Comment by drzaiusapelord | Hacker News Reader

Comment by drzaiusapelord | Hacker News Reader

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7.89 for movies? What? Where? I'm guessing this data is skewed by the low prices of rural and suburban centers that are underpopulated. Here in the urban world where most of the population lives, movies start at 11 or 12 dollars and then there's a 3D surcharge of a couple bucks. When my gf and go to the movies here in Chicago its about 30 dollars before any snacks. Toss in a few bucks parking too. Oh, want to order online? That's another two dollars per ticket.

At the end of the day, Hollywood is asking us to drop 30-40 bucks to see yet another disposable experience. On the value vs cost curve, Hollywood is losing.

Meanwhile, Netflix streams to all my computers and my Boxee. Vudu too. I think I can wait a few months until its on Vudu or On-Demand for a fraction of that price. Even then its still not a compelling experience. I'm in my 30s. Where are the Scorsece's, Allen's, Spielberg's, and Coppola's of my generation? I'm not sure, but they aren't getting work in mainstream Hollywood.

7.89 for movies? What? Where? I'm guessing this data is skewed by the low prices of rural and suburban centers that are underpopulated. Here in the urban world where most of the population lives, movies start at 11 or 12 dollars and then there's a 3D surcharge of a couple bucks.

They seem to be calculated by taking the box office takings[1] and dividing it by the number of admissions[2].

I suspect the big influence on that price is "family" tickets and children's tickets and other concession tickets which push the average price down.

[1] http://www.natoonline.org/statisticsboxoffice.htm

[2] http://www.natoonline.org/statisticsadmissions.htm

Prices at the 12 screen theater in Ames, Iowa (college town of 50k people):

Senior Monday - 4.75

Matinee, Child, Senior - 5.75

Adult Evening - 7.50

Adult Weekend Evening - 8.00

3D - add 2.50

It's pretty common for me to pay 7.50 in Lansing MI (almost 500,000 in the metro area). That's mostly because I always get a student discount (hooray college town where they assume everyone under 30 is a student).

My sister works at a movie theater, and she gets so annoyed because everybody under 30 wants to take advantage of the student discount..

It works if it's crowded, but if not, she'll ask for your ID :)

The prices he lists are “…adjusted to 2010 dollars…” based on the linked calculator.

EDIT: Please ignore this comment. See reply below. Sorry for missing the point here.

2010 was last year (Ok, it will be the year before last in a couple of days, but...), inflation is not sufficient to effect it that much when compared with this year.

Like the grand-parent, this does not fit with my experience. When I got to a new release I usually pay around $13 per person at a decent theater in Las Vegas, and up to $18 per person for Imax 3D.

But the other thing that may skew the results is budget or "dollar" theaters that show older releases. I frequently take my kids to those for around $2 per ticket.

I just realized that I misread the comment, and for that I apologize; I totally missed the boat with my reply.

I actually agree that the average ticket price is way below what I'm used to paying here in Los Angeles. At the same time, I suppose that's the point, to take into account both the high and low ends of the pricing spectrum.

That said, I'd gladly pay $7–8 for a movie!

The price in 2010 in 2010 dollars is listed as $7.89. drzaiusapelord isn't complaining about previous years.

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