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| Photo Credit: AP. |
NEW YORK (AP) — “National Cinema Day” on Saturday brought the big screen to moviegoers for a small price — no more than $3 — as American theaters looked to fill seats during the late summer lull.
The one-day
nationwide promotion was being offered on more than 30,000 screens in more than
3,000 theaters, including the major chains of AMC and Regal Cinemas. The Cinema
Foundation, a nonprofit arm of the National Association of Theater Owners,
announced the plan Aug. 28 and said all major film studios also were
participating.
Labor Day
weekend is traditionally one of the slowest weekends in theaters.
National
Cinema Day is intended to flood theaters with moviegoers and prompt them to
return in the fall, inspired by a sizzle reel of upcoming films from A24,
Amazon Studios, Disney, Focus Features, Lionsgate, Neon, Paramount, Sony
Pictures Classics, Sony, United Artists Releasing, Universal and Warner Bros.
After more
than two years of pandemic, movie theaters rebounded significantly over the
summer, seeing business return to nearly pre-pandemic levels. Films like “Top
Gun: Maverick,” “Minions: Rise of Gru,” “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of
Madness” and “Jurassic World Dominion” pushed the domestic summer box office to
$3.3 billion in ticket sales as of Aug. 21, according to data firm Comscore.
But that
trails 2019 totals by about 20% as exhibitors have had about 30% fewer wide
releases this year. Cineworld, which owns Regal Cinemas, cited the scant supply
of major new releases in confirming recent discussions of a Chapter 11
bankruptcy protection filing.
Organizers
of National Cinema Day described the event as a trial that could become an
annual fixture. While some other countries have experimented with a similar day
of cheap movie tickets, the initiative is the first of its kind on such a large
scale in the U.S.
“After this
summer’s record-breaking return to cinemas, we wanted to do something to
celebrate moviegoing,” said Jackie Brenneman, Cinema Foundation president, in
an Aug. 28 statement. “We’re doing it by offering a ‘thank you’ to the
moviegoers that made this summer happen, and by offering an extra enticement
for those who haven’t made it back yet.”
Follow AP
Film Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jakecoyleAP