Crown Theatres' take on moviegoing trends

Michael Furlinger on August 2, 2006 at 8:05 am

God i cant take it……Every 10 years the boxoffice hits a DOWN TURN ……..This summer numbers are UP ……….Do not sell sky !All will be well with the movie bsns …PRODUCT , PRODUCT , THATS WHAT THE BSNS IS BASED ON ………I can only imagine how others will now attack ….GO

Jim Vecchio on August 2, 2006 at 8:25 am

I am thankful that the CROWN THEATERS offer these free films, as many of the individuals in my agency (which services developmentally-disabled adults)look forward to these free screening each summer. Most of them are juvenile offerings, but that’s okay, it kinda reminds me f the summer kiddy matinees I enjoyed when I was young.The downside is: You better get there early, because there is nary a space in the parking lot, and, if you leave in the middle of the movie for any reason, your seat is in peril, despite the fact that there are usually several packed auditoriums. My personal feeling is people will jump at the chance to get anything for free!

Michael Furlinger on August 2, 2006 at 4:24 pm

There is no gloom and doom so why woould he say so?

Michael Furlinger on August 2, 2006 at 4:43 pm

schmadrian have you ever worked a day in a theater ???

schmadrian on August 2, 2006 at 5:00 pm

Let me get this straight: in order to comment intelligently about White House politics, you’re suggesting I have to have worked there?

That in order to comment with any degree of alacrity about Major League Baseball, the National Football League, or the NBA, I have to have worked in those places?

Lovely, piercing logic ya got there.

You know, the idea that transformative change is approaching in the film distribution business is not something I’ve drummed up all on my lonesome. But then your ‘I know you are, but what am I?’ comebacks don’t actually address the facts I’ve presented on this site of late.

schmadrian on August 3, 2006 at 7:03 am

You know, you’re right. If all you’re really looking at is current box office numbers, then yes, everything is fine. One could certainly go to bed at night feeling comfy about the status quo.

To the same extent that taking a person’s pulse provides a comprehensive bead on their health. “Heart-rate is good…steady…strong… Looks fine to me.”

Of course, when you pull back on this person and take a look at the ‘bigger picture’–
No. I know you don’t want to hear this analogy.

schmadrian on August 3, 2006 at 9:27 am

Actually, the next ‘major change’ for theatres will be simultaneous release. Which, for the initiated, is not a textbook ‘technological’ change as we’ve had in the past, it’s what they call a ‘sea change’; it’ll be the first time ever that a ticket-buyer will have a choice other than at the cinema (not including pirated copies) of how they can view a new release, either by download rental/purchase or DVD rental/purchase.

But of course, you probably don’t recognize this as being a factor on the horizon, do you…?

schmadrian on August 3, 2006 at 2:44 pm

stares at screen

As you prefaced a previous post with the comment of who I remind you of, I have to confess that you remind me of the 55 year old man who’s still living with his mom… I’m staggered by how much of this information is actually out there…but you seem attached to a mindset that’s at the very least, luddite-ish.

stares some more at your last comment

I’m staggered. Congrats; that doesn’t happen very often.

The following is a response to the Mark Cuban blog concerning how to ‘turn around the cinema-going business’ as noted elsewhere on Cinema Treasures. I don’t align myself with some of the writer’s conclusions about the future of cinemas…but I’m offering this up because what he suggests is the ‘change’ I’m talking about: simultaneous releases. When the percentage of the current movie-going public that’s disgruntled with the cost and overall negatives associated with going to the cinema (whatever this percentage is, 10, 15, 25%…) starts getting its new release viewing away from the cinemas, this will be the sea change I referred to. Once this ‘thin edge of the wedge’ has been applied, nothing will ever be the same again. (No, I’m not saying cinemas are doomed. I’m saying that the reference paradigm for peoples’ viewing will inexorably and forever be changed. Cinemas will continue to exist. But more and more of the industry’s revenues will come from non-theatrical distribution, and if you can’t see how THAT will change things… Then I really don’t know how to explain it to you.)

“The theatre experience will never beat sitting in your own living room. Why do you think we spend so much on home theatre systems with pimped-out surround sound and big screen HDTV’s? The future of the movie industry is in the home and traditional movie theatres are dinosaurs facing extinction. We need iTunes for movies, and Mark, you have the money to pull it off.


Give us opening-day, brand new releases in our home, at a reasonable price, and you’ll see boom times again in the movie biz. (Not 8 weeks after it was released in the theatres, opening day.) I’ll spend $19.99 on a new release that I can download to my DVR, watch, and later burn off to DVD for safe keeping. (Twenty bucks may sound steep to some, but actually I’m saving big time compared to the $50 I usually drop in a traditional theatre.) The cost savings for film companies would be huge: no packaging costs on DVDs, no splitting profits with theatres, etc.

Of course, this would officially mark the death of theatres as the distribution channel for movies, but their demise is already evident and unavoidable. The film companies should embrace and ride the waves of change instead of swimming against them.”

Karen Colizzi Noonan on August 3, 2006 at 5:55 pm

Not to change the subject but…. speaking of the Crown Theatres… the chain is historically linked to the Schine Theater chain of old – Dan Crown being the grandson of Myer Schine. So i would expect superior showmanship and attention to patron needs to be the hallmark of the Crown Theatres as they were of the Schine Theaters.