Strange United Incident

Doesn't sound plausible. They would have just shut off the movie and claimed technical difficulty. That would be a lot easier to explain and a lot cheaper.
 
John221us said:
Doesn't sound plausible. They would have just shut off the movie and claimed technical difficulty. That would be a lot easier to explain and a lot cheaper.
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But maybe flipping the screen up triggers the big bomb in the cabin? Or maybe the captain just REALLY liked Alex Cross.
 
Nothing new. I recall complaining about an inappropriate movie on a SYD to SFO flight 4 years ago. UA is still in business. And I still ride them.
 
1. It's PG-13 not R or nc-17. Lighten up

2. Seriously, diverting for that and calling the cops?


Is common sense dead in this country?
 
Sounds like a half-baked story cooked into an anti-Christian, anti family values rant with a diversion to OMG Chicago - Obama's city!!! :eek:
 
Silvaire said:
Sounds like a half-baked story cooked into an anti-Christian, anti family values rant with a diversion to OMG Chicago - Obama's city!!! :eek:
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Yeah, and Christian and family values are pretty stupid to rant about huh. Why should we be able to take a flight without exposing our small children with violence and sex. It wasn't porn or a snuff film, geeze.
 
I cannot possibly believe the story as reported.

I know some United pilots, and though they may be insufferable crabby old bastards, and prone to laugh at you when they're in the back seat and you're under the hood, not a one of them is likely to do something stupid like diverting to a landing when a passenger is being sweet and nice and politely objecting to the content of a movie.

Of course, it's always fun to poke fun at the airlines.

As for me, I dislike airline travel extremely, finding that unless you have Super Ultra Mega Butt-Kissy Platinum Status, you're pretty much relegated to "wait in line, siddown, shaddup" treatment.

For coach passengers, no one can top Southwest, because they have a system which absolutely allows you to stay seated in the boarding lounge until it's your turn, and your place in that turn is nicely defined to within five people. You also have a much better chance of getting a decent seat. Much more civilized. Also, they don't stick it to you when plans change.

But I've had good experiences most of the time on most of the airlines; AA has (for me) had a ridiculous number of cancellations, but I know I have been statistically unlucky; they mishandled a couple of those badly, though, and in one such event, United came to the rescue, big time.

I flew US Airways this last weekend to PHX and back, and they were perfectly decent; but when I asked if I could take an earlier flight, it was something like $450.00 to change, including a $150.00 change fee (ie, apart from the change in fare, which I understand... kinda).

Finally, I do not understand at all the complaining about flight attendants being older and less-lusty-looking; it is hardly appropriate to compare to the FAs on carriers from countries without the age discrimination laws which apply here, and while I like to look at purty gurls as much as the next guy, I also recognize cabin staff as being there for the purpose of saving our fuzzy backsides in the event of an emergency, and these folks re-qualify, demonstrate their ability, every year. That's good enough for me, because I am not mate-shopping when I fly, anyway!

/Rant.
 
A semi-related story: I took a trans pacific flight on one of those airlines that isn't troubled to play seniority and equal-ops with their FA's. Anyway, you got lots of movies from which to choose to watch on your personal screen. I chose a couple.

1. Some random Italian movie. Full on F scenes, I mean, like, where you saw genitalia and damn near saw things going in and out and all.

2. Sideways. I love watching that movie, always a crackup. But they EDITED it! Cut out the scene of Jack running naked back to the hotel, and edited Maya's comment to Miles near the end to "...but you wanted to fool me first." (Hint: She didn't say "fool".)

Severe disconnect here....
 
Sac Arrow said:
2. Sideways. I love watching that movie, always a crackup. But they EDITED it! Cut out the scene of Jack running naked back to the hotel, and edited Maya's comment to Miles near the end to "...but you wanted to fool me first." (Hint: She didn't say "fool".)
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I got stuck with that movie on a flight once, and it made it onto my list of the top 3 most soul-crushingly boring movies I'd ever seen.
 
Not every place has the same "family values" as in the US. Particularly in Asia.

I'm sure you must have noticed some of the, ahem, "services" available in the airports over there.

If you flew a foreign carrier, yours was the disconnect, almost by definition.
 
JeffDG said:
I got stuck with that movie on a flight once, and it made it onto my list of the top 3 most soul-crushingly boring movies I'd ever seen.
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It's a West Coast thing. Sort of like how we struggle to relate to "Deliverance."

MAKG1 said:
Not every place has the same "family values" as in the US. Particularly in Asia.

I'm sure you must have noticed some of the, ahem, "services" available in the airports over there.

If you flew a foreign carrier, yours was the disconnect, almost by definition.
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Oh I get it - and have taken note of the "services" (like anything else, everything in an airport is way too expensive.)
 
OkieFlyer said:
Yeah, and Christian and family values are pretty stupid to rant about huh. Why should we be able to take a flight without exposing our small children with violence and sex. It wasn't porn or a snuff film, geeze.
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I don't know how to respond to this because the airlines, including United, have always been very conservative with carte blanche censorship and editorial rights to films presented onboard. I know you'll never see a plane crash on an in flight movie so, regardless of the film being presented it was most definitely highly edited for content. I understand the people had children but if you are going to take your children out into the public you cannot expect the general public to adhere to all of the constraints a specific parent might want to impose on a 4 year old.

Furthermore, this is only going to get more complicated as all of the airlines are moving in the direction of implementing onboard WiFi and eventually eliminating the passenger entertainment systems completely in favor of people bringing their own media devices aboard. The internet content will still be censored to a point but it will eventually come down to what can you watch on your own personal device on a flight when within line of sight of a minor.

I don't think the rules have been written for that yet.
 
Portion of a letter from the director of the movie.

When I read your piece this morning, I felt extremely sympathetic to the family involved and, in some ways, quite apologetic. I never made the film to cause anyone this kind of discomfort. It seems to me they (the family) were well within their rights to request some control as to what their two young children were exposed. As a father of five year old triplets, I, too, would not want them to absorb some of the images we created for my film. It's a thriller based on the work of James Patterson and accurately captures the milieu, content, and characters of his many "Alex Cross" books.

These books are not for young people, either.

I cannot comment on the Captain's decision as I don't know all the facts but I do know this: there should be another standard of judgement or set of editing guidelines for airline consumption. PG-13 should mean what it does at the box office, at the very least meaning no one under 13 should be exposed to it. If the airlines cannot accommodate a more flexible presentation giving seats the option of viewing or not, they shouldn't show the film unless it meets what we could call "general cabin" suitability.
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http://www.theatlantic.com/national...film-that-made-a-pilot-divert-a-plane/274745/
 
Silvaire said:
I don't know how to respond to this because the airlines, including United, have always been very conservative with carte blanche censorship and editorial rights to films presented onboard. I know you'll never see a plane crash on an in flight movie so, regardless of the film being presented it was most definitely highly edited for content. I understand the people had children but if you are going to take your children out into the public you cannot expect the general public to adhere to all of the constraints a specific parent might want to impose on a 4 year old.

. . . .
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I have a bit of a different take on it, actually.

Personally, I wouldn't mind if airlines eliminated the in-flight movies altogether. Most of them are horrible (at least, by the time the airlines are done butchering them), and the monitors rarely work properly, anyway (except on Jet Blue, whose system solves both the content and delivery system problems rather nicely).

I think that most adults probably feel pretty much the same way. I don't believe I've ever heard anyone raving about the in-flight movies they watched (at least on U.S. carriers). And most adults have other ways to deal with the boredom, whether it's watching something on a laptop, reading, snoozing, getting drunk, or whatever else bangs their shutters.

Soo... what purpose does the movie serve, when you think about it? I submit that unless there's movie choice (a'la Jet Blue), then the movie(s) should all be kids' movies, specially selected for their ability to so fully and thoroughly engage the tykes that they forget all about being whiny and obnoxious.

Of course, we also have the young adults who have been so digitally hyper-stimulated for their entire lives that they consider being bored only slightly less tragic than, say, losing a limb; but in my experience, as long as something sufficiently inane is flashing across a screen, they're usually able to fend off withdrawal long enough to finish all but the longest flights without a major depressive episode setting in.

Besides, chances are that pax in the young adult age group will have brought with them a cache of digital toys that collectively contain more computing power than existed in the entire world a few decades ago, so they should be able to amuse themselves without the airline's help.

-Rich
 
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cowman said:
2. Seriously, diverting for that and calling the cops?
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My guess is, it went down like the telephone game. Family complains to one FA. FA deals with it, but they continue to complain. FA goes to lead FA, story gets lost in translation. Lead FA goes to Captain, where once again, story gets lost in translation.
 
(shakes head) First guitars.... and now this?

Kinda glad I live near the AAL hub...
 
RJM62 said:
I have a bit of a different take on it, actually.

Personally, I wouldn't mind if airlines eliminated the in-flight movies altogether. Most of them are horrible (at least, by the time the airlines are done butchering them), and the monitors rarely work properly, anyway (except on Jet Blue, whose system solves both the content and delivery system problems rather nicely).

I think that most adults probably feel pretty much the same way. I don't believe I've ever heard anyone raving about the in-flight movies they watched (at least on U.S. carriers). And most adults have other ways to deal with the boredom, whether it's watching something on a laptop, reading, snoozing, getting drunk, or whatever else bangs their shutters.

Soo... what purpose does the movie serve, when you think about it? I submit that unless there's movie choice (a'la Jet Blue), then the movie(s) should all be kids' movies, specially selected for their ability to so fully and thoroughly engage the tykes that they forget all about being whiny and obnoxious.

Of course, we also have the young adults who have been so digitally hyper-stimulated for their entire lives that they consider being bored only slightly less tragic than, say, losing a limb; but in my experience, as long as something sufficiently inane is flashing across a screen, they're usually able to fend off withdrawal long enough to finish all but the longest flights without a major depressive episode setting in.

Besides, chances are that pax in the young adult age group will have brought with them a cache of digital toys that collectively contain more computing power than existed in the entire world a few decades ago, so they should be able to amuse themselves without the airline's help.

-Rich
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:yeahthat:
 
Silvaire said:
I don't know how to respond to this because the airlines, including United, have always been very conservative with carte blanche censorship and editorial rights to films presented onboard. I know you'll never see a plane crash on an in flight movie so, regardless of the film being presented it was most definitely highly edited for content. I understand the people had children but if you are going to take your children out into the public you cannot expect the general public to adhere to all of the constraints a specific parent might want to impose on a 4 year old.
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The problem with your argument is that being captive on an airplane isn't "out into the public." There is no reasonable way for a parent to remove children from the situation when a movie is being shown to the entire airplane or class. In this particular case, it sounds as though the captain made the decision to remove the entire family from the airplane, which is his prerogative, though it seems that it was perhaps not the most diplomatic way to handle the situation.

Airlines may censor movies, but the standards by which such censorship is conducted have likely fallen dramatically over the years. Take a look at the trash that appears on television these days, including crude humor and language, even in shows supposedly targeted at families and run during times when children's viewership is likely.


JKG
 
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Interesting discussion on this over at PPW. No one had any direct insight on the incident, but one thing to consider is this - back in the old days (pre-757/767) when just about every jet had three guys up front, the standard response to a pax disturbance was for the Captain or FO to leave the Flight Deck and go back and address the situation. That all stopped when the FE got booted from the team. Got every more restrictive after 9/11.

Today, no one leaves the cockpit and the Captain has to make all decsions based solely on how it is presented by the FA in the back.

So, basically, if you get a situation where you have an upset/emotional pax and a battle-axe flight attendant and tempers rise......not hard to see how a Captain might make the decision to divert.
 
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