The horror movie experience

Mark Kermode is not happy. And his discontent is a joy to witness. The centrepiece of his new book about Hollywood blockbusters is a brutally hilarious account of his attempt to see The Life and Death of Charlie St Cloud with his teenage daughter. First he books two tickets online. At the multiplex, the machine denies all knowledge of his purchase. He joins the queue and attempts to buy the seats he’s already reserved. ‘They’re taken,’ says the ‘zombie’ attendant. (‘He was conclusive proof that Darwin had been full of shit, and we were all heading back to the swamp’).
Kermode buys two new tickets (for the price of four) and is then asked for a tub of popcorn by his hungry daughter. Costing a few pence to produce, and on sale for £4.50, the little bucket of detonated wheat is being peddled at a markup of 1,000 per cent. Inside the auditorium Kermode instantly spots that the film is misaligned by several inches. He sets off to alert the manager. What follows is a 25-page comic odyssey which ends with Kermode explaining how to solve the problem and the manager steadfastly refusing to do so.

There is a magnificent serenity to this man’s obstructiveness. He stands as an emblem of corporate ineptitude everywhere. Here’s the problem. He has no loyalty to the communities that generate his employment. He cares nothing for the film-makers, nothing for the distributors, and nothing for the film fans whose custom supplies his wages. When a cinema-goer like Kermode uncovers a difficulty, the manager can find no reason to resolve it because it doesn’t affect him, only the people who created his job. He shrugs aside every claim on his attention until the complaint dies of frustration. He is the enemy of film. And he’s in charge of the film house.