Going to the movie theater can be an expensive outing. Seeing an IMAX 3D film will cost you $21.50/ticket BEFORE tax at the AMC Loews 34th Street 14. If you’re purchasing a movie ticket for you and your girl that’s $45.98 after tax just for the two movie tickets, and that’s before purchasing drinks, candy, or popcorn.
The major movie studios recognize that many Americans aren’t willing to shell out $$$$$ for the theater experience anymore, but they also recognize those people still want to see Hollywood’s most popular movies. This has put the movie studios in quite the pickle. It’s not like they can just lower the cost of movie tickets. Films these days often have budgets totaling in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Operational costs for movie theaters are expensive too. So what do they do to get people watching new releases again? Major studio executives are exploring the option of pushing new releases into homes just 14 to 20 days after they hit theaters and charging $30-$50 for that movie rental.
Six of the seven biggest Hollywood studios are continuing to push to offer movies in the home mere weeks after their theatrical debuts.
However, the companies, particularly Fox and Warner Bros., are showing greater flexibility about timing. Initially, Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tsujihara had kicked off negotiations with exhibitors by offering to cut them in on a percentage of digital revenues if they agreed to let them debut films on-demand for $50 a rental some 17 days after they opened. Currently, most major movies are only made available to rent some 90 days after their release. Some studios offer films for sale electronically roughly 70 days after their bow in theaters.
Other studios, particularly Fox and Universal, felt that $50 was too steep a price to ask consumers to pay. They are now trying to get exhibitors to agree to a plan that would involve a lower priced premium on-demand option that was made available at a slightly later date, according to three studio insiders and two exhibition insiders. Fox and Warner Bros., for instance, are considering making films available between 30 to 45 days after their opening, but at $30 a rental, a price they believe won’t give customers sticker shock. Universal, which is seen as being the most aggressive negotiator in these talks, would like the home entertainment debut to remain in the 20-day range. (via Variety)
I can say that cost isn’t really prohibitive for me when it comes to seeing new releases. Typically, I’m just too busy to sit my ass in a theater for several hours and watch a movie when I could be at home working and multi-tasking while watching Netflix. So $30 for a new release just two weeks after a movie has hit theaters is something I’d 100% be on board with. Except for movies like Avatar and Doctor Strange that make genuinely good use of the IMAX 3D technology, I really see no reason to spend $$$$$ to go to the theaters, so I’m all on board with this.
For more on this proposed plan you can follow THIS LINK and head on over to Variety!