It's all gone quiet at the back

I go to the cinema on my own, during the day, when a film has been showing for a long time. I sit at the back. That way I minimise the risk of encountering rustling, slurping, and theatrical whisperings that generally include “Who’s that, again?” when it isn’t George Clooney; “What’s happened?” from the hefty woman just back with yet more popcorn; and “This is crap” when there hasn’t been an explosion for a while or subtitles appear.

Why come to the cinema if you can’t concentrate for longer than an episode of Big Brother? And since a lot of people can’t, why not have bouncers to throw them out? You go to the pub, you’re supposed to behave yourself. If you don’t, you’re out. Why not in a cinema? You could hire big librarians to do the job.

But I made a bit of a mistake the other day and went to see Avatar when it first came out. Sure enough, a group of kids armed to the teeth with large bags of popcorn (not buckets, but bags. They buy from Sainsbury's because it's cheaper, I suppose) plonked themselves down in the aisle in front of me talking loudly. Steady on, I told myself. They’re just excited and it’s only the adverts.

Steady on, I told myself a few minutes later. They’re really excited and hey - it’s only the trailers.

This is ridiculous, I told myself a few minutes after that. They might be excited, but the bloody film has started now. How can a bag of popcorn make so much noise? I though popcorn came in rustle-free buckets, anyway. I start tensing up. I look around, but nobody else seems to even notice. I’m sweating a little bit. I reach into my pocket and furiously pull out the last of my jellybeans – which have been emptied from their packet to avoid crinkling. I munch away trying to concentrate on the film but it’s no good, even if I have developed a strange attraction to Neytiri.

What am I going to do? Let’s face it, nobody else is going to say anything. Loud people have no shame. You ask them to keep it down, they’ll have a go at you and everyone will turn and look and you’ll be embarrassed.

Worse, they might call their psycho elder brothers who’ll then be waiting to shut you up after the show. And the real cheek of it is they won’t leave to make the call, even though you’re supposed to switch your mobile phone off before the show.

Perhaps I’ll outshame them. They won’t expect that. They can have a go at decent people, but what if I pretend I’m a complete nutcase? I could launch a volley of abuse that shows I just don’t care, maaaan, and shock them out of their greasy spotty skins. I could even pour water over them from the bottle I bought from the shop next door for one third of the price the cinema sells it for.

These 3D glasses make me feel a bit of a plonker though, especially since they are balance on the end of my nose on top of my normal glasses.

(By the way, you can’t use the glasses they give you for 3D films as sunglasses. I wonder how many people have felt disappointed by that.)

OK, I can go out and ask one of the staff to do the job for me. But they’ll know it was me and it would make me look like a snitch. As soon as the member of staff leaves, they’ll turn around and tease me. But that’s all. Does snitching deserve a good beating from the insane older brother? Nope.

But deep down, despite my fury, I know I’m not going to say anything though. If I do, they’ll just giggle and carry on and that would make me look pathetic.

So I don’t say anything and just mutter. And the person behind tells ME to keep quiet. And do you know what? I do.