Empty Theaters
Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic

A Moviegoers Lament

I miss going to the movies. The shared experience.

Americans famously play the role of the individual spirit who goes it alone into the wild and lives off the land using only their rugged wits. Rip Van Winkle. Grizzly Adams. Ted Kaczynski.

But sometimes, for 90 minutes or so, in the controlled environment of a cool, darkened theater, we shed this persona and allow ourselves to be absorbed by The Blob, that singularly unique living and breathing organism known as THE AUDIENCE.

We laughed together like we did when the beleaguered Indiana Jones shot the Arab swordsman in the street. Or we held our breath and choked back sobs when Bambi called "Mother?" out into the cold, silent wood. And our hearts soared into the rafters when Rocky cried out "Adrian!" as the music swelled. Through movies, we get to taste the highs and lows of life without all that messy clean-up. We just toss our empty popcorn bucket into the trash on the way out, and we're done with the lot of it. Whether it's the hairy paw of King Kong or the trimmed pubis of Sharon Stone, by the time we find our car in the parking lot, we have successfully escaped their grip and owe them no further thought. Unless we choose to.

But it's not just the movies I miss. Remember watching apprehensive late-comers tiptoe into the theater and scan the throng looking for a seat? Good luck, fuckwads. We watched them and smugly chewed our Twizzlers while sitting upon the dirty upholstered parcels of conquest claimed in the name of Our Ass. Sucks to be you, we thought.

And then there was the anticipation and excitement as the lights would go down and the curtains would open. The serene in-house ad for the theater would come on. General Cinemas. AMC. Then came the concession stand pitch. Then the coming attractions. We'd lean over to our pal as we watched each one and whisper little Siskel and Ebert sweet nothings to each other. That looks good. That looks stupid. I'm definitely gonna go see that. Think I'll pass.

Finally, we'd hear a pop and crackle like somebody dropped a needle onto a record, and see a big blue screen:

THE MOTION PICTURE CODE AND RATING ADMINISTRATION HAS RATED THIS MOTION PICTURE PG (PARENTAL GUIDANCE SUGGESTED)

Then maybe the rat-a-tat-tat of the 20th Century Fox snare drums followed by horns. Or the TriStar Pictures Pegasus take flight. Or you knew you were in a cool-kids movie if the United Artists logo or the Orion Pictures logo came up. And with each, you felt like you were going to come in your corduroys.

Yes, we used to enjoy movies together. And they were the types of crowd-pleasers that we all could get behind too. The Ten Commandments. Ben-Hur. The Planet of the Apes. Yes, Charlton Heston was usually involved.

One of my favorite memories of a shared viewing experience happened one Friday night in Central Florida at the old Altamonte Springs Duplex behind the mall. Not sure if it was the duplex then or still the one screen before they chopped it into two. Regardless, the screen was huge, and every seat was full. And they rocked. The seats did. Ever so gently, you could rock in them. The movie was Arachnophobia. In this one scene, maybe in the barn, it got super creepy. Very tense. And very quiet. The suspense mounted. Where did that spider go? Where is it? Everybody started wriggling in their seats. And rocking. In 1990 the seats were already about 15 years old by then, so they probably were due for a little WD40. They squeaked. So there's no music, no sound, just mounting tension. Rock, rock, rock. Creak, creak, creak. The theater became filled with the noise from the seats. We all collectively became aware of ourselves and laughed. "Aren't we silly?" we thought. It was an intimate moment. With 500 people. I bet we all remember it to this day. And that is satisfying to me. For a moment, I belonged to something bigger than myself. A shared experience. We did that. We created a magical environment.

Quiet attentive viewing is a joint activity. It requires cooperation. That's the only way the fantasy will work. And when a scene in a film moves us as a whole, or makes our hearts swell in unison, or makes us chuckle, cry, jump, shriek, scream or yell "Huzzah!", that means our collaboration has been a success. We have been rewarded for our efforts. Then we feel pride. This sense of pride may not be as profound as that shared by the veterans of the Allied invasion of Normandy, but you get the picture. I hope to return to the movies someday. And when I do, I hope you'll be there with me. And share your Milk-Duds.