I’ve been reading a few opinion pieces about what’s wrong with movie theaters.
First up, one that I readily agree with about how megaplex owners are more worried about DVDs than treat customers right.
Here’s another piece with a good idea: Ushers.
Finally, here’s a list of other ideas of how theaters will have evolve to compete with closing release windows between theater and DVD/Cable/PayPerView/Internet availability.
It’s worth pointing out that ArcLight Cinemas, my favorite theater, has already addressed most of the issues raised in theses opinion pieces. Going to a movie at ArcLight really feels like a unique experience. They don’t show adds before the movies so you can actually be social with the people your friends. They also have several ushers at each showing who’s jobs including making sure everyone gets in the right seat1, personally introducing the movie with a reminder to be courteous and silence phones, and sticking around after the movie has started to deal with any problems with the projection, sound, or audience (none of which, thankfully, has ever been an issue). Furthermore, ArcLight has regular screenings of movies (new & old alike) followed by Q&A’s from the actors, writors, directors, & producers as suggested in the third column. I’ve been to a few of these (‘Sunshine‘ with Kaufman & co. and Clerks with basically the whole cast including Smith) and I always found them very enjoyable.
Sure it’s $14 for a seat, but I never minded paying that much for a movie I really wanted to see.
1ArcLight is all reserved seating and you can purchase tickets ahead of time online for no extra charge, another awesome thing about them.
(Blog links via Cinematical.)