Grab Your Tickets — Four Discount Movie Days Coming Soon
Movieguide® Contributor
Next year, National Cinema Day will be celebrated with four separate discount movie days.
“Retitled ‘@ the Movies,’ the initiative — hosted by The Cinema Foundation, the non-profit branch of the National Association of Theatre Owners — will feature a series of quarterly events to promote moviegoing and bolster attendance throughout the year,” Variety reported Dec. 10.
Theaters across the nation will have different promotions for each event. It will kick off with National Popcorn Day, with half-price popcorn and free upgrades, on Jan. 19, 2025. Then comes Sneak Peek Saturday on Apr. 19, followed by Date Night @ the Movies on Aug. 15 and finished with Family Day @ the Movies on Nov. 9.
“Sneak Peek Saturday will offer a look at upcoming summer and holiday films with content from CinemaCon, the annual movie theater industry trade show that offers trailers and other featurettes that are typically reserved for exhibitors and industry professionals,” Variety reported. “It’s unclear what kind of price cuts or incentives will be offered on the other discount days.”
“The Cinema Foundation is committed to this year-long campaign by offering exhibitors opportunities to engage with their communities in fun and exciting ways,” said Bryan Braunlich, the Foundation’s executive director. “This is the result of months of hard work and collaboration among our industry partners, and we cannot wait to invite moviegoers across the country to participate in what will be continued enjoyment at the movies.”
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Former Cinema Foundation president Jackie Brenneman created Cinema Day in 2022 to boost the theater economy. In most multiplexes, tickets were only $3, though some bustling cities like NYC saw prices as high as $18. In 2023, most theaters sold tickets for only $4. There wasn’t a national cinema day in 2024.
“The previous National Cinema Day’s in 2022 and 2023 were big successes with roughly 8.5 million attendees and $34 million in revenue garnered on the on the one day in 2023,” Dark Horizons reported.
Mike Bowers, chair of the Cinema Foundation, said, “Cinemas are an indispensable part of our culture. These celebrations emphasize the power of moviegoing to bring us all together to share and create long-lasting memories with our friends, families, and community.”
National Cinema Day was almost too successful last year, which IndieWire says is part of the reason why the event was skipped this year. LA and Atlanta theaters had an overflow of people, which required police evacuation.
It also faced “challenges in the changing nature of post-COVID box office. Unlike its predecessors, this year’s Labor Day-adjacent dates had significant new wide releases,” IndieWire reported.
“Distributors are prohibited from setting ticket prices, but they have some say by virtue of contractual entitlement: Film rentals are based on a minimum price, so NCD requires distributors to waive those clauses,” IndieWire reported. “No major film would want to dilute its opening-weekend gross with discounted tickets while facing elevated competition from bargain-priced films.”
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