Going to the cinema to watch a movie is one of my favorite things to experience. I like going with my wife and kids or with friends, but I’m also okay with just going to see a movie by myself. In some cases I’ve even been the only person in the theater—and honestly, that's a pretty neat way to watch a movie.
The things I like about going to the cinema are the big screen, the incredible sound system, the snacks, and—in most cases—being able to pre-purchase assigned seats ahead of time. Adding reclining seats that spread you further away from folks not in your party is always a plus, too.
I’ve gone to the cinema when I have a random day off from work, with the family when new movies come out, and I’ve even gone while on vacation. On a recent trip to Japan I found myself watching a movie by myself and I had such a unique experience I wanted to capture it here to hang on to the memory of it.
Getting Tickets
We were on one of the last nights of our vacation in Osaka and by this point in the trip we had done the majority of the things we planned on doing. We spent the days walking around shrines, riding the trains, shopping, and eating, so by the evening time we were ready to relax and wind the kids down and get them to sleep.
On this one particular night we didn’t have much going on and I thought about two things on my Japan bucket list: live music and movies. Catching a band in Japan is still something I want to do someday, but I was tired enough from the day of walking around that the idea of just sitting and watching a movie seemed like the better option of the two.
My wife agreed to get the kids down so I could head out after dinner. In the mean time I did some research.
I found that Japanese moviegoers had been reserving their seats in the theater for a long time and that it was pretty commonplace in lots of parts of Asia. It was a relief in that I already knew how that all worked so I found the website for the cinema nearest to the hotel we were staying at and looked at their seat reservation system.
Like a lot of things in Japan, it was all in Japanese, so I was at the mercy of Safari’s on-page translation feature. It worked well enough that from the context I could make my way to find the movie I wanted to watch, pick my seat in the theater, and get to the payment screen.
I had run into an issue when trying to fill out my credit card information, and while I don’t remember the exact problem, I believe it came down to needing to be a resident of Japan or some sort of issue using Latin characters in one field. Either way, I decided not to continue buying the tickets through that site.
Luckily the cinema was a 5 minute walk from the hotel, so on our way to dinner we stopped by the cinema to purchase my ticket ahead of time. The cinema was already bustling when we got there. Right near the entrance and off to the left was a row of ticket vending machines that take you through the same experience you’d have on the website. Luckily every button had English labels so I was able to follow along to get the seat I wanted for the movie I wanted. The only thing that was different from the website experience was the payment portion where you could use Japanese Yen or a credit card and you didn't need to fill out any personal information.
The machines where you purchase tickets reminded me of some of the machines around Japan that you use to order food at restaurants.
When picking which movie you wanted to watch, some movies were listed twice. In my case I wanted to watch Deadpool & Wolverine and one showing was the movie with English audio with Japanese subtitles and the other was a Japanese audio dub with English subtitles. I would have been happy watching either, but I went with the English audio version based on the showtime and available seating.
If you’re familiar with apps like Fandango, selecting your seat was done on an interactive map where you can see where other seats have been reserved. Just like the food ordering machines in Japan, the end result is a receipt and a ticket that are printed and spit out in the collection area.
After getting my ticket we went off and walked around some more. We ate a small dinner and eventually made it back to our hotel. Once the family was all set for the night I headed back out to the cinema.
On my way back up to the cinema I saw a poster in the elevator for Inside Out 2 (translated as “Inside Head 2”).
Snack Time
The layout of the cinema’s lobby starts from the place you purchase tickets, then there’s the counter for snacks, followed by the ticket taker who directs you to your theater.
The snacks counter was very busy with four long lines. While I waited in mine, I looked around to see what kind of options they had. They, of course, had popcorn and soft drinks, but I also saw people getting hot dogs or these churro-style fried cinnamon sticks.
One thing I read earlier was that if you were going to order popcorn, most Japanese cinemas offered two varieties of buttered popcorn. One was a savory flavor and the other was sweet. While they did offer these two options, they also had a variety of novelty flavors. One was loaded with 12 different herbs, another was melon flavored, and they had a couple of caramel corn flavors.
Just like many food places we ate at in Japan, when you get up to place an order there is a menu next to the register that lays out all of the things you can buy. As someone who didn’t speak Japanese, this was very helpful since I could point to items on the card if I couldn’t pronounce the order correctly (which for me was most of the time).
I didn’t notice it until after our trip, but there’s a part of me that wants to know what the avocado hot dog would taste like.
I wanted to try so many things, but I decided to stick with one order of the savory popcorn, one salted caramel corn, and a soft drink. The caramel corn came in a little cup that I planned on using to bring leftovers back for my wife and kids to try. I thought that if it weren’t one of the last days of the trip I would have walked out of there with several flavors that we could snack on throughout the trip.
Everyone gets this epic food tray to bring into the theater. Captain America could easily use this as his shield.
The caramel corn was pretty standard, although I liked that this cinema leaned into a salty flavor a little more than you’d think. The savory popcorn was sort of buttery and it had a tiny bit of soy sauce flavor in it. Overall I was happy with my selections and I took my tray of food with me into the theater.
Showtime
I found my way to the theater and up to my seat. The theater was on the bigger side and the seats were quite comfortable. It wasn’t super packed, but I think the area I was in had several people because it’s got a decent view of the screen.
I usually try to avoid trailers to avoid spoilers but it was cool to see what movies were coming up. Some of them seemed like movies made in Japan, the US, and other places. I made it in with just a few trailers left to go.
During the trailers folks were talking to each other and settling in, but when the movie started all cell phones got put away and everyone drew their attention to the screen. Other than laughs and reactions, the theater was quiet and people were focused on the movie.
I thought the movie itself was really good and there was something particularly fun about being in Japan and watching the crowd get into it when—minor spoiler—Deadpool and Wolverine do a 5-minute fight inside a Honda Odyssey. I got the feeling everyone else in the theater enjoyed it, too.
One thing that I think is a cultural difference between the US and Japanese moviegoers is that when the credits started nobody in the theater moved. It being a Marvel movie, you can expect at least one mid-credit scene and maybe a post-credit scene, but in the US there are usually a good amount of people who stay and some who get up and skip those extra scenes. In this theater it felt like it was expected that you stay through the credits.
When I go up and left, everyone made a point to clean up their seats so no mess was left behind. As we all carried our snack trays out of the theater another short line formed as everyone stopped to divide out their trash and recycling into various bins. It didn’t take long and we were all out of there and back in the lobby soon enough.
My showtime was around 8PM and I think that was one of the later movies. By the time I got out to the lobby the folks at the snack counter had cleaned everything up and had already cleared out (I honestly thought about getting more popcorn for the flight home, so I was a tiny bit disappointed).
On the way out I stopped by a display rack that had small posters for all of the current and upcoming movies. I grabbed some as a souvenir for me and the kids. One guy was going through and taking one of each. Japan has a lot of collectibles, like stamps at shrines and area-specific mascots and manhole covers, so I can see movie posters being another thing you might want to hang onto.
We had an amazing vacation in Japan. We got to see castles, explore shrines, eat amazing food, and meet some really nice people. I wouldn’t do anything different, but there was also this great feeling of doing something so common as going to the movies.
I think going to the cinema around the world might be a new travel tradition.