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Author Topic: Security Guards with Metal Detector Wands? Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 11-15-2003 06:59 AM                        I just ran a sneak of GOTHIKA (WB) and along with the print came the carrier who said he had to remain with the print at all times (poor guy hand no idea our booth is on the fifth floor -- no elevator!). That was a little freaky, but fine, they told me they would do this with an advance screening (it opens Nov 21). And I had no problem with it -- it's just a guy in the booth and it doesn't affect the patrons. What they didn't tell me was that they were also sending in two Security Guards with metal detector wands to frisk my patrons! I was up in the booth when this went down so I was unaware of it or I would have raised hell. Has this happened to anyone else? This is getting way, way out of hand. A good portion of my demographics are senior citizens. I'll be damned if in the future I am going to have some Gestapo-looking guard intimidate them and make them feel like criminals. It ruins the entire mood we try to create in our theatre. We pride ourselves on trying to have the movie-going experience unique and that our theatre has character and class. Making old ladies spread their arms and legs so they can run a search wand over their bodies is absurd. I guarantee it won't happen again. Any thoughts? Frank PS -- BTW, that little amateur piece of anti-piracy propaganda (trailer) never got played in my theatre -- in fact, I am not sure it even got back in the cans. Funny how they made sure that pile o got put in the can but, they forgot the DTS disks! [ 11-15-2003, 03:42 PM: Message edited by: Frank Angel ]  |  IP: Logged Jason Black Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1723 From: Myrtle Beach, SC, USA Registered: Nov 2000 posted 11-15-2003 09:09 AM                        Frank, Yes, that would piss me off royally, but if WB is sending them out, is it a contractual obligation? The customers should voice opinions to the owner(s) who should in turn get back with WB to prevent this type of guilty until proven innocent shit from occuring in the future. It's sad these days. No wonder so many poeple wait 90 days for the DVD release. Wonder why they don't put CRAP CODE on video release? Does Jack think DVD's can't be burned? This whole issue gets me beside myself... I had a discussion with a partron last night regarding the antipiracy trailer... He literally asked me if we though "he" was stealing something. Needless to say, you can guess where my tirade on the MPAA and Jack Valenti went. I did let him know that plans were annouced for his stepping aside.. WOOO HOOOOO..... Jack Valenti stepping off the helm of the MPAA.. now that is BETTER THAN SEX!!! (not really, just wanted to tie in another thread...  |  IP: Logged Greg Mueller Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1687 From: Port Gamble, WA Registered: Jun 99 posted 11-15-2003 09:47 AM                        WTF? Ok I see it all clearly now. There IS a plot to put exhibitors out of business. How could anyone think that this type of demeaning behavior would NOT hurt business? Look what it's done to the airline business. Personally, if I went to a theater and they did that to me I'd tell them to go and never return. OTOH If they caught people going in with knives and/or guns that looked evil, they could make them wait at the door until someone came along that looked good (and had a gun or knife) and have the good guy accompany the bad guy. just kidding  |  IP: Logged Bill Gabel Film God Posts: 3873 From: Technicolor / Postworks NY, USA Registered: Jan 2002 posted 11-15-2003 10:58 AM                     Frank That is old news for me here. We get that treatment from Warner and Fox on pre-release screenings. And the guards sometimes has the night-vision eyeware so they sit in on the screenings.  |  IP: Logged John Carpenter Film Handler Posts: 96 From: Fort Walton Beach, FL, USA Registered: Nov 2002 posted 11-15-2003 11:20 AM                     Universal has sent those bozos out too. Of course they had to "apologize" that they were not able to have any metal detecting wands - that we would never have let them use anyway. These "security guards" that were sent here looked like the security company went downtown and found 4 homeless people and put them in a polo shirt and sent them here. I would only let them stand in the vicinity of the auditorium door and then sit in the film - no searching bags, etc that they said they were to do. Of course reason being that we dont really allow backpacks or large handbags in the theatre in the first place.  |  IP: Logged Robert E. Allen Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1078 From: Checotah, Oklahoma Registered: Jul 2002 posted 11-15-2003 01:17 PM                     OK guys, c'mon. The practice stinks, yes and I wouldn't allow it either. But there's no need to bad-mouth the security officers. They're just doing what they were hired to do. Badmouth the distributor all you want. But the security officers are working stiffs just like you. FYI there's an interesting article on page 23 of this month's Boxoffice. Under "Hill News" it says data is indicating that many of the pirated films out there originate from industry insiders.  |  IP: Logged Alex Rolfe Film Handler Posts: 37 From: Cambridge, MA, USA Registered: Mar 2003 posted 11-15-2003 01:48 PM                        We had "security" at a sneak of New Line's "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" earlier this fall. The courier who delivered the print had to stay with it (though not in the booth) the whole time. We were told by the marketting company that arranged the sneak that New Line's security reps would be wanding everyone, though it turned out that they just watched with their night vision goggles. I did get the indirect impression from the marketting company, which I think deals mostly with sneaks on college campuses) that they'd gotten a lot of negative feedback about the security arrangements.  |  IP: Logged Dennis M Dow Jr Expert Film Handler Posts: 141 From: Bloomfield NJ USA Registered: Oct 2003 posted 11-15-2003 02:51 PM                       As someone who deals with this situation all the time, it is the distributors who want the security guards there. The company does the wanding, night vision and print security.. For the most part they are great people who you can have fun with.. The problem we are all facing is Valenti has all the distributors thinking that all the bootlegs are coming from these screenings hence all the security. Face it until Valenti is gone all this is going to continue and there is not a thing we can do about it  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 11-15-2003 03:24 PM                        Look, I understand that the distribs are concerned about piracy, just like department stores are rightfully concerned about their profits flying out the door because of shoplifting (although as yet I haven't heard that they are producing an anti-shoplifting trailer to play on display screens throughout the store). And I certainly don't have anything against the security guards -- I offered mine some coffee and got him a nice easy chair to watch me -- we even had a lively discussion with him asking lots of questions about the how everything works -- he had never seen carbon arcs and said he never thought there was so much involved running a show (he had only seen platter operation before). In fact, I wouldn't even mind security using night vision equipment in the back of the theatre, but intimidating patrons in any manner is simply crossing, not a line, but a freakin MOAT in my opinion. Besides, it is beyond any rational expectation of having the slightest impact on piracy. The distribution end of the industry seems to have gone insane about this issue....like a idiot-servante going over and over the same irrational actions without rhyme nor reason, unable to focus on anything else, especially now with so much concrete evidence is now surfacing showing that piracy -- the real kind that produces quality bootlegs on a large scale -- that kind of piracy originates in their own house. It almost seems like as that news is surfacing, they are ignoring that known source of piracy in favor of focusing all their energy on blaming exhibition as their enemy, not the enemy within. One the other hand, it was nice having company in the booth the whole show! We transport the cans from the floor to the booth and back again by loading them on a winch cable that drops in front of the followspot window and then to the floor. I jokingly ask him if his instructions to stay with the print at all times meant that he had to ride the cable down with the cans. I said he was lucky they didn't handcuff the cans to his wrists. He thought that was a good one; the guy really had a good sense of humor. Frank  |  IP: Logged Dennis M Dow Jr Expert Film Handler Posts: 141 From: Bloomfield NJ USA Registered: Oct 2003 posted 11-15-2003 03:29 PM                       Frank In all my shows I have never seen anyone intimidated by security. They are usually very curteous to the patrons. I do agree that they have gotten carried away with the over security practices but I have learned to live with it.  |  IP: Logged John Stewart Film Handler Posts: 67 From: Austin, TX, USA Registered: Sep 2001 posted 11-15-2003 03:49 PM                     I don't care that the guards make "nice" with the customers, I still think it sucks to wand patrons that have nothing more than T-shirts and shorts on (it is warm here in Austin) and not even the smallest camcorders could be hid. I don't think the guards really knew what they were looking for. The 2 that came into the booth were not happy until I had wound the film off the shipping reels onto the house reels and into the film safe. Like I could copy a film by simple winding it. Once they left, I locked the doors and didn't even let them back in. I put the cans out for them and left when it was over. This week the same guards didn't even bother to come up the 5 floors to the booth. The governor and Crow arrived at the theater after the film to do Q & A so the security certainly wasn't for them. The film company rep was a pain in the butt too. She got in the governor's face explaining what the schedual was. He told her that his people took care of that not her. His guards wanted to toss her out of the building which would have been alright with everyone else that had to deal with her. She was a royal pain. John  |  IP: Logged Bill Gabel Film God Posts: 3873 From: Technicolor / Postworks NY, USA Registered: Jan 2002 posted 12-10-2003 04:35 PM                     LAPD Captain Busted for Alleged Sale of Pirated Movies A Los Angeles police captain with 28 years at the department was arrested at the Hollywood area station today for allegedly selling pirated & counterfeit DVD movies. >>>OFF SITE LINKS WITHOUT PASTED TEXT DELETED FROM POST PER F.A.Q.<<< Now if only NYPD would get to work on the same matter.  |  IP: Logged Greg Mueller Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1687 From: Port Gamble, WA Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-10-2003 05:07 PM                        I guess I'd have to be making a pot-o-money on the bootleg stuff to risk a 28 year career over it. Amazing  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-11-2003 03:00 AM                        Did it say what the source was of the bootlegged material? Bet the good Capytan wasn't going into theatres with a video camera under his trench coat. Bet he had a someone well connected in the industry possibly in a lab or studio and he was getting some really good source material. Hell, being a police Captain, I bet he had a lot of opportunity to shake down plenty of industry people to get the good transfers. Bet none of this stuff csme from the projection booth or movie-off-the-screen route. When is the MPAA going to get it through their aging skulls where they should be focusing more of their anti-piracy energies?  |  IP: Logged Paul G. Thompson The Weenie Man Posts: 4718 From: Mount Vernon WA USA Registered: Nov 2000 posted 12-11-2003 04:42 AM                     Frank, like I said somewhere before, MPAA blames everyone except themselves. Just like the latest news on Microsoft's new OS that is going to be released a couple of years from now. It is already in the bootleg market overseas. There is only one major place the "leaks" could come from....the employees or executives of the companies themselves. This apples not only to the MPAA or the RIAA. By now, everyone knows it applies to other high and low profile industrial organizations as well as those who have access to the raw unreleased product within our own industry. Many of us who are news junkies read about the corruption being exposed in the higher echelon more and more every day. ...all for the almighty buck that someone could stuff in their pocket. As a spinoff from what Harry Truman said in the late 1930's when he was a senator...."The problem is that the people worship money...." That was over 63 years ago....How true it is today. More so now than ever before. Beware...it will only get worse. The world is going to hell in a hand basket. There are three major moral principles I believe in: 1. Honesty with others as well as myself. 2. The truth will always prevail in the long run. 3. If a person lies, they will lie to justify the lies. Then they forgot what they lied about. That's when they get caught. I would sooner tell the truth even if the truth might hurt. I like to be able to sleep at night because I don't have to spin a lie to justify a lie.  |  IP: Logged

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