If you’ve been to movie theaters much in the post-quarantine years, you’ve surely seen a certain kind of pre-show message where a stars appears on screen to thank the audience for seeing their film the way they wanted it to be seen: on the big screen. (The funniest case for me was when a pre-recorded Margot Robbie thanked me for seeing her new film Babylon with an audience in a crowded theater.
There were three other people there.) The new action-comedy The Fall Guy opens with one of those bumpers, with star Ryan Gosling and director David Leitch bantering about how they had you — yes you — in mind when they made the movie, and that they hope you enjoy it.
It’s cute, it’s earnest, and it’s meant to get you excited about the blockbuster you’re about to see. Except Gosling undermines the whole theatergoing experience by telling audiences that if they really need to use their phones during the movie, it’s fine — they should just try to sort of shield them in their jackets while texting or posting.
No! No!!! Gosling is ceding ground in one of the great battles of our time: the war over movie-theater etiquette. Appeasement doesn’t work when you’re dealing with monsters!
We cannot give the using-phones-in-theaters class an inch, or they will take a mile and bathe all of us in their horrid, disruptive, distracting glow!