Week 24: Code of Conduct

 

The Code of Conduct was drawn up by my favourite film show ten years ago as an amusing riposte to anti-social cinema behaviour. Here's how Jude, Kit and their friend Mari did when they went to the picturehouse together.

1.     No eating of anything harder than a soft roll.

Kit ate an apple. The loudest fruit. Whole. Including the pips.

2.     No slurping of drinks.

As part of the ticket, the cinema provided a complimentary babycino with necessary drinking accoutrement. The dissonant chorus of toddlers sucking could be heard in space.

3.     No rustling of super high density, rustle-o-matic, extra rustle bags.

Children independently ate crisps, which is akin to a Teddy Picker at the arcade where you only collect one after a hundred attempts.

4.     No mobile phone usage.

Parents did their online shopping, applied for nurseries, checked Kylie Jenner’s Insta, re-wrote their wills. Essentially, all of life’s admin they don’t get to when they’re looking after children.

5.     No kicking of seats

Kit, Mari and Jude were on the front row so only the air received a good kicking. Behind them, however, were children that had confused themselves for table football players and the chairs in front of them for a ball.

6.     No talking

When Kit saw an airplane on the screen, he shouted out, “I’ve been on a plane. I’ve been to Australia.” The other kids must have hated him, wondering why they’ve only been as far as The Alps on a skiing holiday.

7.     No arriving late

Kit, Mari and Jude were a little restless so they left the film in the middle for a stretch. They returned having missed twenty minutes of the movie. If a typical narrative structure is exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, denouement; then, the children have no idea what the climatic moment of Bee Movie is.

8.     No irresponsible parenting

(See all of the above)

9.     No shoe removal.

Mari dropped her shoe and Kit picked it up for her. So at least that’s something.

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