Mischief Unmanageable

[Omi Maxwell]

For the past couple of nights beginning at the midnight premier of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, I've been running about in costume assisting my local medieval theatre group in raising money for the Stars of Hope Foundation. Our basic job was to show up in Harry Potter costumes and perform shortly before the beginning of each film, asking a small donation from the audience. People were generous and that was wonderful. The worst part was when I took a break to sit down and actually watch the movie in between 'shows'.

Well, as the opening credits rolled, two or three very obnoxious people came in. There were two men and two women and both of the women had very very LARGE hairstyles and chose to sit in the front. That's okay. That's not too bad. The worst part was when one of the men began TALKING to the characters. He began yelling obscenities at the top of his lungs at the screen, making snide comments about genders and sex and making a general nuisance of himself. Since I was working there that night, it was supremely irritating since I wasn't sure I would get to see the film again.

Several audience members yelled for him to shut up, but he persisted until the end of the film.

[cinema guy]

That's certainly worth of removal where I work.

[Gabrielle Proctor]

You should have made a complaint.

[MrSunshineState]

That's certainly worth of removal where I work.

No kidding, when I worked at the movie theatre I would have bounced them within the first 5 minutes.

[Sliceanddice]

hell if he had been in my theature he would have had clan of ravenclaw girls on him in minutes!! (Off Topic- I am in love the the ravenclaw girl!)

[ShinyGreenApple]

I think Harry Potter is a magnet for stupid/obnoxious audiences. And I'm not bashing fans, since I'm growing to like it myself, but I noticed that from my audience seeing it the afternoon of the 11th and reading other message boards that this movie seems to be suffering from some of the most poorly behaved audiences of all time. Through the whole thing (the WHOLE thing, dammit!) people were talking, laughing at things that were meant to be subtly humorous and not "Har har haaaar!" kind of funny, or the wife explaining everything that was going on to her husband because she had read the books and he hadn't, and the ditz on our row who seemed to find rattling her popcorn bag in two minute intervals more engaging than watching the movie.

Heh, sorry about the rant, but I had to say it.

[CancelMyService]

The theater near me I just started to go to actually had staff roaming the theaters when we went to see the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie on opening weekend.

Anyone misbehaving got a "do it again and you're out" warning.

[cinema guy]

We do carry out regular screen checks, to ensure the film is working; the lights are down; no-one is misbehaving, talking on their phone, smoking, shagging; the temperature is okay; and so on.

The problem with big films (Potter, Pirates, etc) is that people who don't often visit the cinema come and sometimes they don't quite appreciate that they are not watching a movie in their living room. So we get the sucky ones in droves.

[queenbb]

my trip to this particular movie was pretty calm compared to what you guys are talking about, there was no mischif at all, no loud talking, no over zealous laughter

i guess i got a good croud, i went to see a later showing and most if the people there were adults since it was a 10:15 showing all the kiddies were gone, it was funny cause i was sitting out side the theater having a smoke before the movie started and right at 10 it was like they disapeared, there were a few bicycle cops about probably makeing sure that every one was gone by cerfew or something, i was on the phone, and sitting on an ash tray and getting walked in to by kids and then poof they were gone. i thought aw crap they are all going to see harry potter this is gonna be real fun, but i guess not.

[deafcat24]

I went to see this movie on Thursday afternoon. The theatre wasn't even half full.

The only loud noises according to my sister was a little kid crying because he was scared. My 8-year-old nephew wanted to go see the movie to, but my sister told him we were going grocery shopping A long time for grocery shopping though, but we did stop at the mall across the street.

I know the movie theatre would be packed that night. I wonder how busy they were when the second movie came out, they played a new one every half hour. We caught the very last showing of the first movie and it was absoletuly packed.

It was a good movie but I was a bit upset that one of my favorite parts of the book wasn't included. However I'm not going to say for those who haven't seen it yet.

[Shengirl]

I went to a midnight showing, and I enjoyed it. Only big fans go to midnight showings, usually, and they're generally amused or happy about the same things, so it works out nicely. No non-obsessed people to alienate.

[allniter]

It's popcorn and drink throwing time me thinks

[BookstoreEscapee]

I saw the last one after work on a weekday (dinner-time-ish), by myself, a couple weeks after it came out. People were still on their way home from work/eating dinner/etc. Even for summer it was a little early for a weekday movie outing, and most of the die-hards had already seen it. And no one to talk to me or distract me. I might do that with this one, too, since I'm sure most of my friends who want to have already seen it by now.

[Fera Festiva]

I think Harry Potter is a magnet for stupid/obnoxious audiences.

WORD. I'm a big fan and I'm really excited for the new movie, but I'm waiting a few weeks to see it. This is because when Goblet of Fire came out, I saw it on the first weekend, and the movie was ruined by a gang of about a million teenage girls who spent the entire three hours going, "Woss goin' on?" "Oo's that?" "Why's 'ee done that?" and "I don't geddit!" and making phone calls. One of them took a picture of the copyright notice with her camera phone, and another one screeched, "I dint know we wos seein' this!" when the title appeared. I'm not sitting through that again.

</curmudgeon>

[cinema guy]

5 screens of Harry Potter.

Its an eight screen cinema and five of them were HP, and every one was sold out. In fact the management decided to put on an extra showing at 10pm at the last minute.