Walking out of Movie Theaters..................

[Mechaman]

Somewhere between Option 2 and Option 3.

I remember a few years back when I watched the Fountain I felt like walking out.  However, I somehow stayed through the whole thing and then drove back home in the worst f***ing ice storm ever.  In hindsight though, I felt like I should've walked out of it.
But I'm not really comfortable about walking out of a theater if I spent $6.50 on a ticket.

Thoughts anyone?

[angus]

If it's just me, I'll normally sit through it.  If I'm with someone else, then I could be persuaded to leave.  Last night that sort of happened, although with a DVD rather than in a theater.  We got a movie called "The Pianist."  My son has been taking weekly piano lessons for about a year and we try to encourage an interest in music.  The DVD case depicted a group of soldiers on the front wearing German uniforms, so I figured it might have some violence, but the back of the case described the story of an "acclaimed young musician and his inspirational journey of survival with the unlikely help of a sympathetic German officer."  Okay, I'll bite.

It begins in black and white, with "WARSAW 1939" subtitled on the first scene, and I'm thinking, hmmm, anything that begins with "WARSAW 1939" is going to be ugly.  I was right.  In the first 30 minutes there was starvation, brutality, children dying in the streets of hunger, children beaten to death, old people being slapped around and made to degrade themselves for the amusement of soldiers, young women shot at point-blank range for asking questions, cars running over crippled people who could not move out of the street fast enough, people so hungry for food that they fight over scraps of bread found in the street, etc.  Lots of gratuitous violence.  At one point an old man in a wheel chair in the Little Ghetto of Warsaw was wheeled out to the balcony of his fifth-floor apartment and thrown off, onto the streets below, where he landed with a very realistic sound effect of bones and organs breaking.  At that point I picked up the remote and turned off the DVD player and tried to talk to my son.  My wife and I got into a debate about sheltering, and how it's not good for the boy, but this was just a little too much, in my opinion.  He just turned seven a few days ago and I don't think this sort of thing is good for his little head.  

It's funny, if a woman's nipple is shown on the screen my wife freaks out and covers the boys eyes.  And if a movie shows two people about to have sex, she takes him out of the room.  I don't.  Not that I go out of my way to show him pornography, but it's not unnatural for him to glimpse a pair of tits, or see a man mounting a woman, so long as it's not in a violent way.  But she won't have any of that.  Yet, she seemed prepared to have him watch as a soldier walks up to a frail old man and shoots him in the head from only a few inches away.  Priorities.  Ah, well, she's generally far more protective of him than I am, and usually it's for the best.  But I think he needs to wait a bit longer before studying images of murder.

Anyway, I think it was probably a good movie.  I assume that the directors want to set the occupying army up as being particularly sadistic, and the Poles, and particularly the Polish Jews, as being particularly helpless, and that's why there was all the up-close and personal violence in the first five chapters.  But you'd have to be extremely ignorant not to already know that the German armies of occupation--particularly those in the East, although not as much in the West, for reasons I don't completely understand--were extraordinarily sadistic, and the occupants of the Warsaw Ghetto, both Large and Small, were a sad lot.  So at some point the level of violence, if it's there to set the mood, seems a bit overwhelming.  I'll probably watch the rest of it today in stolen moments, or when the boy is otherwise occupied, because it really is interesting so far, but I'm hoping that the mood-setting scenes are just about over and the film will start to focus more on the pianist's talents, and how those talents saved his life.

Ah, I voted for the second option, by the way.  

[Joe Republic]

I've wanted to a few times, but even terrible films give me the desire to see how it ends.

Perhaps Eraserhead can correct me, but don't a lot of theaters give you a refund if you leave (long) before it ends?

[angus]

Finished it.  The violence continued.  Many more people were shot, many more people were beaten, and many more people died of starvation.  But the pianist lived a long life.  Not only did he outlive the Nazi occupation, but he also outlived the (much longer) communist occupation of his native Poland.  Pretty impressive for a guy who was subsisting on about 200 calories per day for five years.


I remember that in the 12th grade my friend Daniel and I had gone to see the movie Bachelor Party, a raunchy, shameless 80s sexploitation film starring Tom Hanks.  It wasn't the sort of movie in which you'd expect to run into your nerdy, bespectacled, 63-year-old calculus teacher (and his wife!), but there they were, in line, buying tickets.  About 40 minutes into the film, a mule shows up and starts snorting up all the cocaine on the table, and the audience starts to groan.  At that point my calculus teacher and his obviously shocked wife left the theater.  That wasn't surprising.  What was surprising was that he'd show up at such a tasteless movie in the first place.  I never asked him whether he demanded a refund.

[Politico]

The ticket is a sunk cost, so it should not matter. My recommendation: Walk out and sneak into another movie that catches your fancy. I've only done this once before. I almost always sit through a movie hoping it will redeem itself. It almost never does. The most recent example: Cowboys & Aliens.

[Eraserhead]

I've wanted to a few times, but even terrible films give me the desire to see how it ends.

Perhaps Eraserhead can correct me, but don't a lot of theaters give you a refund if you leave (long) before it ends?

At my theater we generally give out refunds if you leave way before it's over and can give some kind of reason as to why you're leaving.

[doktorb]

I've walked out of the cinema twice


On Connait la Chanson, because the projectionist hadn't noticed the sound and vision had become out of synch and as the film up to that point was beginning to annoy me anyway I couldn't be bothered waiting for them to repair it.

The Matrix, because I got to the point where....well, I don't know. Because I hated it. Just sat there waiting for someone to explain what on earth was going on, up until one incomprehensible scene too many.

[Joe Republic]

At my theater we generally give out refunds if you leave way before it's over and can give some kind of reason as to why you're leaving.

Does it happen often?

[Хahar 🤔]

It's never been a problem, because I don't buy tickets to movies unless I really want to see them.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Perhaps Eraserhead can correct me, but don't a lot of theaters give you a refund if you leave (long) before it ends?

It probably depends who you talk to.  Most people who care about customer service would, but the high school kid who sold you the ticket probably doesn't care if you thought the movie was terrible and walked out.

I'd never walk out - I'm cheap and I paid $8.50... even if it sucks, I'm milking that $8.50.

[Eraserhead]

At my theater we generally give out refunds if you leave way before it's over and can give some kind of reason as to why you're leaving.

Does it happen often?

Not really.

[Eraserhead]

Perhaps Eraserhead can correct me, but don't a lot of theaters give you a refund if you leave (long) before it ends?

It probably depends who you talk to.  Most people who care about customer service would, but the high school kid who sold you the ticket probably doesn't care if you thought the movie was terrible and walked out.

I'd never walk out - I'm cheap and I paid $8.50... even if it sucks, I'm milking that $8.50.

Chances are it's not really up to whoever sold you the ticket, it's up to the theater manager(s).

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Perhaps Eraserhead can correct me, but don't a lot of theaters give you a refund if you leave (long) before it ends?

It probably depends who you talk to.  Most people who care about customer service would, but the high school kid who sold you the ticket probably doesn't care if you thought the movie was terrible and walked out.

I'd never walk out - I'm cheap and I paid $8.50... even if it sucks, I'm milking that $8.50.

Chances are it's not really up to whoever sold you the ticket, it's up to the theater manager(s).

Right, but that means you have to go to a manager.  Ultimately, whether or not someone goes to a manager depends on how much they care.  When I was just a regular food service associate, I knew what my managers would do, so I'd just do the same for the customer without forcing them to get the manager (usually give them a refund if they want it and offer them some dessert for free).  But most people in service industries don't give a damn about the customer, which is a shame.  Heck, even half of my co-worker department assistants have terrible customer service skills.

[Edu]

I only did it once and it was when I was watching "The Mexican", damn, that movie was really bad. I just simply couldn't stand it anymore and I just left 20 minutes before the end.
According to IMDB I have watched about 950 movies in my life and I can still claim that this one was the worst non-hilarious movie I've ever seen.
I almost walked out while watching The Matrix, The Lord of the rings: The Two Towers and Wing Commander, but I ultimately decided against it.

The cinema which Wing Commander was being shown in,  was almost empty, and I remember running a marathon of some sorts all around the place, running and jumping all across the cinema while the stupid movie went on.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Perhaps Eraserhead can correct me, but don't a lot of theaters give you a refund if you leave (long) before it ends?

It probably depends who you talk to.  Most people who care about customer service would, but the high school kid who sold you the ticket probably doesn't care if you thought the movie was terrible and walked out.

I'd never walk out - I'm cheap and I paid $8.50... even if it sucks, I'm milking that $8.50.

Chances are it's not really up to whoever sold you the ticket, it's up to the theater manager(s).

Speaking of people who sell you tickets... It's now my next goal to get the little twerp at MJR who sold me my tickets the last 2 times fired.  Instead of paying attention to the next person in line, the high schooler is too busy flirting with the chick next to him and checking his phone rather than taking the next person in line... unprofessional and rude.

[Politico]

I would love to know what other movies people have walked out on. For the record, this is the only movie I ever walked out on:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0436078/

I was with my father, who did not appreciate much of the humor and insisted upon leaving. When we purchased the tickets, neither one of us knew what the movie was about, but I recalled hearing good reviews at the time and nothing else was starting at that particular moment.

[Gustaf]

No, I don't think I've ever done it. It'd just feel weird. I also think it's a tad rude if you're with someone else who isn't feeling the same or even just to other people in the audience.

My ex once tried to get me to walk out on a movie, but I think I convinced her to stay. I know I saw it to the end. Then it was partly that I thought it would be rude to the other people we were there with.

One of my dad's friends once walked out on a play and went with his wife to see a crappy kids movie at the cinema as a protest.

[Insula Dei]

Is The Pianist unknown in the US? I think just about everybody I know, knows that movie or has seen it.

Probably never a good idea to watch a Polanski movie with children [/unfunny joke]

[Gustaf]

Is The Pianist unknown in the US? I think just about everybody I know, knows that movie or has seen it.

Probably never a good idea to watch a Polanski movie with children [/unfunny joke]

In Soviet Russia, Polanski watches your children.

But, yeah, the Pianist is pretty well known among educated people in Sweden. Not so sure how it is overall though.
 

[Хahar 🤔]

Is The Pianist unknown in the US? I think just about everybody I know, knows that movie or has seen it.

Probably never a good idea to watch a Polanski movie with children [/unfunny joke]

It's not particularly obscure; not all of my friends would know it, certainly, but a certain subset of them would.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

In Soviet Russia, Polanski watches your children.

I admit it. I laughed.

Though, of course, The Pianist is a film I've never seen and probably never will.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

I've only ever wanted to walk out of one movie, Tree of Life.  I'm not opposed, but I tend to enjoy most movies.

[dead0man]

Is The Pianist unknown in the US? I think just about everybody I know, knows that movie or has seen it.

The Pianist won three freaking Oscars and was nominated for four more including Best Picture.  Hollywood, like the French and opebo loves themselves a hebephiliac.

[angus]

Is The Pianist unknown in the US? I think just about everybody I know, knows that movie or has seen it.

The Pianist won three freaking Oscars and was nominated for four more including Best Picture.  Hollywood, like the French and opebo loves themselves a hebephiliac.

Yes, it had lots of awards.  I would not presume that the movie is unknown in the US.  It was not a strictly US-funded venture, but it was partially US-funded.  And the protagonist was played by an American.  An actor from Queens named Adrien Brody.  And its director is very well known in the US.

It is certainly not unknown to two more US citizens and one Chinese citizen, although one of those Americans only saw the first five chapters, and I hope he never has to sit through the rest of it.

[Gustaf]

In Soviet Russia, Polanski watches your children.

I admit it. I laughed.

Though, of course, The Pianist is a film I've never seen and probably never will.

Haven't actually seen it either.