Headline: Food for Thoughtlessness

Why do we freak out when people whisper or sniffle or cough in the theater, while we placidly endure the sounds of munching popcorn or the last milk dud tumbling down the box towards someone's mouth?

People can be neatly divided into two groups: Those who like going to the movies, and those who like movies. The latter group would be happier in Portugal, where they don't serve food and drink, and where the movie can be enjoyed with fewer distractions. Well, maybe the Portuguese subtitles at the bottom would be irritating, but it'd be worth it.

Come on. If we weren't already used to the idea of noisy foods served at movie theaters, we would never stand for it. It's not like we can't survive for two hours without salt and sugar. Aren't we supposed to be paying attention to the movie? If it makes sense to eat at a movie, it should make sense for your local house o' worship to sell popcorn and snacks at services to raise funds for a new bus. Or perhaps roaming popcorn vendors in classrooms could help enhance the educational experience while helping to pay for band uniforms.

Anyone really into the film experience wants to be drawn into the world of the story. This is hard to do when all around one hears not only the din of the food itself but also the attendant conversations.

"Did you get napkins?"

"Where's my change?"

"Are you sure this is diet?"

"That was four bucks?"

"Want more?"

"Ow, my tooth!"

It's just plain disrespectful to the filmmakers.

I wish eaters would at least make some effort to augment the film rather than detract. I saw some kids demonstrating this principle while watching Jurassic Park, which they'd clearly seen many times before. They sat quietly until a dinosaur chomped something or someone, at which point they fell upon their popcorn like wolves. Well, dinosaurs.

Wouldn't a vampire attack scene be a better time to noisily dredge up the last of your soda? Work with me people.

Those of you who advocate the whole atmosphere and ritual of popcorn and soda at the movies will be ready to carry your principles into battle, but don't bother--you've already won the war. Theaters aren't about to stop serving food and drink at the movies, because now it's considered a cultural aspect of the movie going experience--and they don't mind the money either.

If I didn't know better, I'd advocate jacking the price up absurdly high to thwart purchases, but that's already the case, and clearly it's not working. I've seen people in line at the box office griping about the cost of the ticket, only to happily stand in another line to get fleeced for snack foods at smuggler's prices.

I'm convinced that candy costs so much because huge amounts of research and development funds go into developing especially noisy packaging for theater sales. They want wrappers that act as a primitive communication device, wrappers that make everyone think, hey, someone's got candy! I want candy no matter what the cost!

And though great strides have been made in the audio output of plastic wrappers, it will take years to catch up with the thunderous output of the oversized cardboard boxes used with things like Junior Mints and Hot Tamales, which you can sometimes hear in the next theater.

Fountain soda is cheap to make. A large size costs the theater about a nickel. The cup is the most expensive part. You pay, what, two dollars? There's a 4000% markup right there. So when I recently visited a theater that served bottles of beer (it was in Idaho, so sit back down) for four dollars I figured that was a damn good deal--using theater math, markup on a bottle of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, which probably cost the theater about 90 cents, would have been 36 dollars.

Did I compromise my principles by buying that beer? No. Beer is silent. Soda has ice. Back off.

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