20-25 minutes of adverts and trailers appears to be the norm for most cinemas, it seems.
Over the weekend, on one of our occasional peruses of Twitter, we found something along the lines of a vaguely trending Tweet. One that intrigued us as it ties into something we’ve looked into for the next issue of our magazine.
It’s about how long cinemagoers are kept waiting between the published start time for a film, and when it actually begins?
I went to see Joker over the weekend, and I made it around 20 minutes or so, split between the adverts and then a bunch of movie trailers. Then some gubbins promoting the cinema. Then we could watch the film.
Martin Lewis, he of that posh and rather good money site off the internet, posted a Tweet that reads as follows…
Went to cinema yest for 8:45pm showing, but it was 9:17 before the film actually started.
CINEMAS we pay to see films! Fine show 5/10min of ads & trailers, but this inflation to 33mins isn’t on. Either cut pre-screening times, or tell us actual start times too.
RT if u agree.
— Martin Lewis (@MartinSLewis) October 6, 2019
And whilst I definitely didn’t laugh at that reply from one Twitterer where he noted that “on the plus side, my 4 year old might drop off before Joker starts”, this clearly touched a nerve.
Most of us are aware now that if a film is advertised as starting at 7pm, for instance, we have until at least 7.20pm or so to actually be in our seats. In fact, one cinema manager I know reports that when a film once pretty much started on time, they got complaints.
But, if you’d be so kind, in the comments, could you let us know of your own experiences here? How long are you kept waiting, and how long are you happy to wait? As I said, we’re doing a bit of work in this area, and will have more on that soon…
Image: BigStock
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