Matt O’Connor
If you’ve gone to a movie theater recently, you may have noticed that your screenings are usually pretty empty. Seats aren’t being filled, tickets aren’t being sold, and the moviegoing experience doesn’t have the pazazz that it used to. But things have changed, the world has changed. The unfortunate reality is that movie theaters are closing down left and right, with the entire industry seemingly close to being in jeopardy. Movie theaters are dying, but how did it get to this point?
The Impact Of The Pandemic
When the world shut down in March of 2020, everyone and everything was affected in more ways than one. Movie theaters in particular were basically forced to go dark for most of the year. This left companies and moviemakers with two main options. They either had to delay their movies until the theaters reopened again, or they had to dump their films on streaming services to earn their money back. This caused the global office to lose billions of dollars as the Pandemic continued to take its toll on the entertainment industry. When theaters finally began to reopen in 2021, there were numerous rules and guidelines that theaters needed to follow. And although there were movies like Spider-Man: No Way Home that captured the same experiences of moviegoing like the ones before the pandemic, things would never be the same.
Things Are Getting Pricier
Due to a number of complex financial factors, everything related to movie theaters has gone up in price. Snacks and beverages have become much more expensive than they used to be, which has led to customers attempting to sneak in their own food to circumvent paying the increased prices. Even tickets themselves have gone up in price. In an article published by CableTV, it was reported that only 7% of Americans prefer watching movies in a theater rather than at home. In addition, the article also touched on the average movie ticket price being around $16.08. It’s clear that things are not looking good financially for many theater chains, which is a big part as to why locations across the country and across the globe are slowly but surely vanishing.
What We’re Watching
In recent years, people have become a lot more picky and selective about what movies they want to go see in theaters. With the prices going up and the experience being less enjoyable for many, the general public doesn’t consider theater chains to be a major way of consuming entertainment anymore. With the advent of streaming services, many consumers feel like it’s not worth going to theaters to see a movie when they just wait a month or two to watch it at home. The movies that people do go and see are typically the ones that they know will either wholeheartedly interest them or come from a franchise that they like. But even big blockbuster movies aren’t safe from flopping, with Tron: Ares, Captain America: Brave New World and Snow White all being considered box office bombs. It’s even worse with original films, since people are way more judgemental about going to see something that they aren’t familiar with.
What Happens Now?
While there are quite a few highly anticipated films in the pipeline that will surely be successful for theater chains like Avengers: Doomsday, the recent trends still set a scary precedent for the industry and could potentially be enough to sink the ship at some point down the road. Streaming has taken over, and it’s gonna take a lot for theaters to fully bounce back without the backing of the general public. In conclusion, go to the movies.
