Worthy of Mr Lynch

I went to a very large cinema last night. There was a massive queue for a rare screening of a lost film, which had been shrouded in mystery at the time of shooting - its young star dead in a prescription drugs overdose, its director retired after completion, most copies burned in a seemingly accidental fire. I queued for over an hour to get to the box office, where I was supposed to pick up the tickets I had bought months ago. When I finally got through to the desk, a blonde in black typed something into the computer and said: "I'm really sorry, but it looks like your booking didn't go through and now the screening is sold out. Next?" I couldn't believe my ears. I showed her the print-out of my booking receipt. She looked at the paper. Looked at me. Looked at the paper. Looked at me. Said, "We weren't expecting you today. Please follow me." We went into a small back office with dirty Venetian blinds on the glass-paneled door. She closed the door behind me, browsed into a large foolscap folder and said: "Here are your tickets. Don't tell anybody". I walked into the theatre,surrounded by thousands of seats, most of them taken, some empty. No way could I find the people I was supposed to meet in this crowd. I found my seat and sat down. The heavy, red velvet curtains covering the screen opened to reveal a black wall, as the projection screen was flown in from above. All the seats were filled by the time the film started. The people in front of me hushed and shusshed a little, but some groups of people I couldn't identify in the vast auditorium kept muttering and giggling. The film started but the chatting and laughing which underscored the soundtrack soon began to drown out the dialogue and the music on screen. I felt isolated and furious: nobody was complaining about this! I raised my voice above the incessant cackling of this bunch of philistines and found myself screaming: "Shut up! Don't you know where you are? Don't you see what this means? Shut up! Silence!"

I woke up with a startle, heart racing and short of breath.


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