{"id":595363,"date":"2026-04-20T10:35:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T10:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/595363\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T10:35:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T10:35:16","slug":"a-movie-lover-argues-alamo-drafthouse-blew-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/595363\/","title":{"rendered":"A Movie Lover Argues Alamo Drafthouse Blew It"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n Alamo Drafthouse built its reputation on being the place that would toss you for touching your phone during a movie. David Ehrlich argues in IndieWire<\/a> that in 2026, it’s now requiring you to pull that phone out nonstop. In an excerpt from his “In Review” newsletter, the site’s chief film critic describes how the once-beloved chain, now owned by Sony after a pandemic bankruptcy and rounds of layoffs and labor fights, has replaced its paper menus and call buttons with an app and QR-code ordering system that guests are expected to use throughout the show. The result, he writes, is a business model that undercuts the very “no phones” ethos that made Alamo distinctive. \n <\/p>\n


\n Ehrlich details a chaotic outing to a Brooklyn location for a kids’ matinee\u2014spotty WiFi, confusing digital menus, families huddled around glowing screens, and a neighboring patron yelling about missing fries\u2014as evidence that the system increases on-screen distraction while also making workers’ jobs more stressful. “Alamo pledges that their ‘team is trained to distinguish between a dark ordering screen and disruptive phone use,’ as if that skillset requires years of studying the mystic arts in a Tibetan monastery, but it’s perverse to ask increasingly job-insecure employees to enforce a code of conduct that has no chance of being observed.” He contends the shift turns Alamo from “sacred space” into just another theater, and could hasten its decline as rivals like Nitehawk capitalize on staying phone-free. Read the full essay<\/a>. \n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Alamo Drafthouse built its reputation on being the place that would toss you for touching your phone…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595364,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[101877,30360,56913,13731,74],"class_list":{"0":"post-595363","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-alamo-drafthouse","9":"tag-bankruptcy","10":"tag-servers","11":"tag-sony-pictures","12":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}