So, I decide Saturday to go to a 2:20 movie at Malco’s Paradiso Theatre. We’re rushing because we’re late, but we get there just as the house lights are dimmed and the advertisements begin.
Yes, I said advertisements.
The show time given in the newspaper wasn’t the time when the movie or the previews would began. Rather, it was the time when those godawful, aggravating advertisements bombard us as we enjoy our $15 worth of popcorn and Diet Cokes.
Finally, the ads end after about seven minutes, and the previews begin. The first preview featured flatulence, a second one was built around a tube sock and self-gratification and several stale sexual innuendoes and the third was about a threesome…in high school.
By the time the movie I came to see finally started, I had endured a spate of ads that I didn’t want to see and three previews that injected a coarseness into our afternoon. I’ve never been a prude, but the sexual jokes these days are just cheap laughs from uninspired screenwriters.
And Hollywood can’t figure out why we aren’t buying as many movie tickets.
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4 comments:
First, did you complain to the theater manager? If not, how does he know you were upset? Speak up!
Second, all those ads are what's keeping the price of tickets down. The costs have to be recovered somewhere. It's a trade-off. Unless you'd rather go ad-free and pay $15 per ticket?
Mike:
The managers blame it to the home office and seemed sympathetic. They certainly didn't seem to have a notion that the ads sometimes allowed us cheaper tickets. I guess I'm skeptical about the leverage point between ads and ticket prices. Since the ads began, ticket prices have gone up for an afternoon movie. I suspect the ads are just seen as another revenue stream. As for me, my main goal is to never buy anything from any of the advertisers.
I don't buy the whole advertising deferring the costs of tickets.
If someone could show me that prices have stayed the same since the advertising started and that theatres haven't had improved bottom lines, then I might be open to it.
Now, Mike, we might pay more for the theaters to convert its projection equipment.
Next time, I'll take Roger Ebert's advice, reacting to the trend of pre-movie ads:
"If I were faced with 20 minutes of paid advertising before a movie, I would simply walk out and demand my money back . . . When I pay for a ticket, I am personally subsidizing the screening, and resent being made into a captive victim. I receive an avalanche of mail on this subject, and cannot understand why advertisers would want to attract hostility toward their products by deliberately offending potential customers."
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