Projected thoughts

[lolly_loisides]

A friend teaches screen & media studies at a Sydney technical college. He directed a short documentary with the help of his students about the how the movie going experience has changed throughout the years. There are some wonderful pictures of Australian (Sydney) cinemas (and some really depressing pictures of them being town down).

He'd appreciate your thoughts. Personally I think a few more interviews with people that there during the cinema heyday (Projectionists, usherettes etc ) would be great.

[video=youtube;DPXnz1KHw6w]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPXnz1KHw6w&feature=youtu.be[/video]

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'm always in favor of more thoughts from projectionists -- nobody ever gives them a thought unless something goes wrong with the show.

All in all, this is an excellent piece -- and it's nice to see kids getting to realize that theatres weren't always featureless concrete boxes. Every bit of consciousness raised makes preservation a little less difficult.

 

[Angus Forbes]

In my own personal experience, the movie-going experience has changed much for the worse over the last 50 years as the audience has become increasingly grubby, rude, and dirty (dirty meaning inclined to litter and to spill food and drinks) -- talking during the showing, loudly making lewd comments, and so forth. Maybe it's a natural response to the kind of movies now put out by Hollywood all too often (with exceptions, of course).

Consequently, I have not been to a movie theatre in quite a while. My friends inform me that things may be improving somewhat, especially at the "art" places. Maybe I will try again . . .

 

[Stanley Doble]

Reminds me of Joe Mitchell's piece about Maisie Gordon who ran a movie theater in New York's Bowery in the thirties. Cheap movies were second only to cheap alcohol as an escape and her theater was a popular one, frequented by neighborhood denizens as well as bums. She had a separate section for women and children presided over by a matron. She was fond of the bums and often gave them small change and other things, but felt it her duty to throw out at least one patron a day."If I didn't put my foot down they'd take the place" is how she put it. This she did with a bludgeon made of several magazines rolled together and secured by rubber bands.

If someone made too much noise or otherwise caused a disturbance the other patrons would stamp their feet and shout "Maisie! Maisie! We want Maisie!". She would lock the box office and go after the miscreant with her bludgeon, beating him over the head and shouting incoherent threats "Out of here on a stretcher! Every bone in your body! Big baboon!" until he got up and ran out. This never failed to amuse the audience, especially when she got the wrong man.

Maybe they should try something like that these days. It would add a zest to the show that is now sadly lacking.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've tossed a few patrons over the years, although I'm not quite so rough about it. "That's enough buddy, there's a seat for you on the sidewalk" is more my style. We don't tend to attract that crowd in the first place, and when they do show up they're usually lone drunks or druggies.

One guy I had to throw out for getting a little too friendly with one of the popcorn kids protested that he was a veteran of the "First Airborne Cavalry" and I ought to give him a break. Um, no.

Seek out single-screen arthouses if you want to see what the moviegoing experience should be like. Such places don't attract teenagers and have a very low threshhold for stupid antics.

 

[Stanley Doble]

I watched the first 2 minutes and found out that people don't go to the movies as much as they used to because of all the entertainment available in the home. If the rest of his insights are as fresh and penetrating as that one I'm not missing much by not watching them.