Fredrikstad Blad: "Minecraft Movie" TikTok trend causing global chaos in cinemas, even in Fredrikstad — "not many have complained" | Translation in post body

TikTok-trend skaper kaos på kino: – Det er ikke så mange som har klaget

A Minecraft Movie is causing chaos in cinemas around the world — even here in Fredrikstad, our local cinema has experienced the special TikTok trend which has developed around the new blockbuster.

The cinema in our twin city Sarpsborg has taken special measures in connection with the trend, according to Sarpsborg Arbeiderblad ["nonpartisan" newspaper owned by Amedia] which covered the situation on Friday.

Jumping, screaming, and throwing popcorn

The trend involves moviegoers going completely wild in the auditorium when the character Steve says "chicken jockey".

The room becomes violently lively. People jump, scream, and throw popcorn and drinks in every direction.

TikTok abunds with videos of this phenomenon.

[embedded TikTok video]

And although those participating in the trend are apparently enjoying themselves, there are certainly others who see the stunt differently.

Someone must, after all, clean up the mess the trend creates.

[Embedded TikTok video: ⚠️WORKERS ENCOURAGED US TO DO IT GIVING US FREE REFILLS AND RECORDING US DOING IT, WE OFFERED TO HELP CLEAN UP BUT THEY WOULDNT LET US⚠️]

The noise has been high

Cinema manager Jørgen Søderberg Jansen explains that the "wildest scenes" are from select venues in the USA and England.

Things have not been nearly as bad in Norway. Nevertheless, cinemas in our country have noticed that A Minecraft Movie is causing problems.

—"Not so much throwing things, but there's been some extreme noise with shouting and cheering," Søderberg Jansen says before quickly adding,

—"Some people think it's fun to have so much noise, while others just want to see the movie in peace and quiet."

There have accordingly been some dissatisfied moviegoers. Søderberg Jansen emphasizes that showings of A Minecraft Movie have still generally gone fine.

—"We've gotten maybe 10 complaints from customers, compared to over 5,000 people who watched the movie, so it's not so many who have complained."

—"Have you taken any measures in connection with this phenomenon?"

—"Yes, we have more employees visible in the hall," Søderberg Jansen replies.

More interest

Søderberg Jansen explains furthermore that the cinema has noticed that interest in A Minecraft Movie increased after the TikTok trend took off.

—"We show the movie in both Norwegian and English. In the beginning we were mainly seeing families interested in watching the Norwegian dub, but after the TikTok videos [started showing up], more youth have shown an interest in watching the English-language version," Søderberg Jansen says.

—"So the trend has absolutely contributed to more people discovering the movie," he adds.

16 comments

I saw this article and just had to laugh a little, "Yup! Chicken jockey covered by a Norwegian local paper!" — but the line about how families bringing their young kids generally watch the Norwegian dub while rowdy youth wanting to jump in on the trend watch the English dub, that line does say something about the language dynamic in Norway, doesn't it? As the collapse of the Septic Empire grows more and more imminent, who knows for how much longer that language dynamic will continue. Lernu Esperanton btw.
It's also maybe a little interesting that they interview the cinema manager (kinosjef, "cinema boss"), who's obviously speaking from the perspective of wanting to maximize profits for the cinema. Cinema workers' interest in the trend — namely, the extra burden of cleaning that the trend creates — does get a brief mention, sure, but the focus is largely on the cinema customers having fun, or complaining, or deciding to SPEND 100+ MINUTES IN A POORLY VENTILATED INDOOR SPACE AROUND DOZENS OF STRANGERS OVER A TIKTOK TREND, which is at the end of ends what affects the boss' bottom line.
- At the same time, I don't necessarily want machine translation to be overused, because it's still fundamentally fallible — even in subtle ways — and comes with its own pros and cons with regard to environmental impact.
  
  Don't let the behavior tech bros convince you to dislike one of the only legitimate, and beautiful uses of technology that can unite people from all corners of the earth.
  Sure they will have inaccuracies. Sure it requires more electricity than opening a pocket dictionary. But people will use these tools to understand each other and their cultures better, fostering good will and breaking efforts to propagandize us against each other. Many people will choose to learn once dying languages after using these tools. Many young people will communicate with their grandparents for the first time in their native tongue because of translation apps.
  I share the same apprehension with using them as an authoritative source, but I think flaws and all, the benefits of trying to communicate across language barriers will be orders of magnitude more impactful than their downsides.
  The number of people I have had interesting conversations with due to (the extremely error prone) translation capabilities on 小红书 is already large even after only a few months on the service. These cultural exchanges would have been impossible or extremely laborious a few years ago.
  
  That doesn't really contradict anything I was saying.