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Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

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Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#121

Post by embedding-shape »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #113
nebula8804 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the one hand Its fun to watch movies alone on a big screen. My area of NJ apparently could care less about movies like Knock Down The House(Biography of AOC and other house candidates), Navalny (Movie about the murdered politician opposing Putin), The Imitation Machine: Movie about Alan Turing or Last Night in Soho (A wonderful Edgar Wright thriller) On the other hand, I feel sad that no one in my region seems to…

I have seen too many video projects that were supposed to be non fictional either have fictional material or a misleading slant such that I would not consider it a good use of my time.

Yeah, kind of defeats the purpose when you have to spend hours double-checking if every "fact" you just got "taught" was actually true or not afterwards...

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#123

Post by gblargg »

ap99 wrote: post #110
vlovich123 wrote: post #108

To me this suggests that theater’s are at least partially incorrectly pricing things which explains why they are struggling.

But aren't they pricing based on how much it costs to show the film? Which in turn is how much the studios and distributors pay to make/market the film? Which is in turn driven by costs... Which are basically large bets on if a piece of art will have mass appeal.

They should price to get the most profit (or least loss). If people would buy tickets regardless of price, they could set them at $1 million each.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#124

Post by Frieren »

vlovich123 wrote: post #108

To me this suggests that theater’s are at least partially incorrectly pricing things which explains why they are struggling.

> To me this suggests that theater’s are at least partially incorrectly pricing things which explains why they are struggling.

Theaters are struggling because they need the working class to attend, and the working class has no money. This is true for any non-essential business that depends on 90% of the people.

To find new ways of extract money may help a little, but in the end the basic economics do not add up.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#125

Post by talesfromearth »

menno-sh wrote: post #90
kleiba2 wrote: post #75

When I lived in Germany, I had an apartment in the vicinity of three tiny arthouse theaters. I used to go there all the time by myself because you could basically walk to all three of them. Saw a lot of movies I would have never seen otherwise, most of which I don't remember at all. The theaters were never full. So it was basically just like watching a movie in your own living room. Yeah, except maybe for the handful…

Here in Amsterdam (and the rest of the Netherlands) all the arthouse theaters have joined forces with the Cineville subscription [0], which gives you unlimited access for I think 25 euros a month. I get a subscription for a few months sometimes and you wind up seeing so many cool films [0] https://cineville.nl

Cineville is just great. It’s available in some Belgian and German cities as well.

It sometimes feels wrong to only pay €25 after watching so many movies. So I make up for it by buying things from the cinemas.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#126

Post by Hard_Space »

locallost wrote: post #27
nebula8804 wrote: post #24

I have been quite a heavy patron of AMC theaters these past few years since COVID ended. I have seen A LOT of movies play to empty theaters. I used to actually peek at many of the rooms when I left my movie and so many were downright empty. Its the norm and its probably why their stock is trading at $1.45 as of this writing. Its a dead (not dying, dead) entertainment option. When you are competing for the same 24 hrs…

It's not the ads, but they're not helping. I still like to go to theaters, but am thinking if not going anymore because I can't really take it. I don't go to AMC since not in the US, but where I go you can't even skip them because you never know how long it will be. I sat once for literally 40 minutes. It's also crazy expensive. So they need to do these things to stay afloat, but they're driving away the last people…

In the UK in the 1980s (and with more difficulty in the 90s) I would phone the theater and ask when the film actually starts, even though it was almost always 20 minutes after the advertised programme time. Now there are no humans to ask, and my wife wants to see the entire programme anyway.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#127

Post by 4ggr0 »

ragazzina wrote: post #103
soco wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arthouse is the only thing worth watching nowadays as the others seem to only rechew the same crud. Change my mind.

Cinemas around here have started showing old films and I have rediscovered the joy of going to the movies, whether it's Some Like It Hot or Suicide Club.

same! in the last couple of years i've seen these movies in a cinema: The Big Lebowski, Fargo, La Heine, Apocalypse Now, HEAT. and i already bought tickets for Run Lola Run, Clerks and Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.

it's especially cool as someone who's young and wasn't even born when some of these movies initially came to cinemas.

at the same time it's unbelievably sad that in recent years about 70% of the movies i saw at a cinema were multiple decades old.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#128

Post by reaperducer »

technothrasher wrote: post #117
jmalicki wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

During COVID a lot of empty flights flew because otherwise the airline could lose the gate slots.

I once flew on a flight from ORD to ROC where I was the only passenger. It was very, very weird to be in a big empty cabin all by myself. The flight attendant just came and did the safety briefing sitting next to me. I asked her why they didn't just cancel the flight, and she said the plane had to be in ROC for the next morning anyway. This was in the 1990s though. I've never encountered anything like that since.

I had a similar experience. Christmas Day from CRW to CLT. Just me and the stewardesses.

They tried to sit near me and be friendly, but I was too depressed to engage. Missed opportunity.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#129

Post by globular-toast »

wodenokoto wrote: post #22

I remember I went to a small showing once as a kid. It was just our group and 1 lady in the theater. We got to small talk and the lady mentioned she had once been the only customer for a showing and told the projectionist that she didn’t want to be a bother and could come back and another day. The projectionist had apparently replied that it was no bother - they would roll the movie even if no one showed up!

Nowadays there are no projectionists in most cinemas. It would actually be more effort for them to not play the film than just let it play on schedule.

Re: Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold

#130

Post by bell-cot »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #113
nebula8804 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the one hand Its fun to watch movies alone on a big screen. My area of NJ apparently could care less about movies like Knock Down The House(Biography of AOC and other house candidates), Navalny (Movie about the murdered politician opposing Putin), The Imitation Machine: Movie about Alan Turing or Last Night in Soho (A wonderful Edgar Wright thriller) On the other hand, I feel sad that no one in my region seems to…

I have seen too many video projects that were supposed to be non fictional either have fictional material or a misleading slant such that I would not consider it a good use of my time.

That I've seen, the problem is worse than that. A movie merely says it's "based on a true story". If you're a lawyer or literature professor, that "based on" might be correct usage - since 40-ish percent of what the movie told was true. The other 60-ish percent was utter fiction.

Meanwhile, people who saw the movie and found it decently engaging are busy convincing themselves that it was 99% true. And 99% of 'em will never bother to check.

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