MoviePass Drops to $9.95 a Month For a Movie a Day

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by RayS, Aug 15, 2017.

  1. Monosterio

    Monosterio Forum Resident

    Location:
    South Florida
    So the deal is now four movies per month for $9.99?

    There go my plans to join MoviePass after retiring... :sigh:
     
  2. SquishySounds

    SquishySounds Yo mama so fat Thanos had to snap twice.

    Location:
    New York
    Like Napster, Backpage, and $5 Bitcoin it was too good to be true for long.
     
  3. Steve Martin

    Steve Martin Wild & Crazy Guy

    Location:
    Plano, TX
    Why, are movies $2.50 in your area? Still a good deal, basically 4 for the price of one.
     
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  4. Monosterio

    Monosterio Forum Resident

    Location:
    South Florida
    Good deal? I was planning to singlehandedly put them out of business! :winkgrin:
     
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  5. Steve Martin

    Steve Martin Wild & Crazy Guy

    Location:
    Plano, TX
    I guess some of us beat you to it!
     
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  6. mBen989

    mBen989 Senior Member

    Location:
    Scranton, PA
    Should we pull the switch?

    [​IMG]
     
  7. benjaminhuf

    benjaminhuf Forum Resident

    Perhaps the older members will be "grandfathered in" for a while? Here's hoping....
     
  8. Steve Martin

    Steve Martin Wild & Crazy Guy

    Location:
    Plano, TX
    Since I prepaid the "one per day" for a year, I expect that will continue, but the "can only see a movie one time" seems to apply to everyone (and doesn't really bother me as I seldom do).

    Of course it will continue until they go out of business which I expect will be long before my year is up, but I've made my money back so I'm cool with that.
     
    Last edited: Apr 29, 2018
    benjaminhuf likes this.
  9. I've been following this Moviepass thing for a while now on another site. A lot of people wonder how this is sustainable.
    Firstly IMO there's not just one strategy so I'll just list some possibilities.

    - Sign up enough members so that one can influence the market. That means being able to strike deals with the studios or cinemas. If they don't want to deal, then when Moviepass collapses those businesses will lose ticket sales. Then their profits drop and their share price slides. Nice hey?
    - So the backers of Moviepass might be losing money here but how do we know they're not gaining somewhere else by playing the stock market. They have the ability to influence certain markets, right?
    - Get to know what sort of movies the member likes and then get the studios to pay for advertising suitable movies to them.

    - But maybe it's not just about movies!
    - Get to know what sort of food the member likes and get nearby restaurants to pay to advertise to them.
    - Get to know as much as possible about the member and get various product and service suppliers to pay to advertise to them.

    I can see how the whole business plan might work. The problem though is will they have enough time to implement all these features before the money runs out?
    With a throttling of the free movies to 4 per month it's obvious they can't sustain the money burn. It's now up to Hollywood to write a script or Moviepass will roll the end credits.
     
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  10. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.
    So I had an interesting twist related to the above. When opening my (Android) phone app, I no longer see any theatres. If I click on "Movies" I get the message, "Please Update Your App". Interestingly, there is no "update" button and when I went to the Google Play store, there was also no "update" option. I eventually deleted the app, reinstalled and exactly the same issues popped up. The app told me I'm running version 2.9.14 and I need to run version 3.0.14. I contacted customer service and their response was that I'm running unsupported Android software and it needs to be at least Android 5 (Lollipop).

    My phone is admittedly old - going on 5 years. However, when I bought it in summer 2013, it was pretty much a "top of the line" phone: a Galaxy S4. There is no official Samsung option to update it to Android 5, although there are online instructions about how to upgrade your phone operating system. I contemplated this, checked out some websites with detailed instructions and was thinking about it, until one of the sites I landed on caused my anti-virus to start flashing warnings about how unsafe it was...

    So - on to option 2. My iPad pro, which also has the moviepass app on it. Saturday, I decide to race off to catch a matinee and use that instead, but when I go to "check in" I get the message I need to update THAT app. So I go to the Apple store and search for "moviepass" and it's not there - at all. A little googling leads me to at least one page that says the app is no longer available for the iPad - only the iPhone. Eventually I find a download link directly on google and it works and so now I guess I'll just use the iPad (until I get a new phone).

    Way back in high school, I read a great sci-fi story (short story?) where everyone was buying expensive for-the-times items (tvs, cars, etc.) every couple years because they "had" to. I can't remember now whether it was planned obsolescence or a consumer drive to always have the latest/greatest thing, but it was an interesting read. And I think we're almost there now. Funny (?) to think that one can buy a "top of the line" item and have it be "unsupported" within five years.

    I wonder if anyone else hit with the Moviepass "update" issue will encounter the same issues I did.
     
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  11. RayS

    RayS A Little Bit Older and a Little Bit Slower Thread Starter

    Location:
    Out of My Element
    Thankfully the updates for iphone work rather seamlessly. Since the price drop, I have just resigned myself to this process being inconvenient and buggy. About once a month I go to see a Hindi film, and MoviePass never gets the price right. I always owe an extra dollar and change. The first time this happened the young woman at the counter looked at me in terror, as if the $6 admission had drained the last $4.50 from my credit limit, and she had to tell me the shameful news. :) Sometimes the app is down when I get to the theater, and nearly half the time the movie choices are blank. The travel time to the theaters is also completely out of whack (theaters 90 minutes away show up as 20 minutes away). But doing some quick math, I've seen 3-4 movies a month in 2018 so far, so I am still way ahead. With the semester ending, I expect to rejoin the "take a picture of your stub" crowd before the summer is over. For that, I'm willing to deal with all these "growing pains". I am reminded of that question that permeated 1964 Beatles press conferences - "What will you do when the bubble bursts?" Because this company can't bleed money forever, and other than having a list of movies I've seen, what valuable data have they collected on me exactly?
     
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  12. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.
    I must admit that this experience has pretty much helped me make up my mind that my next phone will be Apple. I planned on buying an Apple one back in 2013, but then I read several articles stating they thought the Galaxy S4 was a more versatile phone and the guy at the shop said the same thing. However, I suspect that if I would've whichever Apple phone was new back then, I'd still have functional updates, rather than being essentially obsolete.

    And yeah, I couldn't care less when the bubble bursts for Moviepass. I've had a blast with it over the past 8 months or so, seeing all kinds of films that I never would've seen otherwise. Even with this minor hiccup, I'm still coming out way ahead.
     
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  13. RayS

    RayS A Little Bit Older and a Little Bit Slower Thread Starter

    Location:
    Out of My Element
    According to this article, MoviePass has enough funds to last about two more months without an infusion of fresh capital.

    Is the end near for MoviePass?
     
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  14. IronWaffle

    IronWaffle It’s all over now, baby blue

    Another good piece from Vox. I’ve skimmed a number of other articles in the last few months but too many are watered-down with deathwatch obsessions.

    Speaking purely selfishly, I just hope they last long enough for the Mitchum, Melville, and Oscilloscope programs at AFI and a handful of Fathom/arthoise/revival events I’ve lined up. Many of what’s below I’ve seen, some I haven’t. A few, like Vertigo even in theater revivals. But most had to be experienced on a TV. Even a 65” TV isn’t enough to fill the eye. Neither is a even a quality audio system enough to replicate the aura of a theater.

    Most of all, seeing a vintage film even with a few friends (especially who haven’t seen it or many) can’t offer the same type of communal thrill as a theater with people comprised of a larger sampling of taste and exposure. Last night, for instance, I saw what at home might have been a dour drama but with an audience, the wry and pained humor of the cast was palpable. Years ago, I led a group of five or so to see Citizen Kane. Two had seen it with me in my home prior and couldn’t get why I laughed. When they saw it in the theater, a roomful if sympathetic eyes and ears made a huge difference. I had a similar experience with Casablanca and Rear Window. Nothing is better than a live audience to fight against “it’s overrated-ism.”

    This pass will make it feasible for me to see in 70 mm, plus the likes of Sunset Boulevard, Stranger Than Paradise, Persepolis, Out of the Past, Army of Shadows, Cercle Rouge, Friends of Eddie Coyle, Cape Fear, Night of the Hunter, Strangers on a Train, Samsara, Meek’s Cutoff, Wendy & Lucy, and even Airplane! on the big screen. Not to mention Grave of the Fireflies, Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away for the Miyazaki corner of my taste.

    In six months I can barely remember all it’s enabled me to see... All the President’s Men, African Queen, Philadelphia Story, Vertigo, Casablanca and Stagecoach (each with a Q&A), Dylan’s Trouble No More documentary, Tarkovsky and Bresson’s respective swan songs Yhe Sacrifice and L’Argent, both Blade Runners, Lucky (Harry Dean Stanton’s last film), Faces Places,... and those are just what I remember from the non-mainstream/current stuff, some of which I’d eventually stream or might have skipped altogether.

    All this is to say, my apologies for my part in killing MoviePass because I have used it to its fullest (within guidelines). I’d/I’ll miss it, but it’s already reinvigorated my passion for film, something that scheduling, marketing and generally running a local film society from 2012-2015 nearly killed.
     
    Last edited: May 10, 2018
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  15. RayS

    RayS A Little Bit Older and a Little Bit Slower Thread Starter

    Location:
    Out of My Element
    Live it up while the MoviePass lasts!

    Since relocating, I have one movie theater within a 50 mile radius. Their selections almost invariably run the gamut from dumb to dumber to dumbest. Who knew there were so many comic books yet to be exploited, or that Dwayne Johnson could literally make a movie a month? You should finish everything on your plate, because moviegoers right in your own country go to bed hungry.
     
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  16. Jrr

    Jrr Forum Resident

    I ended up being the dream demographic they were probably hoping for. I think the service is fantastic, it's been glitch free on their end and I love the app. We have had two hiccups, not their fault. My wife forgot both which user name and password she was using, so we had to pay for one ticket. And then she was going to a film that was likely sold out, so she bought her ticket on line and paid cash ahead of time. So, of the four times in maybe 7 months we've gone to a movie she couldn't use it twice, again not their fault.

    We have both had a pass since they changed the pricing, maybe seven months? I have only seen two movies with it, so I guess I'm bailing out as I was hoping to make up for the loss when I get some time off of my business coming up, but it's looking like they may be gone so time to cut my losses. But, had I used it more it would have been amazing. Would be sorry to see something that works so well (in any industry) go away, but we all knew this was not sustainable. And, I supposed they could raise more money.
     
  17. alexpop

    alexpop Power pop + other bad habits....

    Yeah movie pass a good deal if you have a movie pass that is, if you just want a ticket on the day good luck trying to get a seat. Had to go to three cinemas until I managed to get a seat for Avengers infinity. MPrs were viewing the same film multiple times.
     
  18. Steve Martin

    Steve Martin Wild & Crazy Guy

    Location:
    Plano, TX
    Can't view the same film multiple times any more, but maybe could the weekend Avenger's came out. Yeah, it isn't great for seeing movies on the opening weekend, but I usually go on random weekday mornings when the theater's aren't very crowded. I bought the annual pass for $80 or whatever it was and have made back my money double. I know it won't last but I'm good with it however long it lasts at this point.
     
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  19. alexpop

    alexpop Power pop + other bad habits....

    Bummer for someone that just sees 3 films a month. Damn seat hogs :D
     
  20. Pinknik

    Pinknik Senior Member

  21. Roland Stone

    Roland Stone Offending Member

    Never understood how this could possibly work. Who funds these things?
     
  22. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    Same people who thought etailers that sold 3 DVDs for $1 with no additional purchase commitment was a good idea in 1998...
     
  23. Steve Martin

    Steve Martin Wild & Crazy Guy

    Location:
    Plano, TX
    MoviePass didn't have listings for my theater today (a Cinemark that I noticed had problems with todays listings in their own app yesterday) so I used the "unlisted showtime" option.

    Within 2 hours I was "randomly" selected to participate in their beta verification program where I have to take pictures of my ticket stubs from now on.

    "randomly", right.
     
  24. mikeyt

    mikeyt Forum Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles, CA
    Venture Capitalist investors. The business model doesn't surprise me, and isn't uncommon, I just wonder what the long term plans are and how they inevitably try to make profit.
     
  25. tommy-thewho

    tommy-thewho Senior Member

    Location:
    detroit, mi
    Steve it happened to me also.
     

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