Movie Pass to the Rescue…ish.

Mr. Carrot
Sep 7, 2018 · 3 min read

I realize that my last post was a bit rant-y and feel the need to clarify some things. I love the film industry. It may have its ups and downs and I may be in a frustrated place career wise right now (although I’m in school. What do I have to worry about other than student loans and late homework assignments), but I really am grateful to be in this industry. I know how lucky I am to be pursuing what I love and have the support of friends and family. Also, The Meg was a great movie. I loved watching Jason Statham running around trying to survive a giant shark. I also love blockbusters in general and would give my arm (maybe) for a chance to be in one. Hell, I’m usually at the movies opening night for blockbuster movies.

HOWEVER, this is my blog and I can complain if I want. That being said, I’m going to praise something: MoviePass. MoviePass as a concept is a fantastic idea that this industry needs. It may be slowly bleeding out to the inevitable death right now, but it started off pretty well. It was a simple concept: pay a fixed amount each month and you can see a movie a day, every day. The premise is great because few people are going to go to the movies every day, and those who will are subsidized by the people who barely go once a month. Also, the prices were fixed depending on the market, so someone in LA would pay $30 a month (where tickets are about $17 on a friday night) and someone in Montana might pay $10 a month (with about $8) weekend tickets). The price according to location method worked.

This got popular and MoviePass wanted more members, so they made a change. Now, it would be $10 a month for everyone. Well, that didn’t work for very long. People started abusing the system and MoviePass was losing money fast. Theater chains wouldn’t reimburse them like MoviePass had hoped. So they made another change. Only certain movies could be seen. Well, in order to keep costs down, MoviePass would make available only the less popular movies that didn’t have extreme weekend pricing, as they still had to pay the full price of the tickets.

Well, this actually works fantastically for the point I have been making. The movies that customers are allowed to choose between tend to be smaller or independent movies. This gets people in the theaters seeing movies they wouldn’t normally, which I think is awesome. I love seeing everything I can and this method works great. Plus, I get exposed to different actors, which is my whole concern. Even if MoviePass is falling apart, AMC and Cinemark have created similar services. If Regal (c’mon regal, get with it) follows suit, the three biggest movie chains will all have a similar service to MoviePass, so that, if MoviePass does collapse, there will still be a chance that these smaller movies get seen. Basically, there’s still hope. And hopefully, I’ll be one of those actors on the screen (indie film or blockbuster) in a few years. Here’s to hoping.