All By Myself

Happy New Year! Hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Years! Welcome to Collision Films first blog post of 2015. After spending a lot of time with people over the festive period, I thought this would be a fitting topic to discuss: All By Myself (at the cinema).

Cinema trips are generally seen as an opportunity to socialise with your friends or family, to attend a film screening with a group of people. If you mentioned to the general public about the concept of going to the cinema alone, you may get some strange looks.

However, I am here to tell you that some people go to the cinema alone because I am one of them. It’s not something I do all the time, however on some occasions I have decided to go to see a film by myself.

This is not to say I don’t enjoy going to the cinema with people, because if you do go with people you share the experience with them and you can discuss the film together. Yet there are pros to going on a solo cinema trip.

Naturally I am a deep thinker, and this applies to when I analyse films and try to comprehend what has just appeared on the screen. So when the film ends I usually sit through the full credits to let the film digest, so I can come up with a general opinion of the film.

It’s the last thing that you want to hear when the film ends and two seconds after the screen has turned black, someone asks, “What did you think?” or “It was so good/bad!” and I sit there thinking how they haven’t even give the film time to settle in. How can you know if a film is really good or bad if you haven’t considered the reasons why?

“There are those who consider this sad, and use words like ‘lonely’ or ‘weird’ to describe heading to the pictures by yourself, but those people are wrong.”¹ I loved reading this in the Summer 2013 TOTAL FILM issue by Alex Zane. Someone finally understood my cinema habits and didn’t judge them.

Alex Zane explains how he is truly happy by going alone to the cinema, a statement I can agree with. People often ask me if a film is spoilt because I love analysing films, the answer is no. For me that is why I love films, to go deeper than just saying a film is good or bad. Films allow you to experience so many different things, and to try and relate to characters and place yourself in their story.

I loved it this time last year, I was living in halls for my last year at university and I took more solo trips to the cinema, especially during the film awards season. After work I would go to the Tyneside cinema and do my “research” in time for the Oscars. If there’s one place I would recommend, it would be the Tyneside Cinema. I’m not a cinema snob, but there seems to be more acceptance of going solo to the cinema there then Odeon or Empire cinemas. There is a true love for film at the Tyneside Cinema.

This may sound slightly out of norms, but sometimes I enjoy looking around at people (if the cinema is busy) and see what type of people are there. So many people from different walks of life can be brought together by film, what is it about the film that does this? Are people just there to pass time? Are there any other film fanatics out there? I guess I’ll never truly know. Don’t worry though, I don’t give people intense stares, just glances around the room.

There is a stigma around the concept of going to the cinema alone, that it’s not socially acceptable. Whilst I love seeing a film with people, another side of me loves the solace of viewing a film alone. To be given the time and space to form your own opinion and then to share it with people. It’s not like I see every film by myself, but if there’s a film out I want to see but no one else does, I have no problem seeing it solo. Expect me to be at the Tyneside Cinema a lot over the next month doing my “research” for the 2015 film awards season.

Would you go the cinema by yourself? Feel free to comment and share your thoughts!

1Alex Zane. TOTAL FILM Summer 2013. Page 34.