Lucas Prieto
Crimson Chronicle Reporter
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the state of movie theaters were at an all time high. Domestic box offices churned out over $11.4 billion in profits during 2019. Since then however, the world and sequentially the entertainment industry have changed drastically.
Inflation has risen, people are more likely to dislike social outings, and the importance of political alignments is at a high—all of which have affected Hollywood’s output and the attendance of movie theaters. What once was an easy and accessible pastime has become an expensive outing, financially and socially. Curiously scrolling through the endless bad theatrical experiences and complaints, I have to wonder, how and why has this change in perception of theater-going happened?
One complaint I’ve seen circling around is the less-than-desirable experience when going out to see a movie. Theaters and audiences alike have been receiving backlash for disturbances to the films and making audiences rethink returning to the movies. A negative experience every once in a while is inevitable, but at the rate at which I’m seeing these complaints online I have to wonder if this has something to do with people not knowing how to act after the pandemic. Perhaps crowds need to relearn theater etiquette after that year trapped inside their houses. I can’t even blame them; movie theater prices have become greatly inflated and if the chance of receiving a poor experience is high, why go at all?
The rise of streaming platforms like HBO Max, Disney+, and Peacock during the pandemic have shifted how audiences interact with the movie-watching experience as a whole. Streaming services have gained a considerable amount of popularity during the pandemic. As a result, audiences have become accustomed to being able to watch new movies whenever they want in the comfort of their own home, leading many to begin wondering why they should make the trip to the theater at all. Because of this, studios have shortened the theatrical window in which films stay in theaters before reaching streaming. An entire catalogue of films being available with no extra cost may be great for the audience, but not for the movie theaters which require new films and people’s interest in this specific viewing experience in order to make business.
So what makes people want to come to the movies anymore? Some of the biggest box office hits in recent memory have all been based in varying levels of online virality; Minions: The Rise of Gru, A Minecraft Movie, Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour, and the Barbie-Oppenheimer summer of 2023 all allowing their audiences to turn the theater into its own party. In the age where everything is available online and theatrical films get leaked all over the internet, it has become increasingly important for the movie theater experience to feel like an event within itself that can garner attention online and, in turn, revenue for studios.
Movie theaters are an important part of our culture; the smell of popcorn inviting you into a dimly lit room for a few hours is how so many filmmakers and film-lovers alike began treasuring cinema and the theater-going experience. The thought that we could potentially lose that is so awful, and I think that we should do everything in our power to preserve it.
Luckily for us, LA has many unique theaters that play new and old films regularly: El Capitan Theatre, New Beverly Cinema, and the Vista Theatre are all historical movie theaters I’ve personally been to that remind me to not take this privilege for granted. I would encourage you to support local movie theaters when accessible to you; there may not be a Barbie-pink dress code or a certain line that causes the theater to break out into chaos, but I promise that walking out of the dark theater after seeing an emotionally connective film and feeling like changed person will be more than enough.
