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I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

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Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#121

Post by tseabrooks »

msluyter wrote: post #34

I think Alamo Drafthouse in Austin is doing it right: 1. Food & beer/wine served with movie -- convenient and much preferable to overpriced popcorn. 2. Cellphones must be turned off. 3. They take talking seriously, and preface each film with a strongly (and amusingly) worded statement to that effect. 4. No babies allowed except on specified baby nights. 5. Creative and fun special events, such as quote-alongs, sing-a…

There is a theater in Columbus, Oh Called "Arena Grand Theater" it's a mix of a traditional thatre and something like Alamo... A few points about it.

1) Always been more upclass than competing theaters (and more expensive).

2) Far less seating.

3) Beer, Food, salads, wraps, and traditional snacks.

4)Located in the "Brewery District" or "Arena District" This means there were never any children there because the area doesn't lend itself to it.

They always stayed busy.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#122

Post by jsz0 »

I think point #5 (home viewing) is the most important one. The other issues have, more or less, existed for quite sometime now. It's only fairly recently that the average person could afford a pretty nice home theater setup. I've had a home theater with a projector for the last 5 years or so and the idea of going to a theater to watch a movie seems ridiculous to me. It's like going to a concert hall to hear a CD played over the PA. Why bother? The industry has to focus on delivering content to home-viewers the same day it's released to theaters. They do all this marketing for a new film and exclude a huge portion of its potential audience who would rather watch at home?

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#123

Post by daimyoyo »

I haven't seen a movie in months and don't plan to for the foreseeable future and the movie going experience is a major reason why. I will pay the ticket price without too much trouble, I don't mind kids(going to midnight showings during the week helps with that) and I never eat concessions so I don't care how expensive they are. My problem is once I get into the theater. Most movies today aren't shown correctly(I have no idea why they expect some kid making minimum wage to run 20 screens at once to know what he / she is doing), the watermarks every 20 minutes, and the poor sound quality. But the worst part by far is the commercials. I find it incredibily insulting that I pay $12 for the privilage of watching ads for 15 minutes straight. No one likes a double dipper.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#124

Post by MichaelApproved »

rhplus wrote: post #116

2. Ticket prices are too high. People have always made that complaint, but historically the movies have been cheap compared to concerts, major league sports and restaurants. I had to check this claim, because inflation and purchasing power can fog people's memories. Using average U.S. ticket prices[1] adjusted to 2010 dollars[2], I get the following: Year | Price | 2010 price adj. w/CPI ------------------------------…

"both of which, incidentally, suffer from the same competition movies do: high quality home theater setups and internet streaming."

Live events shouldn't be so easily compared to movies and home entertainment. While you can wait for a movie to come to DVD for a similar experience, it's not the same for a live event. Watching a concert on YouTube isn't nearly as much fun as going to watch it live. Going to a live event is an experience.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#125

Post by int3rnaut »

The biggest reason why I believe movie revenue is dropping is the ability for anyone to pick up a camera (high tech low cost now), create a movie, and upload it to the eyes of many people (like on youtube). Because of this, there are just so many more options to catch ones visceral media experience. I really like Science fiction and while there were certainly some good Sci-Fi movies (and television) out in the past year or so, there were many more interesting and thought provoking movies and shorts (going back to the previously brought up idea of short attention spans) on youtube than there were movies I would actually want to go to a theatre and pay for--and to be quite honest, I am sure that some of the things I saw on youtube recently were far more enjoyable than some of the things tossed at me by Hollywood. It's not so much a money thing for me, it's a time thing, and I want to spend it wisely.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#126

Post by sigzero »

msluyter wrote: post #34

I think Alamo Drafthouse in Austin is doing it right: 1. Food & beer/wine served with movie -- convenient and much preferable to overpriced popcorn. 2. Cellphones must be turned off. 3. They take talking seriously, and preface each film with a strongly (and amusingly) worded statement to that effect. 4. No babies allowed except on specified baby nights. 5. Creative and fun special events, such as quote-alongs, sing-a…

I love the Alamo for all of those reasons. Regarding #2, I have read on the Alamo site about some enforcements of that rule. Love it.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#127

Post by ericd »

saucetenuto wrote: post #113
brador wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's the thing, everyone I speaks to agrees that modern movies are mostly crap. But...why, with their big focus group budgets and such, are the movie studios not listening to this? Or is their output really the best they are being pitched?

Well, two things: "Everyone you speak to" is probably a group of people very similar to you. That's how most peoples' social groups work, and it's hard to notice because your experience of them tends to factor out the similarities and focus on the differences. The value of a potential moviegoer is almost a binary function of movie quality: the looks good enough to be worth the price of a ticket, or it doesn't. The ma…

WRT marginal quality, I don't think that word of mouth buzz from great quality can be ignored - one of the ways to build a massive (and massively profitable) franchise like the Dark Knight/The Matrix/Toy Story is by making a really, really good movie.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#128

Post by ericd »

saucetenuto wrote: post #113
brador wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's the thing, everyone I speaks to agrees that modern movies are mostly crap. But...why, with their big focus group budgets and such, are the movie studios not listening to this? Or is their output really the best they are being pitched?

Well, two things: "Everyone you speak to" is probably a group of people very similar to you. That's how most peoples' social groups work, and it's hard to notice because your experience of them tends to factor out the similarities and focus on the differences. The value of a potential moviegoer is almost a binary function of movie quality: the looks good enough to be worth the price of a ticket, or it doesn't. The ma…

WRT marginal quality, I don't think that word of mouth buzz from great quality can be ignored - one of the ways to build a massive (and massively profitable) franchise like the Dark Knight/The Matrix/Toy Story is by making a really, really good movie.

It's getting a lot harder to "con" people into making a movie a blockbuster via advertising.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#129

Post by Zev »

rhplus wrote: post #116

2. Ticket prices are too high. People have always made that complaint, but historically the movies have been cheap compared to concerts, major league sports and restaurants. I had to check this claim, because inflation and purchasing power can fog people's memories. Using average U.S. ticket prices[1] adjusted to 2010 dollars[2], I get the following: Year | Price | 2010 price adj. w/CPI ------------------------------…

When I want to go to the theater near me (Metreon in SF, local mall's theater in NY), the price you cite is a little over half of what I would have to pay for a single ticket. Its usually closer to $11-$12. And thats without imax or 3d.

Re: I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...

#130

Post by loganfrederick »

tseabrooks wrote: post #121
msluyter wrote: post #34

I think Alamo Drafthouse in Austin is doing it right: 1. Food & beer/wine served with movie -- convenient and much preferable to overpriced popcorn. 2. Cellphones must be turned off. 3. They take talking seriously, and preface each film with a strongly (and amusingly) worded statement to that effect. 4. No babies allowed except on specified baby nights. 5. Creative and fun special events, such as quote-alongs, sing-a…

There is a theater in Columbus, Oh Called "Arena Grand Theater" it's a mix of a traditional thatre and something like Alamo... A few points about it. 1) Always been more upclass than competing theaters (and more expensive). 2) Far less seating. 3) Beer, Food, salads, wraps, and traditional snacks. 4)Located in the "Brewery District" or "Arena District" This means there were never any children there because the area d…

In the suburbs of Columbus in Upper Arlington there is the Movie Tavern, which is a chain with a few other locations around the country. They take a very similar approach, with tables in front of each seat.
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