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Lawmaker wants theaters honest about movie start times
Associated Press

MANCHESTER, Conn. � Coming soon to a theater near you: movie listings that print the start time for the main feature.

Frustrated with lengthy advertisements and previews that delay movies and chew up viewing time, a state lawmaker wants theaters to be honest about when a movie actually starts.

State Rep. Andrew Fleischmann is proposing legislation to force movie listings to print the time the previews start, and when the movies start.

"We're being robbed of our freedom of choice because we're not told when the actual movie will begin," said Fleischmann, a Democrat.

Movie ads are big business for theaters. A report from the Cinema Advertising Council, an industry group, found that on-screen revenue for its members grew 45 percent from $190.8 million in 2002 to $315 million in 2003.

Messages seeking comment were left for the council, the National Association of Theater Owners, Loews Theaters and Regal Cinemas.

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Posted by Jeremy Fuentes (Member # 2135) on 01-18-2005, 10:15 AM:
 
Well at least they have their priorities straight.
 

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Posted by Thomas Procyk (Member # 1170) on 01-18-2005, 10:44 AM:
 
I'm confused. How is not printing the start time of the feature robbing people of their freedom of choice? You're not preventing them from choosing anything else. I would think including the trailers in the running time would be enough to solve this "problem" (the fact that they "eat in to viewing time") and come to think of it, most movies I have seen recently have ended well before the running time indicated they should. (about 10-15m)

I'd like to take this "legislation" a step further and add that if the start time of the FEATURE is advertized, NO ONE shall be admitted after that specified time. Only between the time(s) of the ads and the feature will tickets continue to be sold for the engagement.

All this would cause is an onslaught of people shuffling and mingling for seats during the first reel.

=TMP=
 

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Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 01-18-2005, 12:37 PM:
 
At all the theatres I worked which did show commercials, our contract with the advertising agency (Pearl & Dean or Carlton) specified that only the programme start time could be advertised. Basically they didn't want customers timing their arrival to miss the ads. Box office staff were under strict instructions not to reveal the feature start time over the 'phone when taking advance bookings, on pain of being escorted to a cellar and introduced to The Gimp.

In the one theatre I worked which had an absolute policy of never showing any ads or trailers at all, ever, this caused a problem. This place was a well-known London arthouse with a hard core of regular customers (most of whom belonged to a membership scheme) who knew that the feature always started at the advertised time, and that latecomers would only be admitted if they could be seated without disrupting others. But unsuspecting newbies who deliberately arrived 10 minutes late and whose seat was in the middle of a full row would often find themselves being refused admission - and the place didn't give out refunds in those circumstances. This was all explained in the small print on the ticket and in the monthly printed programme brochure that was mailed out to members, but needless to say the policy caused some heated exchanges at times.

My guess would be that you'd see more of this if you did advertise the feature start time; but that most mainstream theatres probably couldn't afford to be as picky in refusing to admit latecomers. In any case cinema advertising would die off. Only the other day I was reading an article about a new Sky hard disc TV recorder which, on payment of an extra subscription, will record broadcasts off air and automatically edit out the commercials. The writer was predicting armageddon for the advertising industry if the idea takes off.
 

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Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 01-18-2005, 12:43 PM:
 
What a stupid thing to legislate. I dislike cinema advertising as much as (if not more than) anyone here, but I fail to see why we need a law for this.

If a customer cares, he can always call the boxoffice (not the recording) and ask when the feature starts. Problem solved.
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-18-2005, 12:47 PM:
 
While I dislike the increased number of TV commercials tacked onto the front of movies, I disagree with the Conn. State Rep's legislative idea.

As Thomas said, if you post the actual start time in the newspaper ads then you'll have lots and lots of people stumbling into the darkened auditorium for at least the first 20 minutes of the movie, if not longer. This kind of thing would really stink in a normal sloped theater. Who can manage to enjoy watching a movie when a bunch of latecomers are stumbling by with their potato heads getting in the way of the screen? This would still pose a nagging distraction in a stadium seated theater. Viewers already have to put up with enough distractions (cellphones, crying babies, assholes putting their feet on the back of your chair, farting assholes, etc.).

I don't even agree with a compromise move of posting times when the ads start and when the show starts. You'll still have most of the audience arriving in reels 1 and 2. On top of that, most theater directory ads in newspapers are pretty small and already have microscopic copy. Who's going to get out a magnifying glass to read 2 point type needed to fit all those extra numbers?

In general, I think most people would agree movies simply should have fewer TV commercials and trailers attached to the front. But I understand exhibitors are getting squeezed further and further by distributors and have to look for additional revenue sources.
 

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Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 01-18-2005, 01:09 PM:
 
Conn. State Rep. Andrew Fleischmann is clearly an idiot.
 

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Posted by Wolff King Morrow (Member # 2226) on 01-18-2005, 06:11 PM:
 
It's just to pick up from Andy Rooney's rant he did about the same thing. Personally I find it such a non-issue. Regular customers to a given theater simply choose when they want to show up. Seeing as how on busy nights you want to show up early to get good seats, there's no reason a theater should be forced to recalculate start times.

What they SHOULD be doing is forcing studios to offer a skip ads feature on DVD versions of movies. I'm getting more and more disgusted with ad-laced DVD's that you can't skip to the movie on.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 01-18-2005, 06:40 PM:
 
It would have no effect, probably. The smart people would come at the beginning of the program like they always have, but would continue to gripe about the ads. The idiots would, as noted above, stumble around in the dark and ruin the movie for the smart people.

The REALLY smart people will patronize mom-n-pop theatres that don't show ads.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 01-18-2005, 11:30 PM:
 

quote: Thomas Procyk

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All this would cause is an onslaught of people shuffling and mingling for seats during the first reel.

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quote: Mike Blakesley

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The REALLY smart people will patronize mom-n-pop theatres that don't show ads.

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quote: Dominic Espinosa

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I think the legislation should be this:
Trailer packages should not exceed more than 12 minutes max.

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No-o-o-o....the government should STAY THE HELL OUT of the movie business!

Or if they really want to do something useful, make it illegal to bring anyone under 5 to any movie not rated G. And make cellphone usage in a theatre punishable by huge fines. You know, stuff that would really enhance the experience of the actual movie.

The way things are going, ads will probably pay for part of the cost of the new gee-whiz Digital Projectors we'll all be showing Star Wars 7,8, and 9 on, so might as well learn to love'em.
 

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Posted by Thomas King (Member # 2745) on 01-19-2005, 10:59 PM:
 
I'm firmly of the opinion that the feature start time is the time that I press play We'd be sunk if it wasn't for the big fat cheque that Pearl & Dean send us, and we rely on trailers to drill into people what we're showing soon (heaven forbid they should look at our poster boards, pick up a programme or look at our website). I think the twenty or so minutes that ads and trailers take up is quite reasonable, if you're so busy that you can't spare it, you shouldn't be at the cinema anyway However, I must temper this by saying that at "less professional" cinemas *coughodeoncough* I have had to sit through thirty five minutes of adverts alone. As long as advertisers don't get greedy and try to take advantage of the public, I don't see there's anything to complain about.
 

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Posted by Adam Wilbert (Member # 1184) on 01-19-2005, 11:44 PM:
 
Mike is right on on this. I don't think that we should even be talking about outlawing anything just because it's mind numbingly annoying. I think Regal is on the right track with programming: "The 20" starts before the scheduled showtime and previews start at the showtime (with no rolling stock). I'd be embarrased if this dufus was my representative. Brad should post names of all of our connecticut members so we can ridicule them!
 

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Posted by Ron Yost (Member # 1850) on 01-20-2005, 11:42 AM:
 
"As long as advertisers don't get greedy and try to take advantage of the public, I don't see there's anything to complain about."

Hahaha .. thanks for the laff of the day, Thomas. It's all ABOUT greed and taking advantage of "bums" in the seats. (Bums meant in both the U.S. and English sense.) Advertisers would not let people alone for one SECOND if they didn't have to. 'em.

Ron Yost
 

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Posted by Thomas King (Member # 2745) on 01-20-2005, 09:31 PM:
 
"As long as the advertisers don't get greedier and try to take more advantage of the public" is perhaps what I should have said
 

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