A PSA to Moviegoers

Here’s the PSA, don’t talk during a movie. It’s simple and it’s told to you before every movie, but it’s still not followed. I’ll admit, I have talked during movies before, but I’m never loud enough to become obnoxious and disruptive.

I bring this topic up because I was reminded of a friend’s sleepover from last year. I had offered to bring Into the Woods to watch and my friend was all for watching it. It wasn’t just the two of us at this sleepover, it was a bunch of other people. At first, everyone was watching and paying attention, but that came to a halt very fast. Soon, phones came out and conversations started to pop up. By the middle of the movie, people had gone off to other areas of her basement and started to just do their own thing. We had to keep turning up the volume on the movie so we could hear it because people were talking so much and being loud. It was extremely frustrating. By the end of the movie, there were only four of us watching it and everyone else acted like they didn’t even care that they were being so rude. There were complaints about it being so long, the fact that it’s a musical, and just a bunch of other nonsense that I didn’t want to deal with.

If you’re not enjoying the movie you’re watching, fine, but don’t hinder the experience for the others around you. I’m baffled still by the behavior of the other people at the party. It was my friend’s party and she was the one that wanted to watch the movie. They should’ve been respectful and participated in what she wanted to do, not go off and do their own thing while being extremely obnoxious.

I know it’s difficult to sit for one and a half or even over two hours without getting fidgety or wanting to talk. I get that, I completely get that. We’re humans and it’s hard to remain still and silent for a long period of time. Though, you owe it to the others around you to treat them with respect. If you’re seeing a movie in a theater, then you obviously had to pay for your ticket to see that movie. You used your own money because you wanted to be entertained. You wouldn’t want that money to be wasted due to the fact that you couldn’t enjoy yourself and be entertained because people were having conversations around you, right?