Quirks of Working for a Cinema (Part 2)

Back! Finally! Here are some more cases that show how cinema customers are some of the strangest out there. As with before, all of these have happened to me - nothing fabricated. Maybe it's just the area I work in...

16) A customer comes out of a 3D movie, complaining that only half the movie is in 3D, the other half is all blurry. We then give him another pair of 3D glasses, because the ones he is using only have one lens.

17) When a customer comes up to you and asks what films are on: Every time you give the name of a film, they ask for a full synopsis, list of actors, and "is it good?" After 7 or 8 films, they decide they want to go home and do something else with their time.

18) When a customer asks you, over the till during a transaction, whether the building has a rodent problem. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. I'm only going to tell you what you want to hear, which I assume is that the building does NOT have a mass infestation of plague-ridden rats that come out of their holes between films and feast on any customers that have fallen asleep in their chairs. Now go and enjoy your movie.

19) When a customer complains, as if it is the worst day of their life, just how expensive everything in the cinema is. I'm sure everyone does, even if it's just under their breath. Many times when they do this however, they continue to buy a large food combo for every member of their very big family, including children so tiny they could fit in the popcorn bags, which makes me look like the best salesman of the day. And then one of the little'uns points to a bag of sweets, which are quickly added to the mass banquet. Pretty expensive day out.

20) When a lone customer buys a lot of food for themselves, realizes they only have 2 arms to carry anything, and asks sincerely whether we can give them a tray.

21) When people ask "what is 2D?" when given a 3D/2D option. Then they ask me which is better. Probably best not to ask me that question.

22) The business of seat allocation. My cinema has started doing this for every film, whereby every customer selects their seat in the auditorium, so a seat and row number appears on their ticket, and that is where they will sit (in theory, but they won't). 9 times out of 10, when asked where they would like to sit, the customer will roll their eyes and give one of the following responses:

- "Can't I just sit anywhere?"

- "Why do I have to choose when there's only 2 people in there?"

- "Just give me the best seat."

- "The seat where I will see the screen most clearly" (but not at the front. Oh no, NOBODY wants the front.)

- A strangely specific, yet abstract request. E.g. "The middle corner". I try hard not to say "The auditorium is a square, Sir. Not a hexagon."

23) When underage kids try to purchase tickets for a 15 certificate film, and back up their claims of their age in a variety of interesting ways:

- handing me their phone with their mum on the other end.

- shouting their age in my face.

- wearing a birthday badge saying "15 TODAY", even though the child in question still had his milk teeth and barely got his head above the counter. Yes, this really did happen. Give him some kudos for trying.

24) When we clean the toilets and find an array of strange items, including toffee popcorn and KFC buckets. Apparently the toilet cubicle is the best place for a snack!

25) On the subject of toilets, it always causes a stir when a thick cloud of marijuana fumes puffs out from under the toilet door, before a dreadlocked, swedish hippie literally rolls out of the room. 

26) When audience members wait a *very* long time after a film has finished, to watch an after-credits scene, that actually won't come, because there isn't one, and they are verbally very disappointed. This is what I call The Marvel Effect. As the staff have to clean each auditorium after every customer has left, this Marvel Effect essentially ruins our entire schedule for the day. 

Please do your research. Google is a valuable tool. Don’t waste everyone’s time waiting for scenes that won’t come. Thankyou.

Some after-credits scenes, such as in Iron Man 3, or Captain America: The Winter Soldier, make the audience groan simply because they were not worth waiting around for.

27) When a group of customers come in to the cinema on a weekday, roughly around 11:30PM, oblivious to the fact that all the tills are off, the food is packed away, there is almost no staff about, the music is off, a security guard is standing by the entrance getting ready to close the barriers, and it’s 11:30PM, on a weekday.....and they come up to me and ask if they can have some tickets for the next movie.

28) When people come to the till, knowing what film they want to watch, but not really sure what the movie is actually called. So they just go along with whatever comes out of their mouth.

Pretty much every film has been named incorrectly by customers. Here are some of the more memorable recent ones:

- Mrs Brown’s Boys D’Movie = “Mr Brown”, “Mr Brown’s Boys”, “Mr Brown and His Boys”

- The Raid 2 = “Rape”

- Divergent = “Distraction”, “Divulgent”, “That Hunger Games Movie”

- The Amazing Spiderman 2 = “Superman”

- Captain America: The Winter Soldier = “Superman”

- XMen: Days of Future Past = “That Wolverine Film”

- Bad Neighbours = “Neighbours”, “Naughty Neighbours”

- Maleficent = “Malecifent”, “Malelephant”, “Magnificent”, “Macelifent”, “Malefilent”, “Mafecilent” (actually, with this one, not one customer could not pronounce the name of this movie. Way to go, Disney.)

- Godzilla = “Godzilla 2”

- The Fault in our Stars = “The Fault in our Dates” / “The Fault Starts” / “The Love in our Eyes” / “The Love in our Stars” / “Stars in their Eyes”

- Dawn of the Planet of the Apes = “Village of the Apes”/ “Apes of the Dawn of the Planet” / “Monkeys”

 Some more features or general anecdotes will be coming again on a regular basis. Thankyou for reading, and support your local cinema - If you see anyone taking a video recorder into a movie, kindly rugby tackle them to the ground.