The Cinema Business is Dead
By: Jordan Fraser
Tags: Investing, Money, Finance, Entertainment, Business

The Cinema Business is Dead

They’ve gone the way of the roadshow before them

Photo by sydney Rae on Unsplash

Back in the golden days of cinema, patrons were given two options for enjoying their theatrical releases.

Most films were released into cinema the standard way that we’re used to seeing today. But special films, those that were considered “event films”, were given an entirely different level of treatment.

Films that were considered events were mostly musicals and historical epics, including movies such as West Side Story and Ben-Hur.

Tentpole movies like these couldn’t just endure the regular movie treatment, so these movies were released with a roadshow.

What was a roadshow?

A roadshow was nothing more than a gimmick used to create the illusion of prestige and glamour while marketing the release of a new movie.

Back in the 1950’s, movies were seen as far more common and less grand than live theatre.

For live theatre you’d pay more for a ticket, get dressed up, and make a whole night of it. Live theatre was an event, and film marketers wanted that same level of hype for their movies.

To achieve this goal, movies that were given a roadshow were set up as live shows. The movie would be far longer than a regular film, and was broken up with an intermission.

The cinema generally wouldn’t show commercials before the movie, and provide programs with seat tickets.

Just as with live theatre, the movie would only be shown once a day on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursday and Fridays. During the other days, the film would be given a matinee, increasing the showing to twice daily.

The movie would also tour, showing in just one city for a limited time before packing up and moving to the next city.

In every way possible, the roadshow cinema experience tried to copy the feel of being at a night of live theatre. For a far higher price, audiences would be allowed to feel as though they were at something far fancier than they actually were.

This gave movies the appearance of glamour, a feeling that would carry on to the regular cinema, and eventually, to video cassette sales.

Photo: The Verge and HBO

Fast Forward to Today

On Christmas Day of this year, Wonder Woman 1984 will be released in cinema and on HBO Max at the exact same time.

This means that audiences are going to be able to choose whether to stay in the comfort and safety of their own home, or experience the glamour and prestige of going to the cinema.

It’s also important to know that HBO will charge no extra cost for seeing the movie, even on its release day.

Right away, some people will argue that their plan is to see the movie in the cinema, and they’ll do it because of the size and quality difference when comparing their screen to that of the cinema.

While this logic may have rung true 20 years ago, the same logic doesn’t apply today.

TV’s that are commercially available today have every technical enhancement that cinema screens offer. This is because we no longer live in an age when certain tech is only available to certain people.

This widening of technological availability is the same as what happened with phones.

15 years ago, only business executives owned high powered mobile phones that the common man could only dream of. But these days, we we all have the same model of iPhone or Samsung.

Companies in tech would rather sell more units than be exclusive, so there’s nothing a company can buy for its business that you can’t also buy for your home.

So depending on what set-up you have at home, and depending on where you’re able to sit in the cinema, the viewing experience at home may be far superior.

According to Octane Seating, even a modest at-home setup can beat a cinema experience purely because of where you sit and how you view the screen.

The Changing Times

So if the advantage isn’t a technical one, then what does the cinema truly offer?

The answer is that cinema’s only true advantage is the same as that of the roadshow 70 years ago. The only thing the cinema offers us is prestige.

As more people choose to stay home for their safety, going out is being seen as rebellious and defiant.

Being seen breaking societal norms is its own form of luxury. It’s also a way for people to return to their feeling of “normal”, and remember the days when going to the cinema wasn’t a big deal.

But a business can’t survive on patrons who come back because of a feeling of rebellion or nostalgia. Nostalgia can carry a movie, but it can’t carry an entire business long-term.

Eventually, people are going to get bored of trying to piss off their friends and family, and others are going to acclimate to their new feeling of normal.

When that happens, the cinema business is going to find itself irrelevant in the world that emerges after the virus.

Just like the roadshow before it, people will tire of paying more money for something that has been completely outpaced by technology.

People realised that the roadshow offered them no extra movie for the far higher price, and the same realisation is happening again today.

While the roadshow was eventually killed in part by the advent of TV, I can’t help but think that this quote applies to cinema’s today as it did to the roadshow and Hello Dolly in the 1960's.

“When Dolly! finished production, 17 of the 25 top film rentals were roadshows. In response, the industry prepared a bottleneck of reserved-seat giants. A record-breaking 12 were scheduled for release over the last four months of 1968. Marketers faced a huge dilemma in catching people’s attention amid the glut and convincing them that the roadshow experience was still worth the time, cost, and effort. With a roadshow opening practically every week, how do you market something as being special when it isn’t special anymore?” — Roadshow! The Fall of Film Musicals in the 1960’s by Matthew Kennedy.

Photo by Nicholas Green on Unsplash

End Times

There was once a time when movies only came out on streaming services well after their cinema release, but Disney + changed all that with the release of Mulan straight to their streaming platform.

While that movie was terrible, it would have been no less terrible in the cinema, and deep down, we all know it.

Mulan just started what Wonder Woman plans on finishing.

So while a movie provides a fun night out, it doesn’t provide a compelling experience that justifies the expense. It’s far less expensive and no less immersive to watch a movie at home rather than at a cinema in 2020.

So goodbye cinema’s, we enjoy you while you lasted. You saw us through the entire 20th century, and some of the 21st.

With such small margins and slow tech development, you were a business that was always destined for death. But the virus brought your death much faster than it would have otherwise come.

We’ll remember you fondly, and will teach future generations about you in history class.

Go gentle into that good night, don’t bother raging against the dying of the cinema experience.

Though wise companies at their end know dark is right, they know it because Disney+ released Mulan and pretty much everything changed.

Enjoy Wonder Woman, and see it as a last and final hoorah. Then celebrate the new year and ponder your forever sleep that is very soon to come.