I’m Afraid the TCM Film Festival Has Ruined Me for Moviegoing

Since January, I’ve been a contractor with TCM, specifically, the TCM Classic Film Festival (TCMFF), which takes place over four days in late spring in Hollywood. I’ve been a very small part of an impressive organization, where hundreds of people work their butts off to make an incredible film festival. My job was primarily doing editorial work for the website and app, but once I went out to Los Angeles this past week, my task was working at Will Call and the Info Desk. In between those shifts, I was able to see movies, provided there were any remaining seats available.

As you can imagine, I’m a movie theater snob. Working as a professional critic for the past twenty years, I’m already in a bubble by seeing movies early, for free, and with security to ensure that no one is using their phones during the film (although this last point is, unfortunately, rarely enforced despite the big threats made before the movie starts). Even here, in these promo/press settings, there’s rarely a strong emphasis on excellent presentation. Some guy from concessions runs up to the projector, presses a button, and then runs back down. It used to be worse because projection ran off bulbs that were almost always too dim, but laser projection has thankfully fixed this issue. Still, there was no screen masking (raising/closing curtains to match the aspect ratio of the movie so you don’t see the black bars like you would watching a movie at home), and modern audiences are, let’s say, “eclectic.” That’s the nicest way I can put that.

Watching a movie at TCMFF, the experience is placed at a premium, and given the price of the passes, that’s understandable. The organizers never take their audience for granted for a moment, and it’s not only finding terrific film prints, creating an outstanding lineup, or emphasizing that people should turn off their phones. When I went to see Blonde Venus on the first night and the curtains masked the screen, it was something I hadn’t seen outside my trips to Plaza Theatre, and certainly never in any multiplex in recent memory. It felt like every detail had been checked to make for a pristine experience, from the print to the presentation to the thoughtful conversation before the film between TCM host Jacqueline Stewart and Nicholas Josef von Sternberg, son of director Josef von Sternberg. 

But something that is somewhat outside the control of organizers is the audience. Of course, there’s security, and you can’t be a ding-dong at screenings, but that wasn’t even an issue at every movie I went to. Increasingly, it feels like casual audiences don’t know how to interact with anything outside of pop culture. If it’s “old,” it’s met with uncomfortable laughter. Last spring, my wife and I went to see Kenny Leon’s production of Othello with Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal. Not a cheap ticket and not exactly starring a couple of slouches, and people were still laughing at weird moments! That’s not to say that the TCM audience is a joyless bunch, but they engage with the movie on its level. They understood the campier moments in Blonde Venus and Cobra Woman, but didn’t mentally check out at anything played earnestly. No one in those rooms thinks they're above the movies; they're there because they love movies.

Obviously, I’m a bit biased. I’ve been a TCM fan for as long as it’s been on the air; I loved being a full-time employee there from 2022-2023; I loved getting to work on the festival this year; and I love getting to contribute articles to TCM.com. But even if I had just been a regular attendee, I would have been wowed by the amount of care and attention. I’ve been to major festivals like Sundance and TIFF, and they’re good, but even there, you get industry people who are checking their phones, looking to make a deal, and you’re rolling the dice on whether a new movie will be any good or not. TCMFF is “Oops, all bangers,” and as I would tell people at the info desk, it would be difficult to go wrong with any selection they made at any time slot.

I know I’ll go back to the real world where I go see Mortal Kombat II this weekend, and there will be 25-30 minutes of trailers followed by multiple bumpers and Nicole Kidman assuring the audience that AMC makes movies better (provided you pay for their A-list or premiere subscription). And hey, that’s what the market will bear, I guess, as a major corporation, like so many companies, diminishes the experience to maximize profits. But it was nice to see, even for only a few days, an ideal moviegoing experience.