An interesting story showed up on Digg today about a writer who went to the cinema with his girlfriend decided to share his experience with the world about how the MPAA is making the home theater experience even worse.

I wonder what kind of dystopian cyberpunk future we live in when you are physically searched before entering a movie theatre.

The Canadian writer went with his girlfriend to see the screening of a movie and had to wait and witness as every person in front of him was searched, and stripped of his, or her, cellphone. The writer in question refused to be searched, and simply walked along, since there was no mentioning of such a thing in his ticket. Since his girlfriend was there for work, she didn’t want any trouble, so she allowed herself to be searched and her cellphone was taken from her and she was given a ticket to pick it up after the screening.

As if that weren’t offensive enough, there were 4 guards near the stage exits, each one with a video camera scanning the crowd for any suspicious activity.

If you have sat in a chair in a dark room watching disturbing scenes unfold in front of you, while four uniformed people with video cameras stand in front of your, silently recording your reactions, you might be reminded of scenarios from a Clockwork Orange, Brazil, 1984, Videodrome, and strangely, that 90’s relic: SFW.

If this is the MPAA’s idea of how a trip to the theater should be, then I don’t think I will ever go to the cinema again once such a system is used in my local cinemas. I don’t want to favor illegal downloading but, between watching a new movie in the comfort of my own home, or spending an exaggerated amount of money just to be humiliated and intimidated for a movie’s duration, I think I’ll go with the first option.

Related posts:

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Philips Cinema One : Impress your girlfriend! :)

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