Stop Taking Photos of the Movie Screen During the Movie. No, Seriously, Knock It Off

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I am not old, but I am at an age where I find myself with the blessing of being able to opt out of the culture when it suits my interests. Nobody is shocked that I don’t have TikTok, nobody bats an eye if I say I don’t know the difference between Tate McRae and Addison Rae (this is not me asking, my ignorance is bliss). I am young enough to know what a Labubu is, and old enough to have not felt pressured to buy one, but also, again, young enough to have not felt too stupid when I stumbled across one in the wild and shelled out [REDACTED] dollars for it on a whim. This is all simply to say that I am fine with saying, “It’s not for me.” I am fine with not knowing, with not participating. The kids can have their fun, as far as I’m concerned. Recently, however, I’ve found the exception to the rule.

As you’re probably aware, movie theaters are back. The act of going out to the movies, be it solo or with friends or on dates, has regained some of the cultural currency it lost during the streaming era. It’s no longer the move to just “wait until it’s on Netflix.” Going to the movies—be it an AMC for a new release or a specialty theater for a rep screening—is cool. And as with any activity considered cool, participation in said activity must be documented.

This is good news for movies, but it’s given rise to an infuriating trend: Moviegoers (mostly those who fall in the millennials-or-younger category) taking out their phones in the middle of screenings to snap pictures of the film, in order to post them on their IG stories or their X.com accounts or whatever their platform of choice is. It’s ostensibly a flex—proof that you were there, that you saw F1 in IMAX or 4DX, that you participated in the zeitgeist. The problem is, it runs counter to a decades-old rule: Don’t use your fucking cell phone in the movie theater.

To an extent, I understand the thought process that leads to such affronts to the religion of cinema–it’s like taking photos at a concert. And make no mistake, these days movie theaters are coming to occupy the same cultural space as music venues. Pull up to Vermont Avenue in Los Angeles’s hip neighborhood of Los Feliz any given night and you’re likely to find people waiting in a line around the block to get into the Los Feliz 3, treating a preview of some upcoming A24 joint that’s got the TL buzzing or an American Cinematheque screening like it’s a secret Fontaines D.C. gig. Theaters are places to be, to not just watch a movie but to see and (more crucially) be seen. People get dressed up for this, man. I’ve seen a hustler scalping tickets outside the Vista and leaving with cash in hand.