Ouch.  Definitely ouch.

Been there, and had similar experiences that I've ranted about some in the past (such as the absolutely ignorant lady that sat rattling a bag of popcorn trying to get every last stinkin' kernel covered with butter...  Bad enough that she and her date/escort/husband/friend and the other two persons with them came into the theatre late and incredibly *rude* about demanding that some people sitting in the same extra leg-space aisle row mid-way up the theatre move to make room for them when 98% of the rest of the theatre was empty, but adding the popcorn rattle on top of it had me thinking of horrible things that should happen to the whole group, starting with rattle lady!!!)

I despise rude and obnoxious people, and horribly selfish people that come to movies.

Why do they pay good money to come to the theatre just to 'forget' to turn off their cell phone, or at least forget to *silence* the damn thing?  Why do they think the rest of the place has to hear their conversation when they take a friggin' call on the darned thing and then go on to gossip about their day or about how you wouldn't believe what so-and-so did to whichahuzzit...  They're in the middle of the damned movie and they do such stupid stuff and don't bother to walk out into the lobby where they'd disturb no one.

People with kids catch a bit of a break from me because I'm a parent also, but not much of one (the break that is, not that I'm saying I'm not much of a parent).  I'm sorry but if you are incapable of paying for a babysitter, then you shouldn't be at the movies unless you taking the child to an kiddie movie where everyone else is in the same situation.  Taking a child to a long movie and expecting the child to sit still, or at least to stay quiet is stupid.

It makes me long for the other place I wrote an article about some time back: drive-in movies.  I was reminded of those places again when a friend who lives North of the Border sent me a note saying she and her husband went to one the other day and caught the triple feature there.  In her case she and her husband are without children, but they have a little Chihuahua that is like a child to them.  They go to the drive-in because they can take the Chihuahua and let it go for a long walk around the place before the movie starts, and they can walk around with as necessary in between movies if necessary.  They aren't disturbing anyone that way and yet they can enjoy the movies without ruining things for anyone else.

Where people's sense of manners has gone I'll never know.  Where their common sense went, don't know that either.

But people do rude stuff way too often, and they most certainly don't seem to care about others around them.

Even though you didn't get a refund from the culprit, I would most certainly have gone to the theatre management and gotten some compensation from them.  And in my case, I probably would have been a bit rude about requesting the individual to *move* or at a minimum I would have seen an usher and requested them to have that individual move.  If they refused and/or if the usher did nothing I'd have had the manager refunding my ticket price for sure.

TW:  I'd go exactly with Dharma's response about your use of the phone.  You did your best to be unobtrusive to others.   My problem is the (borrowing Dharma's word) Ignoramus (or is it Ignorami?) that don't have an ounce of decency and can't be bothered to be disconnected from others for the few hours that they'd be sitting in movie house.

I don't need to know their business, nor does anyone else in the theatre, and yet they'll sit there talking away as if they aren't bothering a soul around them.  10 minutes later I'm not sure which dialogue I heard more of, the one on the screen, or the one on the phone.  Blech!