This weeks date night found us venturing to the cinema.
After a lazy day by the St Regis pool and an afternoon of '24' (how good is the beginning of Season 5, by the way?!), we jumped in a cab to the Villagio Mall.
It wouldn't be date night without a spot of dinner, so our first port of call was to decide where to go for food. I left the decision making with Matt, and we found ourselves at TGI Friday's.
It's been a while since I've been to TGI Friday's, and to be honest I don't think either of us would hurry back - the food was pretty average and it took forever to pay the bill - not ideal, although I can't fault my Oreo milkshake which disappeared fairly quickly!
Disappointed, we popped next door to Krispy Kreme and bought a pot of 'glazed holes' - basically the middles of the glazed doughnuts - to take in to the cinema with us for desert.
With an hour or so before our film started, we had a look around the shops and bought a few bits before heading to the IMAX for our screening.
We purchased our tickets for 'Interstellar' and made our way inside. Jemma had seen this a few weeks ago and recommended it, and I had heard good things from a few colleagues who had also been to see it, so I was looking forward to what was in store for us.
Thank goodness we were on time, our theatre was absolutely packed.
Going to the cinema in Doha is an entirely different experience to going to the cinema back home in the UK.
For starters, nobody seems to arrive on time for the start of the movie. We were the first to arrive, followed by another couple ten minutes later, and then everybody else came in waves throughout the first half an hour/forty five minutes of the film.
You know those annoying teenagers who chat loudly throughout the film, and mess about with their phones with the volume on loud? That is what the adults in Doha do when they go to the cinema. People take calls, play games on their phones with full volume, chat loudly amongst themselves, and generally do everything except watch the film.
Allocated seating also seems to be a challenge for some - the same group of guys moved seats about four times during the film as they couldn't work out where they were supposed to be, and people kept moving them from their seats as they were sat in the wrong place.
All very distracting when you are trying to watch Matthew McConaughey attempt to save the planet.
This was my second cinema experience in Doha, and both times I've been on a Monday night, which I would highly recommend over attempting a movie on a Thursday, Friday or Saturday night. There were only about 20 people in the cinema, and they were a nightmare enough as it was, without having to deal with a packed theatre full of people with absolutely no cinema etiquette.
If you can overlook the distractions, going to the cinema in Doha makes a nice change from an evening in a bar or restaurant. It's almost a little slice of normality, made even better by those excellent Krispy Kreme glazed holes!
If you haven't already seen 'Interstellar', I would recommend giving it a watch, although it's not a film I'd be in a hurry to see again. Set in a dystopian future, where the only food supply left is corn, and dust storms threaten the existence of human life, Matthew McConaughey jets off on a space mission to find an alternative planet for humans to inhabit, leaving his young children behind. The special effects are very good, but anything to do with space, quite frankly blows my mind and makes me feel a little bit uneasy! 'Interstellar' is directed by Christopher Nolan, and stars Michael Caine, Anne Hathaway and Matt Damon among others.
If you've seen it, what did you think?
Also if you are a Doha dweller, I'd love to hear about your Doha cinema experiences!
After a lazy day by the St Regis pool and an afternoon of '24' (how good is the beginning of Season 5, by the way?!), we jumped in a cab to the Villagio Mall.
It wouldn't be date night without a spot of dinner, so our first port of call was to decide where to go for food. I left the decision making with Matt, and we found ourselves at TGI Friday's.
It's been a while since I've been to TGI Friday's, and to be honest I don't think either of us would hurry back - the food was pretty average and it took forever to pay the bill - not ideal, although I can't fault my Oreo milkshake which disappeared fairly quickly!
Disappointed, we popped next door to Krispy Kreme and bought a pot of 'glazed holes' - basically the middles of the glazed doughnuts - to take in to the cinema with us for desert.
With an hour or so before our film started, we had a look around the shops and bought a few bits before heading to the IMAX for our screening.
We purchased our tickets for 'Interstellar' and made our way inside. Jemma had seen this a few weeks ago and recommended it, and I had heard good things from a few colleagues who had also been to see it, so I was looking forward to what was in store for us.
Thank goodness we were on time, our theatre was absolutely packed.
Going to the cinema in Doha is an entirely different experience to going to the cinema back home in the UK.
For starters, nobody seems to arrive on time for the start of the movie. We were the first to arrive, followed by another couple ten minutes later, and then everybody else came in waves throughout the first half an hour/forty five minutes of the film.
You know those annoying teenagers who chat loudly throughout the film, and mess about with their phones with the volume on loud? That is what the adults in Doha do when they go to the cinema. People take calls, play games on their phones with full volume, chat loudly amongst themselves, and generally do everything except watch the film.
Allocated seating also seems to be a challenge for some - the same group of guys moved seats about four times during the film as they couldn't work out where they were supposed to be, and people kept moving them from their seats as they were sat in the wrong place.
All very distracting when you are trying to watch Matthew McConaughey attempt to save the planet.
This was my second cinema experience in Doha, and both times I've been on a Monday night, which I would highly recommend over attempting a movie on a Thursday, Friday or Saturday night. There were only about 20 people in the cinema, and they were a nightmare enough as it was, without having to deal with a packed theatre full of people with absolutely no cinema etiquette.
If you can overlook the distractions, going to the cinema in Doha makes a nice change from an evening in a bar or restaurant. It's almost a little slice of normality, made even better by those excellent Krispy Kreme glazed holes!
If you haven't already seen 'Interstellar', I would recommend giving it a watch, although it's not a film I'd be in a hurry to see again. Set in a dystopian future, where the only food supply left is corn, and dust storms threaten the existence of human life, Matthew McConaughey jets off on a space mission to find an alternative planet for humans to inhabit, leaving his young children behind. The special effects are very good, but anything to do with space, quite frankly blows my mind and makes me feel a little bit uneasy! 'Interstellar' is directed by Christopher Nolan, and stars Michael Caine, Anne Hathaway and Matt Damon among others.
If you've seen it, what did you think?
Also if you are a Doha dweller, I'd love to hear about your Doha cinema experiences!
No comments:
Post a Comment