{"id":41018,"date":"2025-01-14T14:51:24","date_gmt":"2025-01-14T19:51:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/entertainment\/laughing-in-the-dark-the-new-york-times\/14\/01\/2025\/"},"modified":"2025-01-14T14:51:24","modified_gmt":"2025-01-14T19:51:24","slug":"laughing-in-the-dark-the-new-york-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/entertainment\/laughing-in-the-dark-the-new-york-times\/14\/01\/2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Laughing in the Dark – The New York Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Annoyed moviegoers may be making incorrect assumptions about why others in the theater are laughing. Some audience members might be chuckling because something onscreen is funny ha-ha; others may be laughing out of discomfort, surprise, or recognition; still others might titter to convey that they understood an obscure reference. Or maybe laughter is just contagious.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes I just hear someone else laugh and then it makes me think, maybe that was actually funny,\u201d said Jordan Linekar, a manager for scripted and unscripted content at Paramount who sees movies in Los Angeles theaters about every other week. \u201cOr sometimes people\u2019s laughs are really unique, and I laugh at their laugh.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the book \u201cThe Audience Effect: On the Collective Cinema Experience<\/a>,\u201d the author Julian Hanich, a professor of film studies at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, defines 10 types of cinematic laughter. \u201cIn the darkness of the movie-theater one can hear aggressive, nervous, degrading, evaluating, embarrassed, shocked, disgusted, irritated, or contagious laughter,\u201d Mr. Hanich writes.<\/p>\n

Such are the side effects of being a voyeur among strangers.<\/p>\n

Though it may be a human response to laugh \u2014 and to laugh for lots of reasons \u2014 some say that laughter can allow a viewer to avoid engaging with a film in a meaningful way when things onscreen get intense. Ms. Coburn said she noticed that audiences lately struggle to suppress snickers when films deploy melodrama, as in those directed by David Lynch or Douglas Sirk.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople don\u2019t know how to respond to that kind of mode anymore, because it\u2019s so in your face and so saccharine,\u201d she said. \u201cI think you\u2019re robbing yourself of a really important part of life if you can\u2019t allow yourself to be truly overtaken by a movie without mediating it with laughter.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the same time, audience members who shoot the evil eye at people who do not share their own reactions may also be missing out on something, said Mr. Dieringer of Screen Slate.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes when movies try to make us feel a complicated range of emotions they\u2019re susceptible to being misinterpreted,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I think that\u2019s part of the experience of seeing films in movie theaters, and feeling those emotions not just about the film but about the reactions of the people around you. I think that\u2019s what makes film-going really exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Annoyed moviegoers may be making incorrect assumptions about why others in the theater are laughing. Some audience members might be chuckling because