Ok, enough is enough. Read this!
What corporations have to understand is that it is not they who set the ticket prices. It is us. I have been out of the loop for a few months with the baby, the last movie I saw was District 9. But I paid 12 bucks for me and my wife then, which almost made me blow an O-ring, and now? This is just CRAZY! Theaters in New York City are now charging almost 20 bucks a ticket! The problem is that we let them do it! They raise the price, and we reward them for it by paying any way. Avatar sets huge records, and CEO's see dollar signs. So the prices go up even further. Here is a little secret. The prices will continue to go up so long as we continue to pay them. If they charge 40 bucks a head and we still go, they smile all the way to the bank. But what most of us don't even consider is that all we have to do is NOT PAY THEM and the prices will go down. If enough of us just don't go to the movies, they will feel the impact in their pockets.
I didn't see Avatar, and I for one was excited about movies like Iron Man 2 coming up... but when the time comes, I will have to pay 40 bucks plus a baby sitter to go see it with my wife. Throw in popcorn and a drink and my wifes red slushy and I am now paying upwards of 140 bucks to go watch a 2 hour movie. I don't care what movie it is... it is just not worth it. A movie is a movie. 3-D or not, they are selling us the same thing they were selling us for 6 bucks ten years ago. Lets put this into perspective. 13 or so years ago in New York City I paid 7 bucks each to take my girlfriend to see Titanic. Now they are charging 19.00 for Avatar. Almost three times as much!
Sure inflation happens, now things cost more to make... but think about this. If I paid 10 grand for a car 13 years ago, and prices went up the way movies have, I would be paying about 27,000.00 for the same car.
But that is not the case. In 1997 a new car cost about 21,000 dollars. (I removed any specific maker to avoid dumb comments.) Now, it actually costs LESS! Why? Because that is the price the market bears. The car company knows that if they double the cost of their car, they will not sell it. So why are we letting the movie industry double the cost of movie tickets, then add ANOTHER 50%?
Hey, you want to go see Iron Man 2 for 20 bucks? I got a 2007 Toyota Matrix I will sell you for the bargain price of 50,000 dollars. That is what the movie industry is telling us.
I will be the first to get in the "I'm not paying!" line. I have a sweet 40" HDTV at home. I can wait 6 months and watch Iron Man 2 on Netflix.
What do you guys think? This summer, just say no. Stay in, watch Netflix with the wife, play with the kids, or go out and play 40k. Whatever you do, do NOT go pay 20 bucks a head to watch a movie.
Jawaballs
I didn't even get into how the movie experience is starting to really suck. Last time I saw a movie, I counted no less then 27 cell phones out in hands in front of me while people were texting. Or browsing the web on their Iphone. Some of those things were bright! Nothing like trying to enjoy a movie with kids shining little flashlights in my eyes. Add to that the fact that it seems to me at least that theaters are taking a step back in design by trying to pack back in the seats they removed in the late 90s, and is it really worth it? What am I going to do, go wait in line to complain to a manager about cell phones just to have him shrug and say so what?
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15 comments:
I would have to agree with you Jawaballs.
By waiting 6 months, the $40's I would spend for my wife and I to see a movie, can now be spent on buying the BluRay and watching it in comfort on my nice big flat screen tv, where I don't need to hear my neighbours yapping about their lives while i'm trying to concentrate on the movies.
And, with the way the movie industry is going, they are bring out the DVD/BluRay's earlier and earlier. It will come to the point where you can by the DVD as you walk out of the theater.
I'll wait a bit and buy the movie, thank you very much movie industry.
Also, stop charging more to see 3D movies; they aren't that much more to make compared to the 2D version.
I used to work in a movie theatre, and the horrible thing is... the theatre doesn't even see most of the ticket cost. For the first 2 weeks, all of it goes straight to the producers, and then the 3rd week the theatre sees 50%, then finally 4th week and on the theatre gets the money from the tickets. So blame the stupid greedy producers. /:
Oh and the reason why the popcorn, drinks, candy is so expensive is for the same reason as above. Theatres have to make pretty much all of their money off of concessions.
Whether it's Regal Cinemas, AMC, or GW, companies are going to see how far they can push the needle/squeeze the lemon before the hand that feeds the gift horse in the mouth ends up biting them...or some mixture of metaphors.
I'm all for Netflix. We just need more people on the "stick it to the man" bandwagon.
Not related, but since we are talking about movies...
All movies now are just a re-hash of what has been done, and the producers don't even try to hide it anymore! They get away with it b/c the "kids" of today don't even know it!
District 9 = Alien Nation
Avatar = Dances With Wolves
Etc.
What is next? Might as well just rip off the entire Star Wars story line, oh wait Star Wars did that with The Hidden Fortress...
In the White Plains movie theater you get to pay $5+ to park and going on a Friday/Saturday night you are already looking at $20 a ticket for seating in the expanded screen hall. Sucks! I to will just wait for DVD or just FIOS is when it comes out. Of course I have to upgrade my old projection TV to a flat screen...
The last movie I paid full price for was Indiana Jones. It's just too expensive. We're fortunate enough to have a dollar theater in town so if I really want the big screen experience that's the place to go. Or just wait for Netflix.
Yeah, and we should boycott GW too for their high prices! ;-)
While it's nice to see movies on the big screen, it's not that much nicer. I agree with those that say just buy the DVD when it comes out. Or not, since by then you'll have heard more about if it's really worth spending money on or not.
For a reasonable price, seeing movies on screen is nice, and it can be good to get out of the house now and then even if it's for a sedentary thing like watching a film. One of the local theaters is running showings of older movies at certain times at reasonable ($2-5) prices, classic/cult movies like Aliens or Big Trouble in Little China, and also doing kid movie showings on the weekends for $3 which includes a small drink and popcorn. Since you don't have to pay the producers as much twenty years later, more goes to the House.
I'd like to see more local theaters take this sort of thing up - I'd much rather pay a few bucks to go see something like Ben Hur on the big screen than pick the new movie we think is least likely to suck.
wtf, what theater are you going to man. I just say Green zone and it cost 20 bucks for me and my father
The sad thing is, if you don't pay they somehow make you sound like a criminal...
It's probably a good thing that there are less and less good movies around these days. Though I do want to see a few of them:)
At least the Ultra Marines movie is direct to DVD :) (hope they release it to BD, as I will buy it because I am too curious not to, and since it is rendered I really do want the resmolution!)
Well the movies dont set the prices its the theater chains, I have a place in town that sells tickets for $5 still with $1 popcorn. but yes the increases aggrivate me too
Im with you all on that. I went to go see Alice in Wonderland in 3D recently, and the only reason I went was because my wife really wanted to, and I had been sitting on a gift card for a few months. Before that the last movie I saw was in 2008. Netflix all the way!
Jawwa I see where your coming from and on the otherhand with the new BA codex up and about soon I know you will still pay GW handsomely for doing the same thing!
It's like GW you buy it even though it's expensive and you enjoy the experience. I'm not a person with a 40" flatscreen and full surround sound at home so Yes I like to spend some money going to the movies.
@ Fritz but hasn't everything been done before? I mean how many stories were great books before they got made into some crappy movie?
Cheers CJ
@CJ I think there are only seven stories all in all and then everything is a variation of them. Something about classical writing:) Look it up if you are curious as I am not a good source here:)
At what point does it become too much? 30 or 40 bucks a ticket? At the rate the movie industry increases their prices, you will be paying that in 10 years. I don't think there is any industry out there that doubles the cost of their service every ten or fifteen years. Especially when the movies themselves remain fundamentally the same. A little louder and flashier, but you are still just paying for 2 hours of some one acting out a story.
off course it will increase.fewer and fewer people go to the movies so profit margins need to be higheer per customer. GW seems to want to do the same thing (and a lot of other hard hit businesses) Unfortunatly this eventually kill there business.
But until then I'm going to hit the cinema's when I feel like it :) I'm a sucker for old school cinema flair. And it's still a great date location ;)
Cheers CJ
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