There are some things in life that we can agree are universally bad-- Tuberculosis, the Spice Girls' solo careers, and the first row of movie theaters. The latter violates the 8th Amendment's protection against cruel and unusual punishment, which was added to the Bill of Rights after protest from parents who were forced to sit through "Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2." But today, I'll explain why the first row of movie theaters exists, defying common sense and substituting my own reasoning. Par for the course.
Ever since teachers allowed students to pick their seating, a stigma against the front row developed, and it's one that's pervasive throughout cinemas. Generally, moviegoers avoid the front row like it's an unathletic 5th grader during kickball at recess, and for good reason, too. Watching a movie from the front row requires bending both the laws of physics and your neck, the latter to a more extreme degree.
The rational existence of the front row is that movie theaters want to make money. However, they do this already by selling food at prices that make college tuition look cheap. Of course, the two are related: the amount of food purchased correlates with ticket sales, but in general, people buy tickets for the movie hoping they won't have to sit in the front row.
This worked, traditionally, as you went to popular movies with suspense, knowing that good seats were never guaranteed unless you arrived three weeks early like a premature baby. If you arrived at a reasonable hour and asked the attendant about the seating arrangements, they would say, "There are still some seats available, and I'm sure they aren't in the front row."
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Wrong. Those seats were always in the front row, and if the movie theater employee told you that the seats weren't, they were about as truthful as you are when you tell the dentist that you'll definitely floss every night for more than one week after that dentist appointment.
And unfortunately, many movie theaters now offer the option to pick your seating beforehand, thus removing the element of suspense and making going to the movies like finding out which way you're going to die: "Oh, please, choose from these two seats at the edge of the first row, which you could obviously see even if you weren't a giraffe."
But then I realized something: There's always a front row of a movie theater, as there is in life. The front row exists for rationalization, for relative comparisons. While sitting through "Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2" (in the back row), Albert Einstein thought, "Well, this could be worse. I could be in the front row" (thus, the theory of relativity was born). He was trying to rationalize going to see such a terrible movie, and he did so by reminding himself that things could be worse.
Therefore, the front row serves a vital purpose in society, providing a silver lining, a reminder that we don't live in the Great Depression (unless you're from Florida).Things could be much worse. Now, go out and haggle for a discount on a front row movie ticket. You can use the money you save to offset the requisite chiropractor bills.
