CHILDREN preparing to watch Madagascar 3 at a Nottingham cinema fled in terror after staff put on hair-raising horror film Paranormal Activity 4 by mistake.
Cineworld magazine describes the film, in the genre of family/comedy, as "An animated threequel that never lets up in its torrent of funny gags and frantic action."
Well, the audience of around 25 families at The Cornerhouse at the weekend certainly had some 'frantic action.' In the opening scenes of the film an array of lovable zoo animals was instead replaced with a woman's blood drenched corpse being hurled at the screen.
Children, some as young as five, started crying and the auditorium rose to their feet as they were forced to head for the exits.
Angry mum Natasha Lewis, 32, accompanied her eight-year-old son Dylan to the screening which took place at 10.30am on Saturday.
She said: "We sat down and it was meant to start at 10am, but it took until 10.30am for the lights to go down and for the trailers to start.
"They started playing the movie and I thought - this doesn't look right. And then I recognised the opening sequence as a flashback to the first movie, which I saw a couple of years ago.
"It opens on the most terrifying scene in the first film – where a body shoots full pelt towards the camera.
"It's enough to make grown men jump, so you can imagine the terror in these young faces.
"Everybody just scrambled for the exits, all you could hear were children crying and screaming. Everyone was very upset.
"It was only about two minutes worth of the film but it was enough to scar them for life."
Natasha was fully refunded the full £11.40 by staff who also offered customers the chance to see Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted on another screen.
A spokesperson from Cineworld said: "We have investigated the incident and can confirm that this was a technical error with the projector and apologise sincerely to the families in the screen at the time.
"All customers who were affected by the incident were offered refunds and complimentary tickets. We also invited customers to watch the screening of Madagascar 3 half an hour later.
"We take matters such as this very seriously and are currently working with technicians to ensure this does not happen again."
Cineworld magazine describes the film, in the genre of family/comedy, as "An animated threequel that never lets up in its torrent of funny gags and frantic action."
Well, the audience of around 25 families at The Cornerhouse at the weekend certainly had some 'frantic action.' In the opening scenes of the film an array of lovable zoo animals was instead replaced with a woman's blood drenched corpse being hurled at the screen.
Children, some as young as five, started crying and the auditorium rose to their feet as they were forced to head for the exits.
Angry mum Natasha Lewis, 32, accompanied her eight-year-old son Dylan to the screening which took place at 10.30am on Saturday.
She said: "We sat down and it was meant to start at 10am, but it took until 10.30am for the lights to go down and for the trailers to start.
"They started playing the movie and I thought - this doesn't look right. And then I recognised the opening sequence as a flashback to the first movie, which I saw a couple of years ago.
"It opens on the most terrifying scene in the first film – where a body shoots full pelt towards the camera.
"It's enough to make grown men jump, so you can imagine the terror in these young faces.
"Everybody just scrambled for the exits, all you could hear were children crying and screaming. Everyone was very upset.
"It was only about two minutes worth of the film but it was enough to scar them for life."
Natasha was fully refunded the full £11.40 by staff who also offered customers the chance to see Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted on another screen.
A spokesperson from Cineworld said: "We have investigated the incident and can confirm that this was a technical error with the projector and apologise sincerely to the families in the screen at the time.
"All customers who were affected by the incident were offered refunds and complimentary tickets. We also invited customers to watch the screening of Madagascar 3 half an hour later.
"We take matters such as this very seriously and are currently working with technicians to ensure this does not happen again."
