When I saw the final Harry Potter movie in 35mm, the screen randomly went dark for several seconds while the sound kept going. This happened a couple times during the movie and they were within only a couple minutes of each other, roughly halfway through. I don’t want to mention specifics on the off-chance I’d be spoiling it for someone, but the first flub happened right in the middle of a pretty significant moment and I seem recall saying out loud “you’ve got to be kidding me.”
When it happened again only a minute or so later the lighting in the scene was, uhhh, much brighter, so the screen going dark again for a few seconds was even more noticeable.
I don’t know what the hell caused it, maybe the shutter in the projector got stuck or something. There was a trio of folks complaining to the management afterwards as we were leaving the theater, and I was tempted to do the same, but I could see the person on duty wasn’t giving in and so I figured it wasn’t worth the trouble.
When I saw Rise of the Planet of the Apes at a Thursday midnight screening with my cousin a week or so later, it was at the same theater and we had a choice between digital and film. I chose digital, thinking that would prevent any screwups like what happened with harry potter.
We go inside and I notice the real-d filter is still over the projector. I ask a theater employee to remove it and she does. Eventually the trailers start, and then the movie.
About halfway through, the same exact thing that happened during Harry Potter happens again … only the picture doesn’t come back this time.
We all start making our way out of the auditorium with very little light to guide us, booing the whole time. As we’re finally getting to the hallway, the theater staff emphatically tells us it’s okay and that someone’s coming to fix it. We all take our seats again and someone comes in with a remote (yup, tv in the cinema indeed, Tarantino) and asks us to let her know when we’ve gotten to the right scene as she fast-forwards through the movie.
Goes without saying they were waiting outside to give us all free passes once the movie ended.
tl;dr, digital cinema can be just as bad if not worse than film projection.
Six years later it’s almost worse in certain ways. I’ve complained about them not removing the 3D filter on at least two trips to the movies in the last year. With Rogue One I mentioned it to them afterward and they said “it turns on and off automatically,” completely ignoring my point that it shouldn’t be on there at all. With Wonder Woman I tried letting someone know during the trailers, but the theater was so understaffed that the guy in charge understandably told me there was nothing he could do about it.