What a nightmare for all involved.  I cringe sympathetically.

right. ok. got it.  I miss a lot sometimes.

We did not stay long enough to find out if he did the Q and A, but I imagine he was embarrassed by the whole event.  I hope Zinema figures out the problem they are having.  It is such a great place to see movies.  MEL1110/Mary

By the way, if anyone is interested, check out my movie blog:  http://maryslist.blogspot.com/

just wanted to add that patrick coyle did indeed stick around to apologize for the mishap and chatted up the audience for some time.

i made the mistake of agreeing to run dvd which is not an acceptable exhibition format. it's made for your teevee. i won't be making that mistake again in the future. again, my apologies.

OK, I've tried to let this go but its been really bugging me.  I love having the Zinema in town, and I will continue to support it.  I think you've done a great job programming, but you can't treat the audience like assholes and have us keep up the enthusiasm.  Stuff breaks, shit happens, no big deal, but I would have appreciated an announcement - at least after the credits ran (the first time), something like "hey guys, sorry about the issues here, we're just going to keep trying, if you don't feel like sitting through it get a refund at the front desk or just come back and watch for free some time this week."  I sat through an hour of technical difficulties and realized I wasn't being patient, just a chump.  

I would disagree that DVD is not an acceptable exhibition format — sure it's not film, and it's the director's fault for not giving you a good copy, but the HD projector looked great, and if you had just checked the disc before the show you would have caught the problem (ditto for the issues with the cinema lounge). 

Making an apology two days later 10 comments down in a blog post rather than to the people who were really trying to watch the film is obnoxious. 

Thanks for hearing me out, and again, I like what you've done with the place.

Dave --

Whoa man... I'm hesitant to add fuel to this fire but I'm kind of confused as to how 64 people in one auditorium could have had such diverse experiences.  Explanations -- and intense apologies -- were made both immediately and repeatedly.  Refunds and passes were distributed.  

And, Dave, here's the thing: did you notice on the schedule that the same  film played in the same theater on Friday with nary a complaint?  As anyone who owns this technology (i.e. everyone I know) can vouch for, DVDs are fickle as all get-out.  If the Zinema was making an exception by screening a DVD for this, and let's not forget this was an effort to focus on local filmmaking, requiring some concessions on the Zinema's part in the formats they'd be willing to screen, I'm sure they won't be doing it again.  

Or if they do, I sure hope to shit you're in the room and paying attention so you don't make another gross misstatement in a public forum.

Burn, baby, burn.

I'm glad folks love the Zinema.  

Mel, perhaps there was some extra confusion in the audience that the staff was not aware of so for you, and for anyone else who's following this, I present a play by play of the evening's events in Screening Room 2.  Maybe I should have been posting these developments live via Twitter.

7:45 screening began (ran late due to Cinema Lounge running over)
7:47 employees noticed skipping and monitored to determine whether it was a one time glitch
7:50 film is stopped and cinema director makes an announcement through port window regarding difficulties, indicates that director is running across street to get another copy and that the film will resume imminently
8:00 director returns with disc and makes announcement apologizing to audience personally
8:04 disc appears to hesitate for 10 seconds or so in same place as previous disc but moves forward so, with no other alternative, Zinema decides to let screening continue.  Two people opted to leave.
9:15 disc jumps to credits, Zinema staff tries to fix problem from within booth (presuming the audience knows by this time that there are issues with the screening -- from the beginning -- that need no more explanation)
9:20 with no further success cinema director makes a last announcement, apologizing and offering refunds.  One patron piped up that she didn't want a refund, just wanted to kno whow the movie ended.  Cinema director responded by bringing film director Patrick Coyle in for an explanation.

Still wanna argue that DVD is an acceptable exhibition format?

DVD is not really a suitable format for theatrical screenings.  While the quality is passable at best, the real issues lie in the reliability.  It is too bad that it seems like a possible problem became a reality with a bad batch of disks, but it also sounds like the zinema did the best they could with what they had.  I went to see the movie tonight and there were no problems, so whatever it was, they seem to have things fixed now.  I thought it was a great movie and I really hope that anyone who had planned on going to see it wont let the unfortunate events on Saturday stop them. It's so nice to see something good that was made in our own back yard.

Hey, I ordered a cheeseburger!