$50 to watch day and date releases at home!

[Rblu-Dblu]

I know a lot of people would spring for this vs. going to the theater. Especially if you have a larger family, this idea would trump the cost of theater tickets alone.

http://variety.com/2016/film/news/st...ve-1201725168/

[zorbonaut]

Originally Posted by Rblu-Dblu

I know a lot of people would spring for this vs. going to the theater. Especially if you have a larger family, this idea would trump the cost of theater tickets alone.

http://variety.com/2016/film/news/st...ve-1201725168/

I could never see myself springing for this idea at the price point of $50. I have a family of 5 and even the rare times we all see a film at the theater together, it is always below $50. Most of the time we will go and see films in groups. I'll see R rated films with my wife or adult son, some PG-13 and PG with 11 year old daughter and G/PG with 5 year old.

I can never see a time when I could justify $50 for a glorified rental, even if it was for the whole family.

[Michael24]

Yeah, I'd stick with still going to the theater, too.

[FrodoBagginz]

Can't imagine movie studios putting the big money making films onto this service. Mostly we will probably see movies like Epic Movie and Date Movie. Nobody wants to pay $50 to see that tripe.

[Doctor Jack]

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...ht=sean+parker

A day late.

[AKORIS]

no thanks, I'll stick to buying the blu rays when they come out....

[Macgyver10]

Good deal for my family... I'm the oldest of 8 kids (soon to be 9) and it costs us $88.60 to go see a 2D matinee right now.

[Groot]

I spend $30-$75 every theater trip (the high end if my parents go) so this would be awesome. Prima costs too much to be reasonable for anyone but uber wealthy people.

[doctor_who]

Originally Posted by FrodoBagginz

Can't imagine movie studios putting the big money making films onto this service. Mostly we will probably see movies like Epic Movie and Date Movie. Nobody wants to pay $50 to see that tripe.

Second time in three days I've read "tripe" on this forum. Glad to see it's making a comeback.

[Captain Flint]

Yeah, no thanks. I'm only spending about $7 to see morning showtimes at my local Regal.

Theater is always barren early in the morning too. Win-win for me.

[Dynamo of Eternia]

Originally Posted by zorbonaut

I could never see myself springing for this idea at the price point of $50. I have a family of 5 and even the rare times we all see a film at the theater together, it is always below $50. Most of the time we will go and see films in groups. I'll see R rated films with my wife or adult son, some PG-13 and PG with 11 year old daughter and G/PG with 5 year old.

I can never see a time when I could justify $50 for a glorified rental, even if it was for the whole family.

I have mixed feelings about this myself, but in the article it does say that they are partnering (somehow) with theater distributors, and with the $50 fee you would also get two free tickets to go to a local movie theater for a movie.

IMO the whole ting is a catch-22. While $50 is a lot (especially since it is just my wife and I), and the quality of streaming tends to be somewhat lacking, I can kind of see the appeal of this.

While I otherwise like going to a movie theater since I do enjoy the "big screen" experience, the worst part tends to be the other people in the theater. Not that everyone is bad (and I do actually like when a new movie comes out that is highly anticipated, and people cheer at various parts, etc.), but my wife and I have had A LOT of bad luck going to a theater and having the rudest, most annoying people sit near us (adults who can't shut up... kids who can't shut up... kids who kick the seat, etc.). And our tolerance for it has gotten less and less over the years.



But this whole partnering with theaters thing is also kind of what bugs me a bit. The last time that this sort of thing was proposed, it was the exhibitor/theater chains that cried fowl over it, for obvious reasons. And I certainly don't want to see theaters going out of business. But the article states, "To get exhibitors on board, the company proposes cutting them in on a significant percentage of the revenue, as much as $20 of the fee."

Again, while I don't want to see theaters go out of business, why the hell should they get almost half of the money for this service? This is reminiscent IMO of all of the talk back in the mid to late 90s about how email was impacting the post office and the idea was being "kicked around" (but never went anywhere) about there being a cost-per-email sent that people would have to pay which would go to the post office, all for a communication transaction that they had absolutely NOTHING to do with.

On the one hand while the two free tickets to a theater with the $50 is nice and all, since avoiding the hassles of going to a theater (i.e. rude people) is what appeals to me about this option, getting two free tickets to a theater kind of defeats the purpose.

I'd rather just pay $30 or $35, not get the free tickets, and not have a chunk of the money arbitrarily going to the movie theaters. At that price, I'd be more inclined to just stay home and see a movie.



That said, I am curious about the 48 hour viewing window. Is it only one view, meaning that if once you watch the film from start to finish, that's it and you lose access? Or can you rewind, fast forward, and otherwise watch it as many times as you want during that 48 hours?

If it can be watched more than once, I can see that being appealing (even at $50) to people who might go see a new Star Wars movie several times or something like that.

Plus even at the $50 price point, it would be cool to get some friends together and chip in together. That way they don't have to deal with others at the theater, and if they do want to talk amongst themselves, they aren't bothering anyone aside from (potentially) each other.

[dvdmike]

If they are 4k PCM DCP based I would be there all day

[klauswhereareyou]

Unless they can unearth a pristine print of Orson Welles' original cut of The Magnificent Ambersons, no thanks!

[Eternal Dreamer]

Even taking my family and buying snacks for everyone, this wouldn't be worth the money (or a good deal) for me because luckily, cinema prices are fairly low where I am. There's even one cinema that has free unlimited popcorn once a week, so you can save more money going that day. Plus, concession prices are great there, too.

I'm curious to see what happens with projects like these, though. Despite whatever protection they may use, it'll no doubt be broken soon enough, just like nearly every form of copy protection. This will just make it a lot easier for pirates to upload copies of new movies. Even if they can't break any protection, they could easily just point a high-quality camera at their screen and capture the audio stream or something like that without having to worry about cinema employees catching them.

Either way, it's cool for consumers to have more choices.

[jacobsever]

This is the stupidest thing in the world.

I already refuse to spend $6 on a digital rental. Spending money to watch something on your home setup is just a complete waste of money.

Why would I spend $50 to see a movie on my 50" tv in my bedroom, alone, when I could go see it on a huge screen with better sound in a room full of like-minded individuals for 1/5 the price?!

I'm actually angry at how dumb of an idea this is.

EDIT: In reading through some of these comments, I totally didn't even think about those with families/kids. I am a single man, that goes to movies by himself, and never buys food or drink. So my theater experience costs from $7 at the low end, to $12 at the high end. With that, I could go to the movie theater once a week, for over a month, for the price of one rental at home.

[Ray Jackson]

The end is nigh.

...theaters will be a relic of the past within 20 years.

[MrBlonde]

Even if it was free, I'd still pay money to go see films in a theatre. Nothing compares.

[DanTheMan]

Originally Posted by MrBlonde

Even if it was free, I'd still pay money to go see films in a theatre. Nothing compares.

This is a good idea for those who "appreciate."

[ZoetMB]

Originally Posted by Dynamo of Eternia

But this whole partnering with theaters thing is also kind of what bugs me a bit. The last time that this sort of thing was proposed, it was the exhibitor/theater chains that cried fowl over it, for obvious reasons. And I certainly don't want to see theaters going out of business. But the article states, "To get exhibitors on board, the company proposes cutting them in on a significant percentage of the revenue, as much as $20 of the fee."

Again, while I don't want to see theaters go out of business, why the hell should they get almost half of the money for this service? This is reminiscent IMO of all of the talk back in the mid to late 90s about how email was impacting the post office and the idea was being "kicked around" (but never went anywhere) about there being a cost-per-email sent that people would have to pay which would go to the post office, all for a communication transaction that they had absolutely NOTHING to do with.

Very bad comparison. The post office is a government service paid for by taxpayers. And frankly (and I'm in the tech business), I never heard anything about consumers being charged to send emails, which couldn't happen anyway because the government does not own or control the Internet (even though it started as the Arpanet).

The reason why theaters would be entitled to a huge cut is because theaters are guaranteed an exclusive theatrical window. That window used to be a year. It's been cut back and cut back and now it's just a few weeks and for many independent films, there is no window - the film is available on many online streaming services the same day it hits theaters. They're offering $20 to get theater buy-in, but over time it would be reduced and reduced. IMO, the theaters already blew it when they permitted shorter windows. They should have definitely refused to play any film that didn't have a minimum theatrical exclusive window and they possibly should have refused to play any film from any studio which broke those conventions. The studios would have had no choice but to back off. Years ago, the studios used to guarantee the "nut" of major theaters in NY, L.A., San Francisco, Chicago and a few other cities. The "nut" is the basic operating expense of rent, insurance and staff. They don't do that anymore and they still give the theaters next to nothing in the opening weeks of a film. Add to that all the equipment investments theaters have had to make and the theater business is becoming completely unsustainable.

Take away theater exclusive windows without paying them and it's the end of theaters. Theaters are already in decline. We lost some independent theaters during the transition to digital (mostly the ones who were too out of it to get involved with industry funding plans), but especially in cities where real-estate is expensive, theaters are disappearing. I've posted this before, but in spite of some recent new additions, NYC has lost 18% of its screens and 32% of its theaters since 2001 and roughly 15% of its seats over the last three years.

Since theaters give films their imprimatur, if theaters disappear, movie budgets will drop dramatically and we'll get tons of films that look like "direct to video" productions. Go on to a streaming service and look at the endless crap that's available on there and that's what the film business will largely become.

Competition is generally a good thing, but if you carve up markets too much, no one makes money and everyone goes out of business.

[ZoetMB]

Originally Posted by Dynamo of Eternia

But this whole partnering with theaters thing is also kind of what bugs me a bit. The last time that this sort of thing was proposed, it was the exhibitor/theater chains that cried fowl over it, for obvious reasons. And I certainly don't want to see theaters going out of business. But the article states, "To get exhibitors on board, the company proposes cutting them in on a significant percentage of the revenue, as much as $20 of the fee."

Again, while I don't want to see theaters go out of business, why the hell should they get almost half of the money for this service? This is reminiscent IMO of all of the talk back in the mid to late 90s about how email was impacting the post office and the idea was being "kicked around" (but never went anywhere) about there being a cost-per-email sent that people would have to pay which would go to the post office, all for a communication transaction that they had absolutely NOTHING to do with.

Very bad comparison. The post office is a government service paid for by taxpayers. And frankly (and I've been involved in the tech business since 1980), I never heard anything about consumers being charged to send emails, which couldn't happen anyway because the government does not own or control the Internet (even though it started as the Arpanet). What you may be confusing that with was a post office proposal to provide email with extra services, such as proof of delivery, etc. for a fee. But that wasn't really practical either.

The reason why theaters would be entitled to a huge cut is because theaters are guaranteed an exclusive theatrical window. That window used to be a year. It's been cut back and cut back and now it's just a few weeks and for many independent films, there is no window - the film is available on many online streaming services the same day it hits theaters. They're offering $20 to get theater buy-in, but over time it would be reduced and reduced. IMO, the theaters already blew it when they permitted shorter windows. They should have definitely refused to play any film that didn't have a minimum theatrical exclusive window and they possibly should have refused to play any film from any studio which broke those conventions. The studios would have had no choice but to back off. Years ago, the studios used to guarantee the "nut" of major theaters in NY, L.A., San Francisco, Chicago and a few other cities. The "nut" is the basic operating expense of rent, insurance and staff. They don't do that anymore and they still give the theaters next to nothing in the opening weeks of a film. Add to that all the equipment investments theaters have had to make and the theater business is becoming completely unsustainable.

Take away theater exclusive windows without paying them and it's the end of theaters. Theaters are already in decline. We lost some independent theaters during the transition to digital (mostly the ones who were too out of it to get involved with industry funding plans), but especially in cities where real-estate is expensive, theaters are disappearing. I've posted this before, but in spite of some recent new additions, NYC has lost 18% of its screens and 32% of its theaters since 2001 and roughly 15% of its seats over the last three years.

Since theaters give films their imprimatur, if theaters disappear, movie budgets will drop dramatically and we'll get tons of films that look like "direct to video" productions. Go on to a streaming service and look at the endless crap that's available on there and that's what the film business will largely become.

Competition is generally a good thing, but if you carve up markets too much, no one makes money and everyone goes out of business.