I think we should consider whether the American movie theater experience is really the best way to share video entertainment in a communal fashion. One anecdot

I think we should consider whether the American movie theater experience is really the best way to share video entertainment in a communal fashion. One anecdote to consider: Back in 2005 I went to India on business. While there in the city of Hyderabad, a local contractor that I was working with invited me to visit the village where his grandparents lived. We went to the village which was several hours drive from Hyderabad (something like 8 hours or more ... I don't remember exactly). The village was a completely different environment than Hyderabad ... very humid, but green and beautiful. And very few people spoke English there (which is relevant as you'll see). In that village there was a kind of communal video hall run by a local entrepreneur. He basically had computer projector (I think it was 720p resolution ... nothing fancy) connected to a computer and a rudimentary PA system. Starting at around 6pm or so, after people in the village had had their supper, he would start showing films. It was whatever he felt like showing or whatever people paid him to play. My host was kind of a big man in the village, since he was from the city, and much more well to do. He was shown a lot of deference. My host asked the theater owner to play a movie that I would enjoy ... and the theater owner decided to play Rambo. It was very clear that everyone in the village had seen the movie before ... probably many times before. People talked with each other during the film. Some of the men were smoking (which I wasn't a fan of). And it was hot and humid. But god damn if it wasn't the best action movie screening of my life. Everyone was commenting and cheering for Stallone ... and nobody knew what the hell Stallone was saying directly ... but there was kind of a really bad audio running in Telugu on top of the English audio ... which I can only assume was a local translation recorded over the original audio. At one point Stallone has a bow and arrow and shoots a guy with a grenade tip ... and the guy explodes. Not something I'd want my kid to see ... but there were kids from 5 to 15 cheering and hollering like he'd scored a goal in a tournament or something. Really an enjoyable experience. Maybe we just need smaller, nearer, more locally tailored theaters.