Point/Counterpoint: Should Film Critics Use their Phones in Screenings?

A call to 911 during the Toronto International Film Festival is once again raising questions about phone usage in theaters. We pulled in Latino Reviews Dave Gonzales to hash out the issues of phones-at-the-movies once and for all.

The below series of Tweets came from FirstShowing.nets Alex Billington, whose attempts to see Ti Wests The Sacrament at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival were interrupted by cell phone usage among the other attendees at the Press & Industry screening. This dust-up which included Billington calling 911 in order to find satisfaction once again brought about a social-media discussion about cell phone usage in movie theaters. Particularly when it comes to critics screenings, is it in any way defensible to be on your phone while the movie is screening?

I was sure about my stance on this issue, but after a short Twitter exchange, I asked Dave Gonzales of Latino Review to take part in a little point/counterpoint with me. Well see if my righteous indignation could hold up against Daves march-of-time modernism.

Joe Reid: Hey Dave! So once again we are to have a Serious Conversation About Cell Phone Usage In Movie Theaters. Its kind of the perfect flashpoint discussion, as it manages to involve film-critic process, Millennial-based generational strife, and complaining via social networks, three of the four essential elements of online debate (the fourth is "Batman castings"). Pivoting off of the specifics in the case of Billingtons complaint and whether the Royal Canadian Mounted Police ever did take that theater by force, the issue here seems to be whether people should be using cell phones in Press & Industry screenings. My initial reaction was "NO! OBVIOUSLY! THEY SHOULD BE LOCKED UP!" And I guess I still hew closer to that line now even after having calmed down. Even more so than being annoyed by phones in public screenings, seeing someone on a phone in a press screening flips my lid because were now beyond recreation.

Everybodys supposed to be doing their jobs. And not only does sending a text (or God forbid taking a call) in the middle of a screening bad form, its now distracting me from doing my job, right? AND is it not also unfair to the filmmakers, who ought to have a reasonable expectation that the professionals evaluating their work are at least doing so via as unobstructed a viewing experience as possible? How much of an idealist does this make me?

Dave Gonzales: Allow me, if you will, to social-network a bit myself as a way to re-set the scene. Attached is a screen shot about how Mr. Billington represented himself on his Facebook Page, which includes some facts that make this specific case a case about a single person flipping out.

Billington was attending a Press and Industry screening at a film festival. TIFF itself does not allow cell phone use during their public/festival screenings, only during Press and Industry screenings. These are held in a separate theater and require different accreditation to get in, for free, to see both competition and out-of-competition movies. These are movies that are looking for distribution. Some films already have distro deals and some are likely to get a distro deal because of notable cast or creators. Other films are just there vying for a piece of the pie, if you will, and its a piece of the pie that is increasingly diminishing as The Wrap Via The Chicago Tribune points out.

The "I(ndustry)" part of a "P(ress)&I(ndustry)" screening is a group of people with a completely different job than the person doing the complaining in this case. They are media buyers or someones assistant who may not even want to be in that movie. The "P" is there to buzz a film they get to see before anyone else. Yes, there might be that occasional film you walk into that you werent expecting to be worth a damn, but in a festival like Toronto where there are hundreds of films debuting, youre in a movie-grab-bag situation and the best thing to grasp at are movies that are going to get picked up and distributed so your "P" audience can give you all your "P" credit.

In this case, the complaining party is the one who seems incapable of doing his job. If someone covering TIFF for their website is capable of taking in 3-7 movies in a day and claiming they can still critically isolate each of those movies from each other and their own fatigue, then I have a hard time believing they cant suck it up with some light pollution in what is probably the SINGLE screening that movie gets allowing cell phone usage. It allows cell phone usage for the "I" audience, because those people are in a competitive business dealing with million dollar deals and more movies per day need to be processed on their end than on the "P" end.

Are you distracted by cell phone usage? Then I suggest you do your job even better and buy tickets for a public screening of the film in question, which will not allow cell phone use.

Thats why Press and Industry screenings allow cell phone usage. Sundance does it too, but with a limited slate and such a long distance from awards season, its not as super-competitive as the TIFF Industry Cell Phone Users Brigade is.

Problem #2 here is that Mr. Billington called an American Emergency Service to report Piracy rather than confronting the cell phone user, the theater manager, or festival staff. Granted, if this person was pirating a TIFF film thats pretty bad. But what happened was he was using his cell phone (in a place where he was allowed to be using his cell phone) and Mr. Billington CALLED 911 about a CRIME that WAS NOT being committed. This is the theater-going equivalent of thinking that killing an abortion doctor will stop women from getting abortions, not to mention it might actually BE ILLEGAL. Im no lawyer, but I know a kid in my high school got publicly shamed by the community for abusing 911.

Now to your

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