Thanks for a great night and signing my book Brighton (I was the one with the save Ferris T-shirt)

Oh my God! Why don't I have a "Save Ferris" T-shirt?

Ha! I won't a "SAVE FERRIS" t-shirt too. Celluloid@2 I suggest we get ourselves one… in fact, c'mon everyone, lets all get one!

'want!!' jezz, typo-city!

Please excuse my previous posts on Save Farris t-shirts. I've just been working 22 hours straight and, clearly, I should no longer be allowed to use a keyboard. I'm now off home to sleep.



Loved the Cronenberg post and, yes, I always have a smile and thank you for cinema staff because… well, why wouldn't you?

Never made it to the end of this vid. Guess the previous posters had better things to think about too. Sorry Mark.

RE: expressing emotions. does laughing out loud throughout the entirety of 'the expendables' count?

These are great. Just goes to prove that there are always more positives than negatives in life. Refreshing list of ideas here and so chuffed to get a mention, you made my weekend.

You need end credits, Mark...

Re: applauding at the end of the film.

For the past 5 years I have been fortunate enough to have Press Accreditation for the London Film Festival, giving access to all of the preview screenings of the films. At 9:15 am on the morning of the American Airlines Gala screening of (the absolutely marvelous) The Artist, an enormous herd of Press trudged into the Odeon West End to view the preview. As the screening progressed, the room seemed to magically light up as the cranky, battle-scarred critics melted and gradually turned gooey-eyed over the film. And at the end of screening, a huge, spontaneous round of applause echoed throughout the auditorium: I was amazed as, after years of press preview screenings, that is a genuine first for me

Who is Ferris and why should we save him?



Appauding at the end of a good film is great and I always stay till the end of the end credits. And I always thank any loitering staff for their hospitality and the film (even if it is a poor film). And I never leave rubbish behind... but take it with me and deposit it in the appropriate receptical. This all just seems polite and considerate to fellow human beings.

Who is Ferris? Anyone? Anyone?

Save Ferris

"Who is Ferris? Anyone? Anyone?"



Damn, you're young! You seriously never heard of "Ferris Bueller's Day Off"?

OK, an 80s teen brat pack movie, but a lot of people liked it at the time. Lots of snappy one liners and attitude.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&v=91oESPRinas

A bit like having never heard of American Graffiti, Happy Days or The Breakfast Club or...



Headphones? Oh no. If people chatter, phone, munch etc. then no matter how much you love/hate a movie then you're getting other peoples' feedback.



One memory that stays with me is watching Shindler's List in a cinema when first released (also applies to the first 20 mins of Saving Private Ryan, the last 20 minutes of Last King of Scotland ~ and the Russian 'Idi i smotri': 'Come and See'), utter silence; a few people praying or crying quietly as the credits rolled; that's when a film's power hits you.



As for Rocky Horror midnight revivals... 'Let's do the Time-warp...' Let your hair down. Audience participation ~ Yeah!



Being respectful (and thanking) the people that work in a cinema? Goes without saying. I thank bus drivers, so why not cinema attendants?



If you want silence and concentration then wait for the DVD and watch at home, otherwise support your cinema; even if it does bring you into contact with people you otherwise wouldn't want as your friends.

I do most of those things so I would get a gold star but for this one weakness: What do you do if a film is inappropriately funny? My daughter and I were unable to stifle giggles at the ridiculous 'vision' sequence in New Moon where Edward and Bella (now a vampire) run in slow motion through the forest looking like an M & S commercial. Or some of the awful dialogue between Padme and Anakin in Attack of the Clones? (I wasn't alone in laughing at that one) My daughter wants to see Breaking Dawn. But even the trailer made me cackle, god knows how I'll manage the whole headboard biting and feathers scenes. Perhaps this is the perfect excuse not to take her...

Back in the day when a young film geek at uni, when everyone wanted to be a director and had delusions/an overweening sense of entitlement/an underestimation of talent/hardwork/luck required/naivete etc. my friends and I would shout "It's God" when the name of the director came up during the opening credits. There's a number of names up there that would make me ill if I said that now.



At a screening at a rep house of An American Werewolf in London, a pretty young woman yelled, "That's my dad" at one of the producer credits. My mates and I spectacularly failed to chat her up afterwards. We did wonder whether it was actually her father, or whether her father just shared the name. Ok we just told ourselves that, to dull the pain.



During the opening credits of the Corman produced alien ripoff Forbidden World, a particular wit a few rows in front from us shouted, "No wonder it's forbidden, it sucks!" Somehow that really set the tone to enjoy the slimy sleazy silly movie that followed. If only someone had yelled that at Revolutionary Road, I might have enjoyed it.



Audience participation only really works if everyone's up for it. At the New Forest Film Fest's screening of Shock Treatment, a handful of very game fans turned up in character with a response script ala Rocky Horror, but with the weight of the room's collective embarrassment (and the frank bewilderment of first time viewers), they fell silent after about five minutes, they really deserved their own screening and private audience with Richard O'Brien. I wish there was a way to instantly poll the rest of the audience, like they do in focus groups, so that if we all decide a film is rubbish, we can loudly improvise a collective response, augmenting bad story telling with old fashioned folk telling. Again, that's really the only way I might have enjoyed Revolutionary Road.

At 00:38 29th Oct 2011, jayfurneaux wrote:

"Who is Ferris? Anyone? Anyone?"



You are either being extremely ironic or simply not spotted that my tag is ferris' best friend's name and the 'anyone' is a quote from the voodoo economics lesson. You can know a film or you can live it.....................

Thank you for picking my suggestion and apologies on the name.

Trying to mould my birthday and initials seemed smart at the time...

My local multiplex has got to the pint where there aren't even any people to thank for holding the door open. Once you pass the ticket stand, there are not staff whatsoever, and it does make the experience a lot less friendly

Noctivagus@11



Bueller?.. Bueller?.. Bueller?



Sorry Mark.

Completely agree on the applauding front. Coming from New Zealand, kiwi audiences are stiffer than the poms - they don't react! I liked it when I first started going to film festivals and people clapped at the end. It's a different vibe there; people really want to see the film that's on and want to be a part of the experience. I went to a screening of 'Easy Rider' a couple of years back and everyone got well into it and was having a good old time and there was a ripple of excitement when Jack Nicholson appeared and then right at the end... nothing. Everyone just filed out one by one like something out of 'Nineteen Eighty-Four'; "That was very nice but thank God we live in enlightened times". What a come down! So, earlier this year, when a mate and I went to see 'Apocalypse Now', I was determined that I would initiate a round of applause because I just couldn't bear to see another great movie go by unheralded by it's audience. I started clapping and a few people half-heartedly joined in but it kind-of trickled away fairly rapidly. C'est la vie. Unfortunately, I won't be back in time for the New Zealand Film Festival next year - I'll have to what I can get in the mean time.

Please let it be that there be a ten commandments of positive cinema to do's to counterpoint the just don't go there's. Ta.

Re:laughing at scenes not intended as funny - I did say 'Eagle!' during the scene in Jane Eyre where Mr. Rochester's horse rears up (in tribute to the PG Tips ad where Monkey gets taken away by an eagle). Also during The Da Vinci Code I couldn't take the scene where the albino guard says 'I'm going to put these boxes on the table' seriously and I asked 'is it time for Deal Or No Deal already?'

Sorry, off topic, just watched Drive (thank God I didn't pay to see it). Super-slow motion, over emphasis on score, stylised violence, and stripped down dialogue does not an art-house action film make. Even Tarantino can manage subtext and social commentary. Dull.

Lovely to see so many positive comments approved by the good Dr K. We can only hope that the Positive Wittertainment Code of Conduct will be published to go with the negative one.



Loving all the Ferris Bueller references. Best use of song in an 80s movie? "Oh Yeah" by Yello in Ferris Bueller IMHO.

Sorry to disagree Carole but the best use of a song in Ferris Bueller is Beat City by The Flowerpot Men.

Having said that the car (the 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California) never looked cooler with that song playing.

I refuse to believe that you would go into a U2 3-D concert movie with an open mind Mark ;)!

@26. keyser_sozes_ghost



I beg to differ.



Dream Academy's cover of The Smiths 'Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want'… Love that scene in the gallery. Cutting in to the painting with each edit, closer, closer, closer. Genius 80's teen flick.

I agree with nearly all those ideas, especially the being nice and saying thank you to the cinema workers.



But I cannot get my head around the clapping at the end of films. It just doesn't make sense to me.



If we clap at good films should we boo at bad films?

Robert Bresson was against clapping at cinemas, it reminded him of theatre, which for him was a bastardised art form. So that's why I never clap, unless the filmmaker is present. Audiences shouldn't applaud themselves.

Laughing is ok, but loud expressions of dislike I just find extremely distasteful. Even if it's bad, don't sigh, mock or boo, you might break a 12-year-olds heart, and that just ain't right.

I laughed at (not with) Pearl Harbor in all the wrong places, and felt a bit guilty afterwards, I might've spoiled it for someone who was enjoying it.

I can remember going to see Fight Club and my mate and I spent the whole film laughing our heads off! We thought it was a great comedy!



We only realised that no one else in the cinema was laughing at the end, left me thinking if we'd misunderstood the film or the rest of the cinema had.