NOW I know it’s me and I am sure many people are more tolerant of noise in a cinema than I am.

I also understand that cinemas need to sell noisy food in order to increase their revenue. But this Friday was especially spectacular.

We went to see 12 Years A Slave at Harbour Lights cinema. It wasn’t full but the couple next to me excelled themselves and brought their schlurping and crunching to a whole new level.

This was even more confounded by the man, who had a large tube of Smarties or some other noisy sounding food.

He took the lid off, tipped the tube up and down and put the lid back on before replacing it in the cup holder next to me every other minute.

I know watching the film we were watching I should have been more forbearing, it was only eating after all.

It wouldn’t have been so bad had he chosen to eat during the louder times of the film but he carried on regardless no matter how quiet and emotional it got on screen.

Thankfully after about an hour he had finished eating them all and just the schlurping remained.

Aah now I could watch the film in relative peace.

One final note, as we waited to watch the credits I heard my husband say “unbelievable”, and he asked me if I had heard what the chap sitting behind us had said. It was: “It was a good film but there was no need for so much negativity!”

A descendant of Edwin Epps no doubt!

HILARY MACKNEY, Totton.