Tomorrow, Saturday September 3rd has been declared National Cinema Day. Theater chains across the nation are offering all film showings at $3 each — and that includes premium formats like 3D, 4DX, ScreenX and RPX. Now’s the time to try something in a crazy format if you haven’t already, especially since those premium tickets can run up to $23 a pop other times.
This event was announced by the nonprofit arm of the National Association of Theater Owners. 3,000 locations (over 30,0000 screens) are participating, and that includes chains like Regal and AMC as well as participating art house theaters.
The purpose of this is two-fold — get people out to see movies on the weekend before Labor Day, a statistically low attendance weekend, but also to bring people back to the movies in general.
In 2019, 1.2 billion movie tickets were sold. $11.4 billion was made off ticket sales. And then, of course, 2020 — that number slumped to $2.2 billion or 224 million tickets. In 2021, the numbers were at around 500 million tickets sold.
July of 2022 marked an improvement in these numbers. People came out in huge crowds for tentpole movies like Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Top Gun: Maverick and Minions: The Rise of Gru to name a few. It injected a surge of hope in an activity that had been hit hard by the pandemic and perhaps a bit of hope to those who make movies… that there’s still a place for films in a theater setting, and not just in the average American living room via a streaming service.
So yes, this is a bit of an unsolicited ad from me to go attend a film in honor of National Cinema Day. I find this idea exciting. After all, the majesty of seeing films on a huge screen, popcorn in hand, was one of the things that lead me to this business to begin with.
Sources:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/187076/tickets-sold-at-the-north-american-box-office-since-2001/
https://variety.com/2022/film/news/box-office-top-gun-elvis-pandemic-return-1235303574/
Bridget LaMonica 