Are movie theaters losing their magic to dining distractions?

As the lights dim and the trailers start rolling, you sink into your seat, in complete communion with the screen. It’s a focus and a withdrawal rarely achieved in any other setting—not watching TV at home, hyper-aware of everything going on around you, and certainly not replicated by peering into a 6-inch screen held in your hand. But soon, a server arrives with popcorn and sodas for the people in the seat next to yours, and you miss the opening credits as they engage in a whispered conversation about modes of payment or a wrong order.

I don’t know who thought it would be a good idea to treat a movie theatre as a full-service restaurant, but I haven’t stopped cursing them since this “innovation” first started making an appearance a decade or so ago. It’s not just food orders —I remember watching Frozen 2 at a special playhouse-style auditorium (I failed to realise while booking the tickets that this wasn’t a regular auditorium) which had slides down the aisles and low-level lighting on the entire time. It was possibly the worst movie-watching experience of my life as toddlers shrieked and fought over taking turns, parents ran after them, and multiple servers came in every few minutes bearing trays of food.

I don’t remember much of Frozen 2, not only because the film suffered terribly from sequel syndrome but because of the utter chaos in which I watched it. That theatre still exists. I don’t know who voluntarily goes there—not even parents with little kids—because surely if you want them to run around and have a good time you’d just take them to the park?

At a “miniplex” in Bengaluru, a tiny auditorium with a projector right above our heads, the screen was constantly blocked by servers with nachos and soft drinks, throwing weird shadows on the screen. There were murmurs of protest from the audience, but we soon settled down because the business of entertainment had to go on.

Such is the lack of access to public spaces in our cities that all spaces must become multi-tasking entertainment zones. A theatre cannot be a theatre anymore but has to level-up as a restaurant, a play area, maybe a shopping arcade next? There are times when it is still possible to enjoy this—watching the recent Downton Abbey film in the super-luxury PVR Directors’ Cut multiplex in Bengaluru at least felt somewhat appropriate as one settled into plush, pull-out seats in an audi made to look like a library at a posh London club (with fake books, no less). But imagine watching a film like, say, Homebound there—I can’t think of a more uncomfortable experience.

Theatre owners are not done, apparently. A multiplex chain is launching “chef-curated dining experiences” at cinemas where the service will presumably not be limited to the beginning of the film, which was bad enough, but throughout its runtime as the… viewers? audience? diners?... are served gourmet pizzas, dimsums, and sushi. Everything has to be a “destination” today, involving multiple points of engagement and entertainment. The movie-watching experience, which I thought was overwhelming enough in itself, is apparently not adequately all-consuming.

That sense of losing yourself to the screen? Gone—replaced by straining eyes and ears to catch the action and dialogue and focusing on your gourmet hot dog instead. Give me the 6-inch screen in my palm any day.