While the world complains about the price of gas, I remain enraged about the price of seeing a movie. I went to my local multiplex last night to see Thor.
21 frigging $ for 2 of us. 10.50 per ticket. If you want 3d, its two more bucks, fake IMAX will make one ticket price 16.50. Per person.
And they wonder why people download movies.
What complete bullshit. I could buy the DVD for less and watch on my big screen with surround sound in my pajamas without all the annoyance of interacting with morons. I
At home there is no asshole that sits right next to me with an entire theater of open seats. No bimbo behind me, compulsively screaming or laughing too loud. No frat boy reject answering their phone during a dramatic scene and carrying on a loud conversation. There isn’t that horrible person that keeps asking, “What’s happening?” “What does that mean?” “Why is he doing that!” No one even laughs at the stupid etrade commercials that are not cute. In the comfort of my own home, I do not have to abide the ignorant masses at great injury to my wallet. I don’t have to pay a 300% markup for stale, over butterered popcorn. I can pause the movie and go to the bathroom if I need to.
And they wonder why people prefer to download movies. No, I can’t imagine why I would download something.
If they let me watch legally from home….I would. The entire process of releasing a movie into a theater for a month or so and then waiting 6 more months for that film to get to DVD is archaic.
Yesterday an article on Wired reported that 23,000 Americans will be sued for downloading The Expendables. Settlements will start at $3000 per person and carry possible prison time. I don’t know about you, but three grand and a prison record would pretty much ruin my life for the foreseeable future, and all for a stupid summer fluff action movie.
Yeah, that seems fair punishment for something that is not only generally acceptable but encouraged in our society.
I have a “Self” magazine on my coffee table that has an article telling me where to go download or watch the latest episodes of TV or new release movies. Legal options like Netflix, YouTube and Hulu are not mentioned. All of the sites mentioned, are in fact, piracy sites.
Isn’t there real violent crime happening? If you want to punish someone for getting free stuff while other people who work hard go unpaid, you should look into corporate crime. CEO’s getting huge bonuses while laying off tens of thousands of employees to cut costs and pad their wallets…. no nothing wrong there. We don’t want to criminalize the rich, they’re our heroes! We’d rather go after 7 year olds and nuns who may have downloaded something that MPAA, or RIAA could make a buck off of.
The movie industry needs to change. The technology is changing, and these old dinosaurs are going extinct because they refuse to acknowledge that change. We have a culture of instant gratification, and that has a thousand further implications I won’t go into here, but Hollywood seems to think this instant streaming/DVR thing is just a phase we’re going through. Yes. We’re all just rebellious teenagers, and someday we’ll grow up and think its ok to pay 15 dollars for a movie ticket.
In other news, Thor was really good, and I will support Marvel for making a good movie, by purchasing the DVD, all legal like. And in the end, they will have 40- 50 of my dollars for just this one movie. That’s almost a full day of working (after uncle takes his cut) to cover the price. Eight hours at a crappy job to have 2 hours of mild escapism. That cost makes me think I’ll skip Green Lantern, and X-men and just wait for Captain America. Probably an early afternoon matinee. And likely the last movie I’ll go see this year.
(Photo By ladybeames)
***Painfully aware I need an editor.
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