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Cinema vs Home Watching

Reviews, favourites and suggestions

If the price was the same, would you prefer to watch new releases at the cinema or at home?

Poll ended at October 18th, 2021, 5:58 pm

Cinema
10
29%
Home
24
71%
 
Total votes: 34

Howyoudoin
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Cinema vs Home Watching

#450635

Postby Howyoudoin » October 16th, 2021, 5:58 pm

I think I know the answer to this question but wanted to ask it anyway.

HYD

pje16
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450647

Postby pje16 » October 16th, 2021, 6:45 pm

perhaps should have also asked pre and post covid
Rates are climbing in my borough (Barnet) so have no desire to sit next to a stranger, for 2 hours or so, at the moment

swill453
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450648

Postby swill453 » October 16th, 2021, 6:51 pm

Do you really mean "same price"? So if there's four of you watching a film in the house, it would cost £40 quid or so?

Scott.

pje16
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450651

Postby pje16 » October 16th, 2021, 6:55 pm

I felt the question meant if price was of no concern (ie ignore it when making your decision)

nimnarb
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450671

Postby nimnarb » October 16th, 2021, 10:14 pm

With TV’s now of exceptional pixel quality and sound plus 65 inches and up why go out. You can make as much noise as you like in your own home as opposed to the coughing, sneezing, shlurping of the last remnants of their drink plus twirling the ice around, totally oblivious. Not to mention food smells, shuffling of feet, hitting you in the back of your seat every time they move plus the odd quiet one wafting around the place. Naff!

Midsmartin
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450673

Postby Midsmartin » October 16th, 2021, 10:28 pm

It depends.
Our nearest cinema sells homemade cakes and tea served on china, and an usher with a torch shows you to your seat. You can also buy a bottle of champagne to take in if you wish. More fun than our little TV, but more effort to get there.

Given that I would not pay to watch a film at home, I assume you are offering free cinema entry in this question?

To be honest it's rare that a film comes along that seems good. Special effects don't impress when you know it's all computer graphics. The sound levels are all wrong. Someone only needs to drop a teaspoon on screen and there is a throbbing low bass noise that's totally unrealistic. Magical powers don't impress me. If they can do magic, then just magic away all the problems. Violence .. And why are we so ok with death and pain on film?

AsleepInYorkshire
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450682

Postby AsleepInYorkshire » October 16th, 2021, 11:40 pm

Howyoudoin wrote:I think I know the answer to this question but wanted to ask it anyway.

HYD

I suspect many now have large TV's at home and spend their money on subscriptions to Netflix, Now & Disney? We do. I wonder if the days of the cinema are limited?

And Star Wars on our TV is just out of this world

AiY

pje16
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450691

Postby pje16 » October 17th, 2021, 7:36 am

AsleepInYorkshire wrote:I suspect many now have large TV's at home and spend their money on subscriptions to Netflix, Now & Disney? We do. I wonder if the days of the cinema are limited?
AiY

Don't forget Prime which has a lot more content than i imagined when I signed up to it
I tend to agree that cinema days are numbered unless they up their offering
I haven't been for a few years but an Everyman visit is well worth it
Every seat is an armchair or sofa (don't go if you feel tired as it's so comfy you're likely to nod off!)
and staff come round and sereve drinks and snacks
It is more of a night out than just a trip to the cinema

https://www.everymancinema.com/about-everyman

Gerry557
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450741

Postby Gerry557 » October 17th, 2021, 11:31 am

Currently I watch at home. Several reasons :- No travel, No cost (Apart from the small fortune on stuff for my home) Convenience, Not set times, Able to pause, watch what I want. (if I don't like it I can put on something different)

Then again I have big TV and an even bigger projector screen with a capable sound system. Depending on the cinema there is not much differential in quality and mine will beat most.

I suspect technology will keep improving so one day I might get wowed by a cinema visit again.

Streaming isn't currently the best quality medium but is not bad for most users. I tend to use UHD bit rates for best quality although I note Disney+ are releasing disks without Atmos sound but the streamed version has it. (Unbreakable 2000, 2021 uhd).

Cinema tended to get the new movies so I suppose it was a driver, the new Bond for example. I might give it a go in one of the Dolby Cinemas or try not to read about it till Christmas.

Against the cinema is sound too loud, exit signs and other lighting, other people, the phone going eating noisy, talking types.

Maybe covid has helped in this regard

JohnB
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450746

Postby JohnB » October 17th, 2021, 11:52 am

I never liked the cinema experience before Covid, but then I find crowds irritating rather than invigorating. But I'd not pay cinema prices to watch films at home, not when there are equally good older films I've not seen. I'm happy to wait until the Bond film appears on as part of a regular streaming package somewhere. Perhaps I'd go to a watch party at someone's house, but TBH I'd prefer a regular party with chat.

dealtn
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450752

Postby dealtn » October 17th, 2021, 12:07 pm

JohnB wrote:I never liked the cinema experience before Covid, but then I find crowds irritating rather than invigorating. But I'd not pay cinema prices to watch films at home, not when there are equally good older films I've not seen. I'm happy to wait until the Bond film appears on as part of a regular streaming package somewhere. Perhaps I'd go to a watch party at someone's house, but TBH I'd prefer a regular party with chat.


I'm happy to "pay up" to avoid crowds. Much the same reason I shop in Waitrose. In fact I could argue the biggest attraction in my town, from a retail perspective, for me is the competing Morrisions across the road.

MaraMan
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450754

Postby MaraMan » October 17th, 2021, 12:14 pm

The day I can afford a 65 foot cinema screen and a 44 speaker 12,000 watt sound system in my house then I will prefer to watch movies at home, but until then....

All the best

MM

kempiejon
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450755

Postby kempiejon » October 17th, 2021, 12:17 pm

Wasn't it Stephen Fry who said "What's the point of Sasinbury's? To keep the scum out of Waitrose."

AF62
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450797

Postby AF62 » October 17th, 2021, 2:31 pm

For the last twenty years (other than 2020-21!) in normal years I have been visiting the cinema about 100 to 150 times a year - thanks to the Cineworld Unlimited card (it was UGC when I first signed up).

For £13 a month each my wife and I can see any film Cineworld is showing and as many times as we want. £26 a month is pretty cheap in comparison to what some people pay for football or other sports on TV.

So far this year since the cinemas reopened in May I have seen - Nomadland, Judas and the Black Messiah, Nobody, Cruella, Dream Horse, Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard, Another Round, Supernova, French Exit, Freaky, Black Widow, Old, Off the Rails, The Suicide Squad, Jungle Cruise, Stillwater, The Courier, Reminiscence, The Nest, Free Guy, Our Ladies, Here Today, Copshop, Respect, The Many Saints of Newark, and No Time to Die. Some were good, some were bad, some were indifferent.

Oddly the films I think will be terrible often are not and the ones I think will be good may not be - but so what, no money wasted, only time.

Comparing watching a film at the cinema against watching it on TV makes no sense; it is the equivalent of comparing a well cooked meal served in a restaurant to a eating a bag of chips whilst sat at the bus stop - both might keep you from being hungry but apart from that..

Watching a film on an enormous screen with wonderful sound as compared to watching on a (tiny) 65" TV screen - frankly no comparison.

For convenience it helps that the local cinema isn't too far away, so if I leave home at the advertised start time then I am walking into the screen to my reserved seat just as the certification card is about to show. However the card allows me to use any Cineworld (other than central London) and there are four or five other Cineworld multiplexes in the surrounding towns which I regularly use.

As for other people's behaviour in the cinema - I generally find it depends on the location of the cinema as well as the showtimes, but pick the day and time right and it is unusual to encounter any nuisance.

By far the worst audiences are Sunday afternoon with a 'grey pound' film (Downton Abbey, etc.) when you get all the old folks who are hard of hearing describing the plot to each other and going "what was she in before", before rustling their bags of Werther's Originals.

Audiences are certainly nowhere near what they were pre-pandemic - When I went to see Bond last week at a late afternoon showing there were six people in a 312 seat screen.

But the death of cinema in favour of home entertainment was being touted long before the pandemic, but frankly I never saw it - the screens were always busy at popular times - and surprisingly so. As mentioned, get a 'grey pound' film in the cinema and (pre-pandemic) you might find there were no free seats on a Sunday afternoon showing.

swill453
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450827

Postby swill453 » October 17th, 2021, 5:04 pm

AF62 wrote:As mentioned, get a 'grey pound' film in the cinema and (pre-pandemic) you might find there were no free seats on a Sunday afternoon showing.

'Silver surfers', if you don't mind :-)

Scott.

Rhyd6
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450839

Postby Rhyd6 » October 17th, 2021, 5:44 pm

Well, apart from the fact that it's half a days camel ride to get to the cinema the last time we attended a viewing we came out to find that some scrote had enjoyed himself scratching pretty patterns in the paintwork of our car and thought it amusing to stick a potato up the exhaust. Since then we've not been near a cinema and have discovered the delights of viewing at home, admitedly on as large a screen as we could fit into our snug. Any loss of "experience" is more than compensated by the fact we can enjoy a decent bottle of wine whilst we view.
What's not to like.

R6

PhaseThree

Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450842

Postby PhaseThree » October 17th, 2021, 5:58 pm

kempiejon wrote:Wasn't it Stephen Fry who said "What's the point of Sasinbury's? To keep the scum out of Waitrose."


No it wasn't :D

It was the late, great Alan Coren on the News Quiz.
"The only purpose of Sainsbury's is to keep the riff-raff out of Waitrose"

AF62
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450843

Postby AF62 » October 17th, 2021, 6:05 pm

Rhyd6 wrote:Well, apart from the fact that it's half a days camel ride to get to the cinema the last time we attended a viewing we came out to find that some scrote had enjoyed himself scratching pretty patterns in the paintwork of our car and thought it amusing to stick a potato up the exhaust.


Not quite sure what the cinema has to do with the behaviour of the undesirables in that area, as it would have happened if you had been at a restaurant, pub, art gallery, etc.


Rhyd6 wrote:Since then we've not been near a cinema and have discovered the delights of viewing at home, admitedly on as large a screen as we could fit into our snug. Any loss of "experience" is more than compensated by the fact we can enjoy a decent bottle of wine whilst we view.
What's not to like.

R6


On an evening viewing I often take along suitable refreshment to enjoy with the film - the cinema staff don't mind what you bring in.

kempiejon
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450845

Postby kempiejon » October 17th, 2021, 6:22 pm

PhaseThree wrote:
kempiejon wrote:Wasn't it Stephen Fry who said "What's the point of Sasinbury's? To keep the scum out of Waitrose."


No it wasn't :D

It was the late, great Alan Coren on the News Quiz.
"The only purpose of Sainsbury's is to keep the riff-raff out of Waitrose"


It was Fry too then - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBpVFwEoXh0 and no attribution to Alan.

bungeejumper
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Re: Cinema vs Home Watching

#450846

Postby bungeejumper » October 17th, 2021, 6:30 pm

AF62 wrote:
Rhyd6 wrote:Well, apart from the fact that it's half a days camel ride to get to the cinema the last time we attended a viewing we came out to find that some scrote had enjoyed himself scratching pretty patterns in the paintwork of our car and thought it amusing to stick a potato up the exhaust.


Not quite sure what the cinema has to do with the behaviour of the undesirables in that area, as it would have happened if you had been at a restaurant, pub, art gallery, etc.

Seems relevant to me. ;) The question being asked was surely "how would you rate the experience?" (Thank you, Amazon.) I could direct you toward some fine little back-street restaurants where you'd be better advised to arrive in somebody else's cab than in your own expensive set of wheels. I think you'd empathise if you were fool enough to try that on a dark night? :)

Besides, we're all human. I once spent a long weekend in Leeds and picked up three quite bad dings on my car over the four days. It might have been just chance, or it might have been that this was an area where people just didn't give a damn. Spoilt my enjoyment of the experience somewhat, though. Illogical, I know, but.....

Thanks, anyway, for the laugh about the "tiny" 65 inch TV screen. Ours is 24 inches - a size that's sold as being suitable for caravans and bathrooms. But then, we watch barely an hour a day, and none of that is drama. There are some of us weirdos out here who prefer it that way. :D

BJ


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