I'll admit it openly: at the cinema, I'm the strict one. The guy who tenses up the second someone starts whispering behind him. And no, I don't think that's over the top — I think it's right.
I was there again yesterday. At first some people were sitting in my seat, but I didn't care — the row in front was empty anyway and the chairs there are better. No big deal. The problem came afterwards: they talked. Not once, but again and again, all the way through the film.
And they weren't the only ones. It's summer, the cinema is packed, and it feels like every second person has the urge to tell their neighbour, live, what they're seeing on the screen.
Reacting yes, commentating no
Don't get me wrong. I'm not some Zen monk demanding dead silence. Laughing is completely fine. A gasp, a "wow", a collective intake of breath when the twist hits — that's exactly why you go to the cinema.
It's actually the best part. The sociologist Émile Durkheim coined a term for this feeling: collective effervescence, the shared vibration of a crowd. A hundred people flinching in the same instant — you'll never get that at home on the sofa.
But this is exactly where the line lies. An exclamation is a reaction to the film. A conversation is a turning away from it. "What do you reckon, is it going to go this way or that?" — no. That's not being swept up in it; that's talking about the film while the film is running.
Eating yes, phone calls unthinkable
My limit is actually simple. Eating, drinking, giggling — all allowed. But the moment full sentences come out that have nothing to do with a spontaneous feeling and turn into an actual conversation, it's over.
Talking loudly on the phone would be the extreme, but luckily almost nobody does that. If someone next to me actually picked up — honestly, I'd lose it. The non-stop chatterers are the real problem.
Would I throw them out? Almost.
There are cinemas that do exactly that. The Texan chain Alamo Drafthouse kicks out guests who talk during the film or stay glued to their phones — one warning, and the second time you're out, no refund. And people love them for it.
When I think about it, I catch myself almost being on board. Not out of spite, but because a ticket is a quiet contract: we've all paid to disappear into the same story for two hours. Whoever talks breaks that contract for everyone else too.
Are we the killjoys?
Now you could say: cinemas used to be loud, people shouted and commented, so don't be so precious. True. But then, to be consistent, we might as well go to the theatre — and there nobody heckles either. People laugh, people gasp, otherwise: silence.
Maybe all of this sounds strict. But at home I'm the most relaxed person in the world — there I talk as much as I want. Then again, nobody ever watches with me. So: I only have this problem in the one place where it really is one. The cinema.