience of having people's lighted phone screens distract you from the movie you paid to watch.
It is possible to watch Death of Stalin in the comfort of your own home. I did.
Real or a Seinfeld episode?
I haven't been inside a movie rheatre in probably 20 years. We have a large screen TV and surround sound speakers at home. And i don't have too many obnoxious people sitting near me.
What's so great about sitting next to other people in cold darkness?
Peanuts cartoon from the 60s, Lucy and Charlie Brown lying in series head-foot-foot-head on a bed, "What's so great about being in bed together?"
Once upon a time, the only way to see a grand story in full color was at a theater. Not until the 60s and 70s could you watch color at home, but then only on a small screen, not shaped to the letterbox format. Then big screen TVs came along, but the quality of the image was still poor. Not until about 2005 could you get a big enough screen with vibrant enough color to make home viewing worth while. The slow death of the movie theater began. Now you can get 85 inches and hyper vibrant color that makes the theater seem washed out. So the only reason to go to a theater is to see a movie early enough to be brat with all your friends and talk about it.
If something is worth seeing, I can wait until it streams. Still, movie popcorn seems better than what I have at home, but at least I can go to my local theater and buy the popcorn without seeing the movie.
I understand the reason people use their phones to take pictures. It's because they can capture the moment. But the capture is really only good for a short time posting to social media where it has no long term cache. People should just resist the urge and enjoy the show. The picture will not be worth anything to them in about a day.
People should also exit my grassy spaces.
Yes. I noticed about 15 years ago that my stepson (he's now 31) wouldn't watch a movie if there wasn't some huge effects scene within the first 10 minutes. Anything story driven that took a bit of time to build up is a non-starter with him.
Just hit PrtScn when you view the DVD, go into Paint and hit paste, then file/save as, and you have a sharp jpg.
Sitting in awe beside other people in a cool, dark theater watching cinema is incredibly special....
Eh, no! The real reason we did it back in the day was because movie theaters were where the movies were.
I was watching a movie in Port of Spain, years ago, a truly dreadful theater, and a baby started crying during a fairly quiet scene, and it quickly escalated into screaming. A great set of lungs on that baby. After about a minute of this, we heard a very deep, very loud and rough, very afro-caribbean voice say "Won't somebody push a breas' in that child's mout' ", which apparently somebody did, because the crying abruptly stopped.
The quote about sitting in the cold darkness reminded me of an actress's view of it--Miss Norma Desmond: "You see, this is my life! It always will be! Nothing else! Just us, and the cameras, and those wonderful people out there in the dark!." It's just you and the actors, together in the darkness.
That era went away long, long ago. WIth the rise of large flat panel displays 20 years ago, many people who like movies have far superior home theaters than what can be found in most commercial theaters. They can also pause to go to the restroom or answer a call. Following that, COVID drove many away from the icky germs of public spaces.
The newer theaters such as Alamo Drafthouse serve food and have true recliners, but they seem to attract a certain sort of...hungry...person...
Film is obsolete.
Broadcast TV is obsolete.
Streaming and mobile devices are contemporary.
Multiple generations of tech lead to overlaps. New generations see obsolete tech as nostalgic, or a complex hobby such as playing LP records versus streaming music.
You have movies like the Avatar series that make a billion dollars, but no one particularly remembers other than for technology/vfx, and I think that's because audiences look at them sort of the way they look at fireworks displays. Fireworks are great! But I don't think about them all that much after they're done.
You are correct, I think, with regard to the dreary Marvel/DC capeshit. I haven't seen a superhero movie in decades, but I remember that all the sequels and noisy stunts were already getting boring and forgettable long before the new millennium.
But Avatar is different. My daughter is obsessed with it, like many other young women. There is a lively fan-fiction and cosplay community centered on the franchise, and apparently even some amateur live-action and animated porn based on its characters and story. I think it's the usual "girl-boss tames the beastly man" trope, set on an exotic foreign planet.
A man after my own heart.
Won't somebody push a breas' in that child's mout'
That would work equally well as a response in the comment section.
Yeah mon!
I swear to God if somebody had done something like this back in the day when we were watching Lawrence of Arabia or Jaws or The Godfather or Star Wars or 2001 on the big screen I think the entire crowd would have come together and torn that person into bloody chunks. Excusing the misbehavior of selfish entitled teenagers JUST BECAUSE they're selfish entitled teenagers simply encourages more of the same. When I go to the movies I make sure to have pepper spray on me and if/when people act out they hear about it from me. I paid extra for the big screen in the dark and the quiet so STFU and behave or else.
Wouldn't surprise me if they were also texting their date sitting beside them - were they able to get a date.
Who is worse, these people of the idiots who talk on there phone using the speaker in restaurants?
Does no one here know about movie piracy? It's big business. No, not the record the movie, burn it to DVD, and sell the copies on the black market big business. That's so 2000. Waiting for the film to come to Netflix or some other pay streaming service is also passé.
Movies go from the silver screen directly to the big screen in a matter of hours. Numerous websites offer first run movies on the night a film is released. Depending upon the premiere location, a movie can be available in a country where the movie has yet to be released. And, it's all free of charge, commercials, and crowds. Bring your own Jujubes and popcorn.
I have seen many films over the Interwebs before actual release in the US. I have seen Gladiator 2 three days before it was publicly released. And, Horizon: An American Saga, too. Other recently released films recorded on cameras that are now streaming free are Moana 2, Absolution, Venom: The Last Dance, Red One, AMP House Massacre, Small Things Like These, and Heretic. Those are just the US movies released since October 2024 all pirate recorded on camera and streaming free online now.
But what about the quality? Can't tell the difference between phonecam and HD in most cases. Isn't that illegal? Yes, it is. It's a brave new world and it can't be stopped. That is why streaming services are making their own content and why Robert De Niro is starring in his first television series on Netflix, to bypass the pirates.
Quite the reveal!
Quite the reveal!
If you sit in the front row those people aren't as much of a problem.
This does not happen for the kinds of movies I (since covid very infrequently) attend. They are usually so empty I wonder how the distributor makes money. But I'm in socal where everything plays at least briefly. Perhaps these are films only screened in Socal and the Tristate area.
I'd say follow the money but that doesn't apply to most of the kids recording a film in a theater these days. Back a few decades it was pirates recording in movie theaters to make bootleg VHS copies for sale, as immortalized in a Seinfeld episode. Now I suspect it is to show off to friends online, which is indeed free publicity for the films.
"I have no idea who Esther Zuckerman is or how old she is...I checked and see that she graduated from Yale in 2012. I'm guessing she's about 33."
Even if you didn't look her up, that probably describes close to 50% of the NYT writers. Most of the others went to Harvard, with maybe a stray Princetonian. I'd bet that she was on the staff of the Yale Daily News, too.
"Your view of cities seems weirdly dystopian and fearful."
Depends a lot on the neighborhood. I've seen some things. Not every day, but often enough.
That sounds right.
I've commended DOS here, long ago. Watched it on the home screen, a mere 36" or so.
Brilliant.
On my recent flight to Belgium, I watched the two-part Turkish epic "Ataturk: 1881-1919," which was pretty good, even with the bizarre subtitles.
On the flight back I viewed a documentary about the Van Cliburn Piano Competition.
I doubt I would have seen either one if I hadn't been stuck on a plane.
Continued with Chinese VCDs and CDs sold in the wholesale district in downtown LA for years. Used to refer to them as "in the toilet" because of sound quality
I've heard of the one about the saint.
No Howard, it is more of an affront to theology and geometry.
Hell yeah, fsck geometry! Stick it to the man!
"they are ignoring the communal experience they are having at that very moment. Sitting in awe beside other people in a cool, dark theater watching cinema is incredibly special...."
Pee-Wee Herman certainly thought so.
Missing tag: Those Kids Today
In 2020, there were 5,798 cinema sites in the United States, a similar amount to the 5,773 recorded a decade earlier. However, a look at the figures during the mid to late 1990s shows that there has been a significant decrease in the number of cinema sites in the U.S., dropping from 7,744 in 1995 to just over 6,100 in 2005. With the increasing take-up of streaming services, leaked movie files available online and rising movie theater ticket prices, the gradually decreasing amount of cinema sites in the U.S. is just one way in which the film industry and the act of going to the movies have changed.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/188643/number-of-us-cinema-sites-since-1995/
Does she mean "awe" as in 'awful"? Because that's the only awe I've felt in a movie theater. Tarintino in his book on film says he used to go to movies in black neighborhoods in the 70s because black audiences were so much fun. Talking back to screen, hooting and hollering and expressing themselves. No cold, silent "awe" for them.
Personally, I've always found it humorous to be seated next to someone so into the movie, they'll talk back to screen. They'll do silly things like warn the leading character to "Watch out" or "Dont trust her". Or get indignent "How dare you".
People don't bootleg movies anymore by filming the screen, because they can hack netflix and streaming services. Plus, the number of movies anyone cares about has declined dramatically since Seinfeld.
Last movie I saw in a theater was Saving Private Ryan. Doesn't appear I'm missing out on much.
You shoulda hipped her to the “whoever smelt it dealt it” axiom, wild chicken!
We used to have fun sneaking friends into the Anaheim drive-in via the trunk of my buddy’s ‘51 Pontiac. Worked like a charm.
Now I'm nostalgic for the dollar movies that various "film societies" would show in various lecture halls on the Madison campus back in the 70s. If it was a blockbuster it would show in one of the larger halls, like B10 Commerce. Those were the days....
One of the joys of movies seen in the Alamo Drafthouse chain of theaters is that they give a serious, but funny warning before the movie - no talking, no phones, no bright watches or you get expelled ( after one warning). No exceptions. Not please don’t - do it and find out we are serious.
Makes it a much better experience.
If you choose to go into a Movie theater you consent to see other movie-goers do stupid things, chewing popcorn loudly, throwing it on the floor, obnoxious reactions. A concert or a baseball game, it's pretty difficult to get audience to stay in their seat and stop cheering wildly. At the Ballet, the audience is silent, but other venues call for heavy audience participation.
Good movies seem to be few and far between today. Most movies are made for “modern audiences” as the Critical Drinker puts it - dreck filled with woke content and DEI actors. Moreover, it seems like half of movies are cape-shit comic book fare that have over-the-top CGI. But the cape-shit fad may be dying with a string of recent money losing flops like The Marvels. Haven’t been to a theater in years and don’t miss the experience.
When was the last time a visit to movie theatre was a quasi-religious experience? What was the last film you saw that could qualify as a revered artifact? I'm guessing most modern movies don't inspire awe. However things were in ancient Greece, Elizabethan England or the Golden Age of Movies, taking screenshots and videos at movies is now as acceptable as taking pictures at a ball game or at Disneyland.
The social role of the movie theater is changing now and has been since long before COVID. It is less about solely experiencing the movie as an individual viewer and more about sharing it with a group of other people. People who want to solely view the movie now do so at home. 60 inch 4k TVs are several hundred bucks. I think the declining movie theater attendance, which has been declining for 15-20 years, is in large part because the people who now purely want to watch the movie have such good options to do so at home. A lot of people enjoy the group aspect of movie-watching. TV Sitcoms have had laugh tracks for generations now to simulate that group activity of sharing a story.
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