Top 5 Reasons I don't Want You at my Theatre!

Blargh! I know that being in the movie industry (well, movie theatre industry) means that you should be doing everything you can to get people to the movies. Well, I have to admit that there are certain people I don't want at the movies. I'm not talking about just the ones that are disruptive during movies (though that's really annoying as well), I'm talking about plain ol' don't come to the movies! Here are my top 5.

You are under 16, and it's a Friday Night Thriller/Horror - These kids are the bane of a movie theatre manager. I don't know what it is about their "pack mentality", but put a movie with some predictable jump scenes, and you've got a Friday night hit.

What exactly do these kids do that make me want them to just stay home? First of all, they all show up at the same time, about 15 minutes before a movie starts. A minor complaint, but it does make things a bit more difficult to keep organized. It only gets worse from there. Before the movie starts, there's the endless chatter, texting, taking pictures (who does that inside a movie theatre?), and arguing. They run around too. Remember your elementary/middle school cafeterias? Well imagine that, times 5. During the movie, they jump at every little thing, scream, talk on their phones, throw food, and are generally little brats.

After the movie is when they really shine. Last week was a prime example with Prom Night. A few kids from nearby towns decided that they were going to fight after the movie. I broke up a couple arguments, and went back inside, as parents began to show up. Of course these kids begin kicking the parents cars, the cops come, and so on and so on. If you happen to fit into any of the description abov, JUST STAY HOME. Parents.... learn to control your kids.

You are intoxicated, and disturb everyone else. This guest is a little more subtle in their disturbance of others, but can be really annoying nonetheless. These types of guests tend to get way too drunk or high before coming to the movies, and you can tell right away that something's gonna happen. The main disturbance with these people is that they fall asleep during movies, or they talk really loudly. Now I have no problem if you fall asleep during a movie, and sometimes it might even be better, but not if you're going to snore!

Snoring guests are the worst because usually they're so drunk, they're impossible to wake up. Just this past friday, I had a guest who was sound asleep, snoring really really loudly, and it took about 5 minutes to wake him up. Shaking, flashlight in the eyes, and screaming into the ear just wasn't working. Add to that you have to be afraid they might lash out when they wake up... and I've had enough. JUST STAY HOME!

You think you're all deserving. This category actually applies to a lot of different types. Daddy's little girls, people who are sure the whole world is against them, the antagonist, the racist.. etc. You can just imagine what these people do. There is no pleasing them. No matter what you do, you've done something to offend them, and they're going to threaten you with the law. You have to be afraid of losing your job, having words put in your mouth, letters being written, insults, and more. Yes, it is part of the job to deal with difficult customers, but there is no reason why you should be threatening or overly aggressive.

If you can't stay calm and be polite in a situation, you probably won't get what you want anyway. What makes you think that you have the right to act like this? JUST STAY HOME!

You have loud children. Normally, I have no problem with children. I actually enjoy having kids come to the theatre most of the time because they are pleasant, don't usually complain, and are trying to have a good time. I have a problem with the parent more often than the kid usually. For some reason, parents think that their kids are the best kids in the world, and never do any wrong. That's fine, and you are entitiled to your own opinion of them. However, when your kid is crying or causing a disturbance in a theatre, and I ask you to please take them outside until they calm down, and you yell at me, we have a problem.

Like I said before, if you can't control your kids at home, they probably shouldn't be out at a movie theatre, where there are going to be people who are going to be pissed off if something like this happens. You should know in advance what your kids are like. If they don't sit still or can't stay quiet for a couple hours.. JUST STAY HOME! Rent a DVD, and eventually they'll be mature enough to come to the movies.

You're the parent of a kid trying to get into a Rated R movie. One of my pet peeves.. I really love this kind of guest. Actually, they're not really a guest because they're not actually going to the movie themselves. What they're here for is to buy tickets for their kids, then take off so they can have a couple hours peace without their little monsters. Not every theatre is like mine, but we check ids, and don't let these kids into those rated R movies, just like we're supposed to. Then these kids usually try to sneak in, and when we catch them, they call their parents.

Then comes the fun. You have to hear all their reasons.

"I'm here, giving my permission for them to see the movie without me."

"They've done it here before, they always see rated R movies."

"I've never heard that rule before, that must be new."

I've heard all the excuses before. And its not going to work. Screaming at me over the phone, or in person is not going to get you anywhere. I'm not getting shut down because your little prince or princess just HAD to see that movie. And that's final. If you can't take the time to go with them, JUST STAY HOME.

Had to get that off my chest. I'm sure there's more where that came from, and it might seem like working at the theatre sucks, but generally it's a pretty good time, and there are a lot of people I do enjoy seeing come to the movies. In fact, there will be a post about them coming up really soon! :-) That's all for now, hope you enjoyed my rant!

Sold Out.

Man. I really thought that this would never affect me again. For those of you who don't know, I do work at a movie theatre, and I honestly thought that a sold out show was a thing of the past for me. I've always been able to get into movies even if they were close to selling out, as I always waited to see how many seats were left and moved people around. But for the second time this week, I got rejected by a movie. What I don't understand about it is that the movie sold out the last time I was there, and they moved it to a smaller auditorium. Makes no sense at all.

Anyway, apologies to my lovely girlfriend... we will see 27 Dresses yet. For those who were doubting this movie, I think its the real deal in a Devil Wears Prada kind of way. It's been hugely popular, and I highly suggest that you check it out. I'll be sure to provide a review just as soon as I see it, but I have no idea when that will be now. It was actually pretty upsetting not to be able to see it, and I can definitely understand how people feel when a movie sells out right when you get to the front of the line.

What I won't excuse though, is the poor management of the film. I had heard someone there discussing why it wasn't in the largest auditorium, as it had been selling out all weekend, so when I came back, I fully expected it to be there. It wasn't though, so I was left hanging again. Just gotta decide where you need to put movies, and move em around if they perform/underperform.

Anyway, on a separate note, I just saw on TV that a ton of theatres are giving out "barf bag" refunds for Cloverfield. Is that really necessary? I know that at my theatre, we have warnings posted because of the reactions of the people who had seen it. Going into the movie, you should know that it's filmed on handheld digicams, ala Blair Witch Project. It's expected that the camera work will be shaky. I don't know about you, but if you know how the movie is going to be, it's something that you should think about before you see it.

I personally didn't think it was that bad. I didn't feel sick at all. If you've seen it, how did you feel while watching it?

You Ever Watch a Movie Because

You knew it would impress the person that you're with? I'm guilty of that sometimes. In fact, my first "date" movie was Save the Last Dance. That's something that I definitely wouldn't have seen on my own, but you know what... just about every girl I've dated has seen that movie and loved it. They also seem to like the fact that I've seen the movie. I also might own it. But I'm not going to admit to that.

I'm sure that some of you know that once you start a relationship, it's now a couples decision as to what movie you see (if you go to the movies). I'll admit that sometimes I'm not a huge fan of the movies I see, but sometimes I do end up watching movies that I never would've watched on my own, and actually enjoy them. I know that I'll probably get some crap for this, but chick flicks aren't bad all the time.

Some movies that I enjoyed that I wouldn't have seen otherwise:

• This Christmas
• Save the Last Dance
• Step Up
• Madea's Family Reunion
• Diary of a Mad Black Woman

I think that the next movie I'm going to tentatively see is going to be 27 Dresses. My girlfriend really wants to see it. Here's the trailer:



What do you think? I told her that I wouldn't see it until she wore a dress. lol. I've never seen her in a dress so I think it's a fair trade!

Anyway, have you discovered any gems because you ended up watching a movie that you never thought you would, but did because you wanted to go out with or impress someone else?

Daddy's Little Girl

Before I get started on this post, I'm still looking for comments! Only a couple so far :-( I can tell from the site trackers that there are plenty of people visiting.. just trying to get you guys more involved as readers! It helps provide the inspiration to write more. It can be a drag if it seems like you're writing just for yourself. Regardless, I hope that you are enjoying your time here!

Onto the content you're all looking for... B*tchy customers! This one was a doozy, and it happened last Thursday. I meant to write about it sooner but the holidays crept up on me much quicker than I anticipated. Setting the stage... I was upstairs grabbing the posters that we needed for the coming weekend, so that they could be put up. (For some reason, people at my theatre can't seem to find their movie without a poster of that movie in front of the entrance. Too hard to read the ticket? They actually get mad if you don't have it.. go figure!) Anyway, I get a call down to guest services, letting me know that a guest had a pass that was invalid for I am Legend but she wanted to use it anyway. So I make my way downstairs, as I figure it'll be a quick fix. Just explain the policy and the restrictions on the pass, she'll buy a ticket or see a different movie. Simple.

When I get downstairs, there is no one at the Guest Services counter. I walk around, asking the staff if they saw anyone. Everyone says that they saw her walk in that direction at least. Then one of my employees who was in to see a movie let me know that she actually went into the movie. Great. The other manager and I proceed into the theatre to go look for the girl. I wasn't expecting to find her, as the movie had already started, and it was pretty dark in there.

Scanning the crowd as I walk through the aisle, something catches my eye. Two girls who attempted to pull their hoodies over their heads and cover their faces. A bit suspicious, especially since it happened right after I walked by, lol. So I go up to them and ask to see their tickets (The girl who snuck in would not have one). One of them proceeds to pull out her ticket.. and the other proceeds to blow up on me. Ok.. looks like I've found her. I ask her to step out of the theatre so I can speak to her in the hall. She instead screams that I am embarrassing her and her friend. Ignoring that, I insist that they step outside, as I don't want to cause more of a disturbance in the theatre than has already been created.

Once we're outside, she proceeds to scream at me some more, about how its ridiculous that we wouldn't take her pass, how she was told that it was just the first weekend that the movie was out. Trying to be reasonable, I told her that she could check the pass, and it would say that it's not valid on "special engagements", which are typically the first two weekends, not the first weekend. After explaining to her what a special engagement was, she said that its not her fault and she was going back in. I told her that there is no way she is going back in without a ticket. Of course, she has no money. But her friend does! Not good enough though, because she insists that she needs to go home to get money. Fine.. I'm ok with that.

But she wants me to pay for her cab. Whoa. I say there is no way that I am paying for a cab for her to go home and get money. She can leave instead, and I won't escalate the issue. Instead, she wants to get the corporate number. I go to get that for her, and she asks for my name, the GM's name, and the phone number for the theatre. Fine... done and done. She then says she needs my last name...which I tell her she does not need. She then says "Well, I don't want to get racial about it when I explain it, but I guess I have to." WHOA!!!! WTF?!?!? Ok...

After all this, she and her friend proceed to pull out all coins to pay for their ticket. She has the sweetest smile on her face and says "Can I pay here?" (Guest Services). I point to the Box Office and say "Nope. Over there." On her way over there, she says "I hope you two have fun losing your jobs over this." The other manager states her fear at being fired over this. Daddy's little girl proceeds to say "My dad is a lawyer." Struck fear into me actually, having her dad take on a team of corporate lawyers... I say "See you next week, when I'm still here." She pays for her ticket, and I don't hear from her again.

Still haven't heard from him yet, and I know I won't. It's stupid issues like this that make me really angry. Parents, learn to control your kids... this is what happens when they think they're all deserving. I hope her dad laughed at her when she explained this, I easily could've kicked her out instead of listening to her.

Please... keep em coming. One thing about the holidays is that people are actually very nice... so no complaints about the past weekend!

Don't Ruin the Holidays!

This is an open letter to those of you who are out there to ruin people's holidays. You know who you are. Specifically, this is addressed to those of you who go around smashing open people's windows in order to steal their stuff. It's happened again at my theatre, and I see the grief that it brings to people and I hate it. It's the holidays, people! It's time to be happy and make merry. Scumbags like this don't even deserve to have a holiday.

A family outing to the movies turns into a depressing moment tonight. Again I had to call the police and watch a guest walk away disappointed that someone would do this to them. It makes me even more mad that there was nothing I could do about it. I wish we had more security, even cameras in the parking lots to help take care of this issue, but alas we don't. This is the only means I have to express myself to a large audience at this time, so I'd like to say it here.

I despise people who make a living by ruining other people's property and lives. You are scum.

When people go to the movies, they expect to be entertained, not have their stuff stolen. I understand that these people think they are making a living, but that is no excuse. I urge everyone not to leave things visible in your cars wherever you have to go. These thieves have struck over 50 times in the past three months. That's despicable. I really hope that they get caught and are put away for a long time. Maybe missing a few holidays will make them think again about what they've done to these people.

I try not to get angry about stuff like this, but when I could be the next victim, it just hits home a bit more. Do you guys have any suggestions on how to keep your cars and possessions safe? Do you feel comfortable parking your car in large public areas? Let me know!

People Don't Like to Be Told They're Wrong

Now this wasn't something that I dealt with personally but I thought I'd share it anyway. Some background to the story first! A woman comes into the movie, and had purchased tickets online. At the Guest Services counter, a fellow manager was attempting to retrieve here tickets for her. All you need to do (usually) is simply swipe their credit card. If that is in fact the card that was used, the tickets will print out. Occasionally, we do need to enter in numbers manually, but the tickets will still print out.

Unfortunately, after trying all of these methods, we could not retrieve her tickets. She did not have the confirmation page that prints out when you purchase tickets online (I believe), so we weren't really sure what to do. She purchased additional tickets, and went to go watch her movie. I'm sure that the other manager told her that if she got charged for the tickets then she could return and we would be glad to issue a refund. Traditionally, if we can't retrieve tickets, it's because the site didn't properly capture the data and did not charge the card. So things should be fine, correct?

Duh. Of course not. There would be no story without it! Anyway, her husband returns later on and is quite upset. It turns out that he was the one who had purchased the tickets, and he saw the confirmation page and everything. He hands us her card again, and we attempt to retrieve them again. No Dice. He's pretty upset, so the manager there calls for backup. Two of us head there, and we ask if that's the card that was used to purchase the tickets.

It turns out that it was not. The guest had used his own card on a linked account to purchase the tickets. However, his wife's card did not have the same credit card # on it! Linked bank cards do NOT have the same number... so it wasn't our fault we couldn't retrieve them. The card number was different, so the system did not recognize it! We did end up refunding the tickets onto the card, w/o the service charge (we don't charge that, the website does). However, the guest was still pretty insistent that the card #s were the same, and said that he would be sure to check it when he got home, not accepting our reasoning for the issue.

I don't understand how hard it is to accept something that you are wrong about if it solves the issue. I know that I am the same way sometimes, but I still can't figure it out! What explanations do you guys have? I'm no psych major or something like that... so I'd love to hear your responses!

My Biggest Critic

You might be wondering who this is. Is it Matt? Is it Mrs-Mandypoo? How about Skittle? Well.. those people have actually been pretty supportive of me. So its definitely not them, lol. Having a critic is not always a bad thing. Where would we be without critics to help us form ideas on movies before we go see them? Siskel and Ebert, and now Ebert and Roper are essential to some people. They're always at least good for a laugh, or a nice review.

That being said, my biggest critic is my lovely girlfriend. She reads my blog on an irregular basis, and while I was stuck in traffic on the way to work, she offered up some criticism. She said that I need to have some better posts. I agree. So I asked her what she wanted to hear about on the blog. She said that I should include the stories I have of kicking people out of theatres, and other fun customer service issues. That's all well and good... unfortunately I haven't had any huge issues recently. I think its the holidays coming, people have been more tame.

So, do you agree with her? I'm always open to criticism, as any good movie should be, right? Let me know what you think. Like I said before, criticism is not always a bad thing. Learn to make it work for you. I hope that you will provide some so that I can become a better blogger!

If you've made it this far, how about some of my favorite responses on the phone that I've never used? (The "Movie Theatre is Closed" edition)

• Are you open? - "I answered the phone, didn't I?" - Can also be replaced with "Nope, they just pay me to sit here and answer the phone."
• Hello, thank you for calling! Unfortunately, I have no staff here due to the blizzard, so NO, we are not open.
• Wow you guys are open? - Yes. I dragged my butt out of my house, shoveled the driveway, and drove here to show you and 5 other people a movie. Your shock that I am here does not help my mood.

I just hope that one of those doesn't actually come out one of these days. lol. You ever had any funny responses to the phone at work?

Movies This Weekend!

Or should I say... Movie this weekend. Once again, we've got one major release. This one is quite the doozy though, and I'm definitely looking forward to screening it on Thursday if I can. It's gonna be a strong performer, so lets get to it!

The Golden Compass - Based on Philip Pullman's best selling novel. This is the first in the Dark Materials trilogy. A fantasy adventure, it takes place in an alternate universe where souls are manifest as animals and talking bears fight in wars. Lyra is in the middle of it all, and is kidnapped by a group known as the Gobblers, who hope to guide her in their quest of saving not only their world, but ours as well.

How I think it will do - I think this one is gonna do great. I know there was a lot of controversy about what the underlying tone of the movie might mean towards religion, but I look at it as another great fantasy movie. I'm a huge fan of these, and it really reminds me of The Chronicles of Narnia, which I really enjoyed. If this one lives up to my expectations, it should be excellent. I'm going to definitely try to watch it tomorrow! With no competition, its' a slam dunk for the number one movie this week.

Well, that's all for now, I won't mention the indies this week cuz I have a bit of a story to tell. I tried to post this yesterday but couldn't seem to get an internet connection working well enough.

So on to the story. As some of you may know, I just got a new car! I really like it, and I can't wait to give it a car wash and wax... and get some other stuff for it. Anyway, the weather here isn't cooperating, but that's beside the point. The point of my story is.. a car got broken into in the theatre parking lot tonight. That doesn't happen often, but it did tonight. What concerned me was that the car broken into was.... right next to mine. I'm hoping that they saw I have a security system so they didn't do mine, but the car next to me had its window smashed pretty bad.

The moral of this is not to leave anything that could be stolen out in the open, especially in your car. While I consider the parking lot of a theatre to be fairly safe, this just shows that anything can happen. I had nothing visible in my car and I think that's why it wasn't targeted. The lady next to me had a bag visible, and I think that's what happened. Needless to say I got out late tonight, and my heart was pounding when I left, hoping that the person who did it didn't come back and get mine, seeing as it was the only one left in the lot.

Everything was fine though! :-) Have you guys had any scary experiences happen in the parking lot somewhere? What would you do to prevent your car from being broken into?

Don't let this discourage you from going to the movies! Most of us have security at some point, and a lot of them have it all night! I might make a request for that now....

Some Cool Things I did this Weekend

Folks, I apologize again, but my schedule has been so busy lately. I know I said I'd try to provide more regular updates, and I'm going to try again starting now. How does a Box Office Update sound? Lame? It's ok, I'm going to do one anyway ;-) (Later on Tonight!)

Just thought I'd mention some cool things I've come upon recently!

Scented Gift Cards. They smell like popcorn! Get em at one of your local theatres, they make a great gift! Another tip about em. If you spend a certain amount of money, I think it's $50, you get a free popcorn and drink coupon for yourself! So treat a loved one to the gift of movies and you can get free snacks next time you go to the movies yourself.

There was nothing truly eventful happening at the movies this weekend. However, I did try to go see a movie, and couldn't see it for two reasons:

• Parking in Downtown Boston can be near impossible to find!
• There was a fire alarm at the theatre. I never made it in, but I saw the fire trucks and the crowd and decided to avoid it altogether.

I've had to deal with my share of fire drills, and they're no fun at all. Imagine having a thousand angry guests... all wanting to finish their movies and then getting a free movie on top of it. I understand they're angry, and it's disruptive, but if we did have a fire, didn't we just get everyone out successfully? I don't know, I think our crew usually does a good job of informing people of the situation and trying to keep everyone calm.

I have no problem giving everyone a free movie. Hey, its usually not our fault that an alarm gets triggered, but we like to keep people happy. My main issue is I can never get my staff to our designated meeting area. We end up stuck near the doors because people are crowding to get back into the theatre. I can understand that they're anxious to get back it, but it might not be safe, and that puts my staff in the most danger, seeing as they're now closest to the building. I have to make sure they are ok as well. Something about the mob mentality makes people press closer and closer towards the doors, and people don't walk back in, they RUSH in... causing more chaos. Blah.

Anyway, I also bought a new car this weekend, and went to the car show! You can find an update about that soon over at one of my other blogs, I'll let you guess which one ;-).

My Terriers lost twice this weekend. ::tear::. Anyone else like hockey?

I have no internet, so I can't post this now. Hopefully I will have some tomorrow, when I try to post this. Busy day at work, gotta work on a difficult translation trace program. (Don't ask) Until the update!

More Interesting Customers

Sorry about the long hiatus, I've just been so busy! Here's some of the things that have kept me from posting:

• My regular job - 9-5:30 Mon-Fri (Pays the bills!)
• Price changes at the theatre (2.5 hours on Thursday night). That also caused me to miss my own screening of We Own the Night. I still kinda want to see it. Got home at 1:30 AM.
• Worked Friday night also - Got home at 2 AM. :-( ew. So tired.
• Hung out with my baby tonight :-)
• The Red Sox are losing as I type this. :-(
• My BU Terriers just gave up a goal and are tied 4-4 going into overtime. :-\
• They lost to Robert Morris University last night :-(

So not too bad, but the last two are real tough to deal with right now, being a huge sports fan. I was thinking about starting a sports blog, but that's for another time.

On to my interesting customers! This actually happened last Sunday, but I've been holding it for now. It actually involves a topic that is really touchy, and I don't mean to offend anyone by doing this. It involves racism, and "profiling".

My boss at the theatre had been checking tickets inside one of our many rated R movies. We're quite vigilant in doing this, just check my previous post for an example. He had just asked two girls for their tickets, and they were quite offended by it. They came out to the concession stand, where I was working, and I heard the following statement:

"That guy was straight up profiling right there. What kind of racism is that?"

That was the problem right there. These two girls happened to be African American. Like I said before, I don't mean to offend anyone, so don't take this the wrong way, but I see and hear about this happening way too often. Their friends (who they were at the movies with) decided to add their own comments.

"If I had been there, I would've told that guy to get out of my f***in face before I sue his ass. I'd get the cops in here so fast he wouldn't know what hit him. I can't believe they be profilin' like that."

I was actually quite upset by this. I can't believe that they thought that he was profiling. Yes, my boss is white, and yes they did happen to be the only two African Americans in there at the time, but I don't feel that his request was racially driven. I myself have been called racist by African Americans for, which I think is somewhat unfair, because I am a minority myself (asian). If someone asked me for my tickets, I wouldn't immediately assume that it was racial profiling.

It doesn't help that if it had been white kids in there, we would have done the same thing, but not had this issue. What made it worse was that there was an African woman in line, who got quite upset that we were apparently profiling. It just really irked me. You're at a movie theatre, you look young, and you're in an R rated movie... does that scream racial profiling at you?

How Much is Your Blog Worth?

My blog is worth $10,161.72.
How much is your blog worth?

A slight improvement over last week! I just have to keep the linking from technorati blogs up and it should continue to go up. The increase isn't too great, but any improvement is good. How are you doing with this?

Just checked the alexa rankings, and it doesn't look like anything has changed. I don't know how often they update, so I will make that a monthly thing here. Someone remind me when the time comes three weeks from now. Hmm, this entry seems pretty boring right now. What do I have that is exciting right now?

How about some crappy people that come to the movies! Sunday evening, there was a gentleman who came to the theatre, bought two tickets and left. Boring huh? Well, he actually gave the tickets to two kids, one his son, and one not. For a rated R movie. They got caught, and called him to come pick them up. Here's where things get interesting. He asked to speak to me, and when he came up to me, he explained that he bought them tickets, and that they should be able to see the movie without him. I explained the policy to him. Simple, right?

Of course not. He said "Why did you sell me two tickets then?" Of course, it was under the assumption that he was going to the movie, right? "Don't assume anything. You shouldn't have sold me the tickets." How were we supposed to know? Anyway, right after this he demands to see the MPAA guidelines. You guys know that I've had my experiences with this. So I go upstairs looking for the pamphlets we carry, and I couldn't find them. I did find the poster from this post though. It was sitting in our lobby, right where it should be. He goes on to tell me that all he has to do, according to that poster, is accompany them to the theatre, not the movie. At this point the GM has gotten involved, and re-explains it to him again. His final response? "You've got about 30 seconds to return my money." Geez. What a jerk.

I don't like people who speak in a threatening tone. I don't know what they think, that intimidating people will get them far in the world? It's easier to be nice, and keep things like that in. The look on their faces as you stay calm while they freak out is priceless. :-) I've got another one, but I'll save that for another post!

Review: Feel the Noise

I didn't expect this to be great, and it wasn't great, but it wasn't totally unbearable either. Feel the Noise , starring Omarion, is about a wannabe rapper from New York who, after a run-in with a local gang, heads to Puerto Rico to stay with his estranged father. There, with the help of his step brother Javi, he discovers reggaton and they begin to produce hot tracks together. He also finds a girl who he falls for, C.C. After overcoming some local troubles, they manage to sign a record contract and head back to New York.

Once they arrive in New York, the troubles start. Their producer tries to change up the sound they have worked hard to create, and then tries to take advantage of C.C. In the meantime, the gang that was searching for Rob (Omarion) catches up to him. Not gonna spoil what happens if you're planning on seeing it, but I'm assuming its quite predictable.

What was not predictable, was the crowd in the theatre. It's Columbus Day here in the MA, and that means no school for the kiddies (and a paid holiday for me!). However, that also meant that I had to see it with 100 kids who just don't understand how to SHUT THE HECK UP during a movie. Geez, I've never heard so much talking during a movie before. And there were three girls behind me kicking the seat next to me, shaking my seat. She even had the nerve to yell at me when I looked back because of the constant kicking!

I wanted to kick them out, but the girl always tells me to just ignore it, cuz I'm not working. If there weren't so many of the little troublemakers, I would've said something myself. I can't tolerate that. So while the movie itself wasn't great, the crowd made it that much worse.

Guess you can take this as kind of a warning.... Be careful of the movie going crowd. They can make or break the experience.

Feel the Noise gets a 3.5 out of 10. The music was ok.

Top 5 Ways to get.....

the Boot. From a movie theatre. That I can think of right now anyway. Luckily, I've only had to do this a few times, but sometimes, its just that satisfying. :-) We'll start with an honorable mention, being the one that I kicked some kids out for yesterday!

Honorable Mention: Pulling the plugs on the video games, then running into a movie you didn't have tickets for. When you're the only ones in the lobby.

How far did these kids make it? They didn't even get to sit down. I was going to let them get away with the video games until they ran into a Rated R movie. Me and one of my staff leads kicked them out so fast, they barely had time to get a refund. The high point of this one is that just before this happened, one of the girls decided to run across the lobby, tripped on her own feet, and face planted, spraying the contents of her purse across the lobby. The 14-16 year old crowd remains some of my least favorite ever. Now onto the list:

1. Start a Fight - I'm not going to have any sympathy for someone that does this. Once (I wasn't working) and a guy decided that the guy behind him was kicking his seat and decided to show off. Threatening someone by taking off your belt while your girlfriend is screaming stop is not cool. Then going out to blame it on the other guy doesn't help either. You're outta there, buddy.
2. Be on drugs - You always know these people before they even approach you. Hey.. note to those out there who decide to do this... we can SMELL it on you. Now this one won't directly get you kicked out, but it's one of the main things that leads to trouble, and thus, getting you kicked out. Hint: Go to midnight movies. Everyone is drunk or high.
   
3. Sneaking into a movie - These people might think its really cool to get their friends to sneak em in the back but guess what... you usually get caught. And that's an automatic boot, sometimes sans refund. Running and lying will not help you either. I boot a few every month for this very reason.
   
4. Talk during the movie - Sometimes this is ok, but most of the time its not. If you're one of those people who need to do this, find either a show that is not busy, or a really good home theatre system and invest in Netflix. I hate booting these people because they usually cause a scene in addition to the trouble they already caused. Same for the drunks.
   
5. YOUR CELL PHONE - The granddaddy of em all. I don't care if you have a cool cell phone with a cute ring tone. Leave it in the car or turn it off before you get in. At least use vibrate or something that won't cause a lot of noise. And for chrissakes... don't TALK ON IT DURING THE MOVIE.

There's my short list.. I'm sure there's more that I haven't thought about, but I'll leave that up to you! What would you kick someone out of the movies for?

Deedubya over at The Blog of Lists has added this one...



I guess I'll also provide my update on TV shows here too. Can't wait for House to start tomorrow, and Bones too. I've been getting into those two a lot. House is from before, and Bones is new.. just started watching the reruns over the summer. I also really enjoyed Kitchen Nightmares, but you guys already know about my thing for Hell's Kitchen. K-ville is not bad, and neither is Prison Break.

I should be watching Monday Night Football, but alas no cable.

I've been moving things around and getting rid of some things on this site. Hopefully I haven't thrown people off too much. I've also been trying to keep up with the blogs, but there are so many to read, while trying to promote my own. (Sometimes I'm selfish, I know)

Has anyone had any hits through Blogrush yet? It's supposedly helping some people out, but I always see negative credits.

That's all for now, more soon! Like.. tomorrow or something :-)

Halloween 2007: An Experience

I'm sure of many of you have at least heard of Rob Zombie's remake of the horror classic, Halloween. We've all got our own opinions of it, and whether you think its great or terrible is really up to you. If you have seen it, I would like to know what you thought of it. I've seen about half of it myself, and it was definitely a gore-fest.. not particularly scary, but definitely really messed up.

Digging around, I stumbled upon The Last Psychiatrist. In his blog entry, he's basically telling about his experience when he saw Halloween. He too, thought that the movie was quite messed up, not really staying true to spirit of the Halloween franchise. However, it was not the movie that was the scariest thing he saw in there. What he did see I might consider even worse than what was being shown on the screen. Children in the theatre. And we're not talking 12-13 year olds here. He said they looked 3 and 5. Now I'm no judge of parenting, but that could really mess up your kids. Leave them at home for those movies... they disrupt the people in there if they cry and you are really messing with their heads.

Now as you guys know I've had to deal with people sneaking into the movies, and that can be an annoyance, but its nothing like what we recently had a complaint about. A guest and her boyfriend recently came to my theatre to see Halloween. However, they had to leave because of the style of filming. It made them motion sick. That's fine with me, I can understand that shaky filmwork can be sickening at some point, and added to the gore and other stuff in that movie.. it can really make sense.

However, she couldn't leave it at just that. She stated that as a company, we should be responsible for posting warnings about movies that may cause motion sickness. She also stated that we refused her refund (untrue) AND asked for more money back than her tickets were worth!! That just pushes the limit! We will not refuse a refund unless you have seen more than half the movie, and even then we will probably offer passes. In addition, how are we supposed to know what will make people motion sick? If we posted warnings like that people might buy less tickets, and what incentive is there in that? We can't know what will make you motion sick.. its not like an Omni theatre where you're surrounded and can get overwhelmed.

It makes me a little angry that she would say we are responsible for her experiencing motion sickness. And to ask for more money than you paid is unreasonable. Some people just love to complain. I'm sorry that she got sick during the movie, but don't put the blame on us, all we were doing is showing a movie.

Let's be reasonable folks.

Digital Cinema: The Saving Grace of Movie Theatres?

Sorry about the long hiatus in blogging (almost 2 whole days!), but it was my birthday weekend, and my friends would not let me spend it strapped to my computer blogging, as much as I would've liked to! ;-).

Here's a question for our moviegoers out there: Does digital cinema affect your decision when you go to the movies? How about 3-D digital movies?

Personally, I thought that it wouldn't until this weekend actually. The girl and I were driving around in this behemoth of a car (Honda Element) that I had rented. We ended up by a Jordan's Furniture, which happened to be showing Harry Potter 5 in digital. I had heard great things about it, with something like the last 30 minutes (or 15) being completely in 3-D. I really wanted to go, though the idea was squashed by the girl pretty quickly, as it would entail paying for a movie, which neither of us have done in years. That was ok with me, but it really got me thinking.

The theatres that I have worked at have mainly been traditional, 35mm film based theatres. Digital projection wasn't something that was considered, as they were expensive and apparently didn't create much more traffic. As the years pressed on (I sound old right now), I noticed that more and more people began to inquire if movies would be playing in digital. When the theatre I worked for finally got a digital projector, I did notice some people asking specifically for showings in digital, and did see part of a cool 3-D movie, but there were some problems.

• It wasn't in our biggest theatre. In fact, the technology did not allow it to project onto our largest screen. It would've become too pixelated to cover the whole screen.
• Unless you were a big time cinema buff (or watching a 3-D movie), you couldn't really tell the difference between a traditional and digital movie.
• One of our movies expired halfway through, causing us to shut the particular theatre down.
• It cost way more to see a movie in digital 3-D.
  

The last one wasn't a huge issue as it only happened once. But it did bring in a problem that you might not have with traditional cinema. Of course, there are many reasons why it would be beneficial for theatres and production companies to switch to digital cinema.

• No more cost of shipping films to theatres.
• No more cost of printing films to ship out. (These first two cost nearly 1 billion in 2003)
  
• Less staff required to run the projection booths.
• No more projectors shaking through movies.

Then I read this article in Wired about how digital cinema can help prevent bootlegging of movies. (From Wired Article)Traditionally, movies are protected in a few ways (even I didn't know about this):

1. Tones in movie soundtracks that are out of traditional hearing ranges. (old school)
   
2. Speeding up the refresh rate of frames and adding in frames. Not viewable to the human eye, but it can mess up the sensors of recording devices.
3. Other encoding techniques to show what reel and movie are playing (again undetectable to human eyes)

The techniques are much more complicated than what I've stated above, but not much is written about them since part of their usefulness is lack of knowledge in how they work. Digital cinema can aid in the effectiveness of these techniques. Besides the ones used above, there are ways to encode what movie, what location, and even the time of the show onto the screen in an invisible manner, only detectable to cameras. This will make it much easier to track down where bootlegs come from.

Christie, a leader in digital cinema, plans to deliver 4000 units to theatres by the end of 2007. Who knows, your local megaplex may already have one!

This is obviously beneficial to theatres. But what about the benefits of digital cinema for the moviegoer? The images are definitely clearer and brighter. And 3-D digital cinema works much better than traditional 3-D movies. Some benefits and other things to know about digital cinema are discussed in this post from 2blowhards.com. Some good points are made here, especially about cost of transition and the feel of movies.

I know a lot of people don't go to the movies anymore. Does digital cinema create the kind of buzz people need to get out of their homes and into theatres? I think that movie quality will always matter the most, but with less cost into printing, the movies just may get better on the same budget. Only time will tell, but I think the transition into digital cinema will make the experience better for everyone.

Sneaking... the wrong ways to do it

"Don't worry, we'll just sneak in."

I heard that so many times this weekend.

And I've figured out something.

People aren't good at sneaking around.

As I've mentioned before, my theatre is pretty harsh on the MPAA ratings policies.. and everyone that tries to get around them ends up being as inconspicuous as my buddy on the left here. Here's some of the things I noticed people doing as they were trying to sneak in, as well as some other random observations I noticed this weekend.

• Buying a ticket to a movie they obviously didn't want to see. Like a group of 16 year old males buying tickets to The Nanny Diaries. Um.. I don't think so.
• Wandering around the lobby, peering over edges and around corners to make sure that no one will check when they try to sneak by. Umm.. I've seen you at least 4 times now. And I remember your face. You're not getting in.
• "Oops, I must've bought a ticket to the wrong movie, I wanted this one. I am old enough to see it." That's just bad.
• My parents said it was ok. ::hands me cell phone:: "Hi ma'am, you said your son could see this movie? That's great, now just come here and watch it with him and I'll let him in. :-)"
• Trying to get MY STAFF to get you FREE PASSES to a rated R movie 5 minutes AFTER I've turned you down. Hey buddy, you just ruined my staff member's free pass privileges. How do you feel now? I feel like a jerk doing it, but it had to be done. Sometimes I don't understand why they do it... free movies are such a good perk.. why risk losing it?

Now onto the random observations. You all remember my bootlegging post, right? Of course you do, you hang onto every word I write! ;-) Well today I was just sitting at the Customer Service counter, doing a bit of paperwork when I noticed a girl waving around a video camera walking into a theatre. Uhhh... is she serious? was the first thought in my mind. She came out a minute later to head to the bathroom. On her way back I stopped her and asked if that was a video camera she had on her. She said "yep!" I told her that she couldn't have it in the theatre.. so she gave it to her mom.. who first wanted me to hold it for them, (I said no, can't be responsible for that.) then brought it to the car, saying that it was just a school project.

WHAT KIND OF SCHOOL ASKS YOU TO FILM INSIDE A MOVIE THEATRE?!?!!

Last I checked, schools were trying to keep kids OUT of trouble.

Another woman called about a lost cell phone.. which turned out to be an iPhone. Only she realized it 5 hours after her movie got over. HOW do you drop a $600 phone and NOT realize it? Maybe it is too sleek and small for its own good. lol.

People can't read times very well. I had a guest mistake a 10:05 AM show for a 10:05 PM. I guess its not THAT bad, but when your times read 10:05 3:15 8:20 and its 10 PM.. why would you think its 10:05 PM? Unless we have a 3:15 AM I didn't know about, in which case I closed up shop WAY too early and need to head back now!

Well that's all for now. I'm tired. Looks like my last post wasn't too popular. I guess people don't like trying to get free things as much as I had hoped. Oh well, that spike I got from Stumbleupon was nice.. I was kinda hoping for the same from Digg! Happy Labor Day Folks!

A bunch of minor frustrations...but an ok night!

Quite the hectic evening at work tonight! Definitely not busy, but it really feels that way when not enough people are working. Part of the problem with movie theatres these days.. gotta do less with more. At least the coffee I had was good tonight, gave me the energy to make it through.... and is keeping me up at this hour now. lol.

The big hit tonight was.... Halloween! It's what I expected, but it didn't really do all that well either. Bourne Ultimatum had a strong showing, but that's because we were checkin IDs for all of our Rated R movies ;-).

Only a couple of frustrations tonight! Well, I usually try not to let stuff get to me anyway. BUT I am convinced that our security guard is crazy. He stands in the middle of foot traffic and shines his flashlight in people's faces asking them for their tickets and IDs for R-rated movies, which is great! The problem is, he doesn't read the ticket OR check the date on the ID!!! What is the point if you're just gonna say thanks as soon as they put their hand in their pockets. I had to stop a few groups of 15 year olds after he let them through! To add to that, he is extremely confrontational AND HUMS TO HIMSELF MID CONVERSATION. Blah. I'd feel safer without a security guard if they're gonna be like him. I think he is crazy... cuckoo in the head. He also feels the need to tell me that he'll be looking around in the movie that's gonna get out last. Dude... just tell me if you're going to watch a movie. You're not that useful for anything else anyway.. lol.

Checking IDs and turning people away is a bit frustrating when the kids like to make a big deal about it.. but its not that bad. What I don't get its people's obsession with messing around with the bathrooms! I've had to deal with so many clogged toilets cuz of paper towels in them, or the roll of toilet paper thrown in them... and that's not even mentioning the real clog issues that people sometimes cause. Actually, that's not bad either, I can deal with that. But when I put an "Out of Order" sign on a stall door... what does that tell you?


Apparently.. the answer is "Let's go use that one!"

Needless to say, I had a flooded toilet that took about a half hour to drain and clean out. You can't pay me enough to feel like I should be doing that on a weekly basis. I am no plumber! And if I have to be like one... I should get paid like one right? hehe. Moral of the story is: OUT OF ORDER MEANS OUT OF ORDER!

There was one nice guy who I had a nice conversation with while I was cleaning up in there. He even held the door for me when I was moving the cleaning supplies out. Why can't everyone be like that? I felt like comping everything for him.. but he was gone before I mentioned it. Maybe next time, mysterious nice guest!

On a side note, stumbleupon appears to bring in more people than digging, from what I can tell. Anyone feel like stumbling or digging me? I digg me, but guess that's not good enough. Off to try to sleep... got an idea for a contest, will post about it tomorrow!

Wouldn't you go to the movies if...

She was the ticket taker? No.. we don't have too much time on our hands. What are you talking about? We needed a ticket taker! You don't want to be greeted on your way in? Of course you do. We got some nice looks out of it. :-)

But of course, she doesn't quite match the look. You can't have someone coming in to work wearing that! She's gotta look more professional. More movie theatre professional that is. Hmm.. how are we gonna do this? It was kinda tough, but we managed to do it. Before I get to that though....

Thanks to Adsense Tracker for the boost in traffic I got yesterday. I guess Stumbleupon is a pretty good source of traffic. I wonder if it is better than Digg. I don't know. Regardless I just had to take one look and bam, my hits were way up once I got stumbled. Maybe I will help stumble some people too! Has anyone used it before? If you like something you see here, Stumble It! I've even made it easy with tags near the bottom of my post! Right near the comments! Cmon! :-P

Anway, back to what we were doing. We had to make her fit the image that we're trying to give here at the theatre. What do you think? That uniform looks great on her! I actually had a few people who thought she was real.. lol.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to watch any of the movies last night. I heard that Halloween is pretty F'd up, and from what I saw of Death Sentence, it looks really good. It was really loud when I was in there. I really wish I had a chance to see them, but its a long weekend so I'll be sure to post updates as I see them.

Well, that's it for now, more after work tonight! See you at the movies! :-)

Placeholder... I mean Weekly Update: At the Movies!

Don't worry, I didn't forget about this, I am actually busy at work! I will be updating this later on tonight, I know you're all waiting in anticipation. It has been almost 3 days! Thanks for being loyal and reading though, expect visits from me tonight!

Ok, here we go! Now that I'm home I can actually write something of substance! As you guys can tell from the little info box I have on the right, it wasn't a great week for movies. Superbad took the top spot once again. I did hear some interesting things this weekend at work though, as well as something I'd like to find out some more info about if you guys might know.

First off, a little interesting thing I heard about Mr. Bean's Holiday. I asked a guest coming out of the movie what they thought of it. Her response: "It was great! America is so not ready for this...". She repeated the second part as she walked out. Weird huh? Also weirdly enough is that the movie did pretty well overseas taking in almost 200 million up to this point. It should be noted that it opened roughly 5 months ago in the UK, where it was almost as big as Spiderman!

Now onto the second weird thing that happened. It was closing time yesterday, and I was upstairs closing up shop. The staff closing the stand calls me down, and there is someone who wants to buy something. I inform him that we are closed and I have already secured all of the cash for the day. He says he needs something for his diabetic girlfriend, she needs some sugar. Well, I know that can get pretty serious, so I try to compromise. I offer him a free soda instead. That's LOADED with sugar, should be enough right?

Of course not.

"She needs something sour. Like sour patch kids. She says that sour things have more sugar" (Is this true?) Well, I really can't sell him anything, and I keep trying to sell him on the free drink. C'mon, spend $3.50 on a candy or get a free soda?? Well after a few minutes of insisting that it must be sour, he walks away. I honestly hope nothing happened to his girlfriend, but I did offer the sugar she needed right? What do you guys think?

Other than that, it was a HOT weekend, so not much business.

I've also been thinking, would anyone like to have their articles featured here? If you do, send me a link and I'll link it up. My small amount of readers may like what you have to write and we can both rise to fame! Well, that's all for now, time to catch up on reading your blogs!

Oh! I forgot to mention this is my 50th post! I didn't think I'd make it this far, go me! jk, lol. Just another random useless fact from me.

We Have a Serious Problem Here.

This one's for you Karen. I love it when people come up to me and this is the first thing they say. I realize that going to the movies, a pleasant experience is expected. Trust me, people who work at the movies know this. So when something goes wrong, you as a guest definitely has a right to complain. We will do our best to make sure your problem is solved.

So let's set the scene. It's roughly 8pm. We've switched back to fall hours, so it's getting close to closing time. I'm at the customer service counter when an older woman approaches me and says "We have a serious problem here." Now, I took this literally and thought something was really wrong.

What did she say though?

"You're playing Underdog where you're supposed to be playing Hairspray."

"OH CRAP" I thought. But wait, let me check her ticket! Sure enough, what had happened was she went into the wrong theatre. It was my first suspicion since we change posters on Thursday to prepare for our Friday openings. (We use posters at the auditorium entrance, as well as a mylar on top of the auditorium to indicate which movie is currently playing.) We did change them a bit early since we were not busy, making sure to tell every guest twice where they REALLY needed to go. Once when they bought their ticket, and again when their tickets were torn. Of course it's not always obvious to check your ticket, so.....

I could tell she was pretty upset about this though, so I offered her a refund. I was even going to say that she could go in and watch the remainder of Hairspray or whatever movie she wanted. But I got cut off first. "This is infuriating" she fumed at me. I understand its frustrating, but I'm trying to help her out here. Turns out she went to the theatre she was told to go to, saw a different poster, and went to go find the right poster, and thus, the right theatre to go into. She didn't check her ticket or ask anyone. OK, I can still understand where she would be mad though.

At this point, there's nothing I can do. I had already given her her money back for the inconvenience, and gave her a tip to look at her ticket or ask if she was unsure, and we would be glad to direct her in the right direction. Of course, this is not good enough. She wants to escalate it. She wants to talk to my boss. I try to convince her that it's not his fault, and that we do this every Thursday, but she has none of that. She continues to yell at me instead. It's really frustrating when you try to be nice and you get screamed at. I just had to take it. My staff is staring over at me, watching me take this. Not the most pleasant experience. They've often asked me how I can continue to take the verbal abuse some people like to dish. The answer is, its not easy.

Now, her husband or boyfriend or whatever, was extremely nice. I find that often one half of the group will be nice to you. Usually because they're embarrassed. Another group who had the same thing happen and had come out with this lady actually admitted it was their fault and that they had been told where to go, but assumed that we were wrong. They got their money back as well and went on their merry way. Like I said, we try, but sometimes no matter what you do, you're gonna end up with the jerk who decides they need to scream at you. Yes I understand you're angry, but if you scream at me, it's not going to help.

Can't we all just get along?