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By: - 7th April 2002 at 21:00 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
I flew JMC last year and we watched the wedding planner outbound and the family guy inbound. Both were pretty ok actually.
I did hear that a friend of mine had to watch Shrek. This was the main film for everybody. However I cannot recall the airline...thats a lot of good isnt it?!!
AIH have a pretty good selection of bits n pieces from what I can remember. However...I liked my JMC flight last year.
Regards
Benair
By: - 7th April 2002 at 21:15 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
I s'pose watching Shrek is an improvement. It's a fairly recent film and definitely more watchable than Yellow Submarine!
By: - 7th April 2002 at 21:26 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
[updated:LAST EDITED ON 07-04-02 AT 09:27 PM (GMT)]Never really used the charter airlines, but I'd say that BA are usually pretty decent.
They give you a good range of films, documentaries and news programmes to watch through about 15 or so channels on the seat back TV's. So do Virgin, although theirs often don't work very well for some reason. The best economy class IFE in recent years is South African, in my opinion.
A few months ago, I played multi-player chess on the seatback TV with my neighbour - a nice touch. Eliminates the need to bring a GameBoy in long flights.
Everyone expects Singapore, Emirates, Gulf Air etc.. to be top notch (which they are) but SAA was a nice surprise.
What I like these days is that even on short haul flights, the A320's and NG 737's often have drop-down flat screens every few rows. Some airlines display mind teasers (like the ones you get in the cinema before the trailers start). Don't know how many carriers do this, as I've only encountered SAA and Gulf Air flights like this. The others (eg. BA, BMI) just seem to use the screens for safety demos.
Oh - SAA (and SIA's Krisworld I think) both have audio and video on demand - just choose the film you want and the server spins the discs up for you.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 08:35 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
Worst films - Air New Zealand, even if you don't want to watch their crap inflight entertainment, you have to close all the window blinds and suffer it (I prefer to look through the window when I fly). I had to endure "While You Were Sleeping", "101 Dalmatians" (hateful film), "Caspar" and some other rubbish which I cannot remember the name of. Their audio entertainment is quite okay though.
Best - The much-missed Sabena.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 09:37 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
on my last BY flights we had a good selection - mainly comedy but it differed both ways including Trigger Happy TV, One foot in the grave, a magic show, Baddiel and Skinner and then some kids cartoons - this was on B762so no seat bak tv's!
By: - 8th April 2002 at 10:52 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
I found both Britannia's audio and visual entertainment of good quality. We too, got to watch Trigger Happy TV etc.
Our audio entertainment with Airtours last month was rather boring. There were about 5 or 6 stations to listen to and the more modern music station had less than 10 tracks on it. They have these corny famous people doing the DJ-ing for it and this women said stay tuned for Kylie Minogue and some other singer and they never materialised, the loop just started again!
By: - 8th April 2002 at 11:43 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
Again, JMC Airlines were excellent last year on a MAN-CFU flight. (757).
No real complaints when it comes to the inflight entertainment, I prefer looking out the window myself and taking in whats going on outside.. plus they make you buy headphones and knowing my luck, the ones I packed are stored in the hold with my suitcase!!
By: - 8th April 2002 at 12:43 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
They make you buy headphones??????
That is absolutely apalling. I have always had them free. Do many airlines do this??
Certainly all the carriers I have used over the last year have given them away - BA, Air France, KLM, SAA, Virgin.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 13:15 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
That's amazing .
I flew Delta on last month.
International leg : headphones for free.
Domestic flight in the US West bound : headset : 5 bucks ( I guess)
Domestic flight in the US East bound : headset for free !!!!!!!
By: - 8th April 2002 at 13:25 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
BA dont give them away for free. They were collected up!
Although I did get 3 overnight bag thingy's as 2 different young ladies presented me with one each, and then another one gave me a third.
Stables.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 13:39 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
British Midland (Airtours charter)were awful when we flew them down to Monastir.The programs they showed were rubbish!Dinnerladies,a cartoonand a few other old comedy programs which were not at all funny.You had to pay for headphones as well.I looked the magazine which showed the programs they were showing on all there flights including on the A330,gosh did I feel sorry for those people on those flights!
Best inflight entertainent was with Virgin.PTV's,great movies which had just been released in the UK,Bowfinger,blair witch project and notting hill to name a few.Also some good comedy programs.The music system was quite good as well with hit songs from 1999 being played.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 14:53 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
I've not had many long haul flights, so my experiences of IFE are pretty limited.
First long haul flight (5 years ago), LGW-PIT, I was in BA Club World (on a 767-336ER)), and pretty much enjoyed the individual screen with 12 channels, I certainly wasn't complaining. My only problem was... the main film on the BA flight was the same as on the connecting US Airways flight in Coach (757-2??) from PIT-SFO (my original BA LHR-SFO flight was cancelled because of the cabin crew strike). Not only that, but it was the same film again as I headed back with United Coach (757-2??), from SFO to EWR. After a few days in the big apple, I flew back in World Traveller from EWR to LHR. Different films, but I spent the flight walking up and down the aisle, as I'm not a fan of the seating in 747-136's.
Anyway, two years ago, I flew AF tempo (Economy) from CDG-YYZ-CDG (A340-300). There were different films each way, but they were pretty lame.
The European companies distributed the headsets free in all cases, while the American companies all charged a few dollars, not for the headset, but for the adapter that was required to plug them in.
In August, I flew Swissair economy from ZRH to LHR (A321), and the screens remained down for the whole flight. They were showing BBC Wildlife documentaries, but there were no headphone jacks, so they were silent documentaries.
On the return flight (A320), there were again silent wildlife documentaries.
So, of the airlines I've flown, I'd probably say BA Club World wins hands down for IFE (surprise, surprise!), with AF the worst, although I'd have preferred if SR had just shown us the map with our position for the whole flight.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 17:18 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
Best infligt entertainment I've had was with Virgin. Their A340 / 744's have nintendo games and 8 excellent up to date movies on seperate channels, plus a few others like comedy etc and of course the skymap.
When I flew BA long haul it was a 742 and we had one big screen for every 15-20 rows and the highest seats I have ever seen on any aircraft. I had to sit on the arm rest for 1hr 1/2 to watch a really cut up, no swearing or violence version of Beverly Hills Cop 3 (when it was first out. The radio was better on BA than Virgin though I thought.
By: - 8th April 2002 at 19:01 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
Did Virgin give game controllers to Economy passengers for free? I was disappointed to find that Airtours charged £5 per passenger for the flight. We even had to purchase headsets at £3.75 and in previous years, charter airlines such as JMC, Britannia and Monarch have given us a set for free but they must be returned at the end of the flight.
On the return jounrney, I was gonna rent a controller and was pretty miffed to find it was a 763 and only the A330s have the seatback TVs and games available..!!
By: - 8th April 2002 at 20:09 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
RE: Worst In-Flight Entertainment?
The controllers are usually a reversible game pad/phone which fits into one side of the arm rest. They are removible with a springy flex on them. All part of the ticket.
Usually on long haul scheduled flights you have an awful lot of choice becuase of market place competition between the airlines.
Eg. on LHR-JNB you can fly direct with BA, SAA and Virgin and if you connect -KLM, AF, LH, SAS, Alitalia, TAP, Iberia - need I go on?
That is not the case with most charter carriers (ie. your travel operator chooses the carrier, not you) hence the seeming lack of seat back TVs, headphones you have to buy etc.
Posts: 6,503
By: T5 - 7th April 2002 at 20:15
When we fly, we are made to endure so much rubbish. Don't get me wrong, some of it is of high quality and good to watch, but which airlines in your mind show or have shown very low budget in-flight entertainment?
My 'Crap Entertainment of the Year 2002' award goes to JMC who made me watch the Beatles 'Yellow Submarine' film. I've said this before and it still makes me cringe just by thinking about it.
Fortunately, I was unable to see the whole screen and was not really forced to watch it but fellow travellers were not to pleased either. This was a long haul flight of 9hrs and they just seemed to show anything they felt like. Airtours showed recent releases this year i.e. Disney's Atlantis for Kids and Bandits starring Bruce Willis.
What are the best and worst airlines for in flight entertainment?