As someone who worked for one of the big chains, I must sadly concur. My chain was one of the better ones, but they still played commercials before the trailers. If you want to blame anyone for commercials, blame the studios for their sheer greed. Sony took 90% of the box office grosses for the first 3 weeks Spider-Man 2 was in theatres. If the theatres don't have that operating income, guess what happens? Concession prices skyrocket, exhibitors look to commercials to supplement what they're not getting from the gate, and so forth. As to the problem with bringing toddlers to R-rated movies, as much as I am a defender of free speech and freedom of expression, this problem would be dealt with easily by a ratings system that restricted this sort of behaviour. Let's face facts: the MPAA is a joke in more ways than one.

The cell phone problem could be dealt with structurally: let's build movie theatres where cellphone coverage is poor to nonexistent. Problem solved.

This was indeed a sucky year for movies. I only went to 2 or 3 staff screenings this year, compared with 10 or more in 2004.