Movie High

Get stoned at the movies, or something:

“Imagine how much better Barbie or Deadpool & Wolverine would be if you could see it” while smoking a joint, asks Variety rhetorically. “Selling weed could bring fresh revenue and new customers to theaters.” What? Both of those movies were monster hits, the top grossers of their respective years. Who in their right mind believes allowing pot smoking and texting in the theater would have improved their box office? Granted, Variety’s idea is to have exclusive screenings for potheads and texters. Nevertheless, the entire theater will still stink of that crap. Here’s Variety lobbying for texting: “Although cinephiles might object, if movie theaters want to attract younger audiences who refuse to give up their devices during the two-hour running time of most films, they might need to stop banning phones.” If these stupid ideas were coming from some obscure blog, I wouldn’t care. But this is Variety, the so-called Bible of Show Business. Like the rest of the entertainment media, this is just another example of whistling past the graveyard by a publication insulated from Normal People. What’s especially galling is that the answer to the movie attendance problem is right in front of Variety’s face, right there in the sentence quoted above (“Barbie or Deadpool & Wolverine”) and they don’t even see it. Instead of this sentence — “Imagine how much better Barbie or Deadpool & Wolverine would be if you could see it [while smoking a joint]” — how about this sentence: “Imagine how much better theater attendance would be if Hollywood made more movies that appeal to people like Barbie or Deadpool & Wolverine”?

Then you wouldn't have to be stoned...