Theo Ogden

Are movie theaters dead, or is the big screen irreplaceable?

The sound is physically painful and nobody admits it. Modern mixes regularly push past 85 decibels for action scenes, which is the level where hearing damage starts with sustained exposure. I leave blockbusters with ringing ears and a headache, which is a strange price to pay for entertainment. At home the remote has a volume button. Theaters decided that 'immersive' means 'assaultive,' and a whole segment of the audience, older viewers especially, quietly opted out rather than complain. Comfort won. It always wins.

Are movie theaters dead, or is the big screen irreplaceable?

Drive-ins were once the future too. At their peak in the late fifties there were over four thousand drive-in theaters in America, and people swore the format was permanent because it was cheap, social, and fun. Today fewer than three hundred survive. Formats don't die because people stop liking the underlying thing. They die because the delivery mechanism stops fitting how people live. The multiplex had a great fifty-year run. Clinging to it now is like insisting the shopping mall just needs better stores. Sometimes the building is the problem.

I get the distrust, I really do. But the drinking age story kind of cuts the other way. States took the deal voluntarily because the money was worth more than the principle. Nobody's coverage got held hostage in that story. And private insurers already ration care every day by denying claims. They just do it for profit instead of politics.

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