I WENT to see Wonder Woman at the cinema, because where else would I see her?
I settled in my seat with about £12 worth of fizzy pop, ie a medium-sized cup, and realised that by the time I was let out of the auditorium, following half an hour of adverts and trailers and a two-and-a-half-hour film, that I would regret this purchase for more than financial reasons.
As a result, I can tell you that Wonder Woman is an excellent film, and I would highly recommend it to people who like excellent films. It is a far better DC Comics film than the dismal Batman V Superman and Suicide Squad.
In fact, it was so good that it was worth having to listen to Ooh The Trailers Man.
If you do not go to the cinema very often – for example, if you are a person who still calls it “going to the pictures” and doesn’t think that Pearl & Dean are a jungle/drum & bass duo – then you will not know about Ooh The Trailers Man.
Ooh The Trailers Man is the most irritating innovation in cinema-going since they started making 3D versions of films and glasses that you have to wear over your actual glasses.
His voice pops up first before the adverts, when he tells the audience to shut up and be quiet and turn their phones off. Now I am 100% behind his message here.There is a difference between paying out half your monthly mortgage to appreciate a film properly and watching it in your living room with people who keep asking you what’s happening now and what he was in with thingy from that other one.
But he cannot just tell people to shut up and be quiet because that is not how we do things these days. Oh, no, Ooh The Trailers Man has to pretend to be your “mate”, like a trendy vicar.
And so he says things like, “Come on, now, let’s switch our phones off and finish our conversations. Yes, that’s right, I mean you in the middle row. You cheeky monkey. Come on, a joke’s a joke.”
And then, when the trailers are about to start, he says, “Ooh, the trailers” – hence his name – “This is the best bit. And they’re all suitable for this film’s certificate,” which is the point at which my rage reaches peak levels.
Firstly, who is really expecting a trailer for The Exorcist or Emmanuelle VIII: Women In Their Pants at a 12A certificate film? You don’t need to tell us things that we expect anyway. You don’t get Cadbury saying, “We’re proud to say that we don’t put cyanide or broken glass in Dairy Milk.”
Secondly, the contention that trailers are “the best bit”. What on earth is he talking about? Surely the best bit when you go to the cinema is the film. If a trailer for the latest Transformers rubbish is better than the film, I want my money back.
But thirdly, why on earth are you saying, “Ooh, the trailers?!” You are not in the cinema with me, Ooh The Trailers Man. I know that because I would hunt you down and empty £9-worth of brown fizzy beverage over your head. Don’t pretend to be excited about it, Ooh The Trailers Man. I know how recordings work, I used to have a hi-fi.
This matey nonsense is everywhere now. I only pick on Ooh The Trailers Man because you cannot avoid his bumptious rubbish if you go to the cinema. But usually it is written on the side of boxes or bottles or on building society leaflets.
I blame Innocent Smoothies. They are the ones who started this with their twee “1/2 of a lovely banana” in their list of ingredients. And then Dorset Cereals got in on the act. And now every brand out there wants to be your friend. Before too long, BAE Systems will be etching flowers and “Mmm, love a good bomb” on the side of their missiles.
Enough is enough, as the politicians say when even a bit is too much. We don’t buy products because we want to be their friends. I don’t want to go on a stag night with a jar of marmalade, I just want to know what’s in it before I spread it on my toast.
Gary Bainbridge 