Enough individual reports are coming in via e-mail that I'm really starting to think that the managers of these cineplexes are either complicit in the actions of their mostly teenaged employees, or that these kids are taking matters into their own hands on a really grand scale:

• People are unable to buy tickets online for this movie, and have to get them at the cineplex itself;

• When one goes to the theater, the name of the movie frequently isn't on the marquee, giving one a sort of "am I at the right place?" moment;

• There are no posters up for the movie at the theater, reinforcing that "wait; was this supposed to be that place across town?" feeling;

• on the sign inside the ticket booth, the movie isn't even listed. This actually happened to me, and I was about to suggest to my husband that we leave, when I saw another couple ask for tickets to the movie--they seemed to be getting them, so I thought, "well, I guess it has to be playing here . . ."

• The second theater in town where the movie was supposedly was playing didn't allow one to pre-purchase tickets, so I called to check on the time. This particular movie house was a four-plex, and I listened to the long outgoing message twice. It gave me all kinds of information I didn't need to know, like how to get to the theater. And it gave me showtimes for three movies--but not An American Carol.

• I'm getting email and comments about people who are being sold the wrong movie tickets. They ask to see An American Carol, and are handed a ticket that they don't look at very closely (how many of us actually read these things when we're trying to figure out whether there's time to get popcorn before we get our seats?). Later on, though, they look at the ticket and see the title of a completely different film.

It's my understanding that this is often done by theater management "by accident" because they get less money for current releases than they do for films that have been in the theater for a few weeks.

But I'm starting to wonder about this: was there some underground communication among the kids who work at these places? It's starting to look like the phenomenon is a lot more widespread than a few days ago, when I just started hearing people ask questions.

Let's try it this way, folks: how many of you went to see An American Carol, and your ticket stub actually had the name of that movie on it?

I know the kinds of kids who work at movie theaters. I worked at two movie theaters when I was in college. I know what the cultural zeitgeist is—hell; I was part of it.

I didn't really believe at first that this was more than isolated incidents, but the appearance here is that there is an active effort underway to suppress box office numbers for An American Carol.

Previous Entries on the American Carol controversy:

Is this Enemy Action? Please Tell Me 'No.'

An American Carol Made More Money Than Religulous.

Mainstream Critics Didn't Like An American Carol; What a Sur-Prize!

Posted by: Attila Girl at 11:29 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 570 words, total size 4 kb.