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Source: Deadline
Last year on September 3rd (the Saturday right before Labor Day), theaters across the nation participated in the first National Cinema Day event, an exciting new strategy that those working in the film industry hoped would draw crowds unlike anything seen in recent memory to whichever local cineplex was closest. The move was simple, but instantly appealing: charge tickets for no more than $3 (a price that even included IMAX and 3-D screenings, which usually come with an additional surcharge). In theory, it was an idea that made perfect sense; the price of the average theater ticket has skyrocketed over the past few years (currently sitting at around $11.75 as of 2022), so dropping the price to one that most people would be far more willing to pay would logically have greater success in encouraging them to buy one and see a given film. In practice, National Cinema Day was indeed a rousing success, as just over 8.1 million people went to their local theater and paid for at least one ticket to see such films as “Top Gun: Maverick” and a re-release of “Jaws”. The total revenue brought in over that single day was roughly $24 million, a mere 8% increase from the previous Saturday, but one achieved despite tickets costing a fraction of their usual price. Raising attendance was the key objective of National Cinema Day, and with it ultimately seeing the highest attendance of any day in 2022, it’s safe to say that theaters and studios have been pleased with the turnout, so much so that talks for a second National Cinema Day immediately came into fruition.
Those talks were fortunately able to lead to the establishment of a second annual National Cinema, and it’s set to come back even earlier in the year this time. More specifically, the date is set for August 27th, with the Cinema Foundation, a nonprofit organization behind the previous National Cinema Day (one founded by the National Association of Theater Owners, an organization representing a solid percentage of the nation’s most prominent theater chains), making the announcement on Monday, August 21st while declaring that over 3,000 theaters throughout the country (which feature a total of around 30,000 individual screens) would be participating in the event. This time around, tickets will not be sold for more than $4, a whole dollar more than the previous year, but still significantly less than how much tickets usually cost. There’s also a strong possibility that concessions will be sold at a discount throughout the day, but that decision will be left to each theater chain.
What do audiences have to look forward to on this year’s National Cinema Day? For one thing, there are a decent number of new releases that are arriving in theaters that very weekend, most notably Sony’s “Gran Turismo: Based on a True Story”, a biographical sports drama about Jann Mardenborough and his rise from being a mere player of the “Gran Turismo” video game to a professional race car driver. Then there are those films that have been in theaters for several weeks now, yet continue to draw in respectable crowds; these include Warner Bros.’ megahit “Barbie”, which recently became the studio’s biggest domestic grosser of all time, and Universal’s “Oppenheimer”, which recently became the highest-grossing release to never hit the #1 spot at the box office. Other recent hits will also be given another chance to shine on the big screen like they had earlier in the year; whether they’re animated offerings, like Disney and Pixar’s “Elemental” or Universal and Illumination’s “The Super Mario Bros. Movie”, or more action-oriented affairs like Lucasfilm’s “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny”, these films pulled in solid numbers during their initial runs earlier this year, and could very easily pick up a decent amount of additional revenue come the 27th. Finally, there are big re-releases for films that have not graced the silver screen in years but will undoubtedly be appealing to those in need of a nostalgic throwback. Last year, Steven Spielberg’s 1975 feature “Jaws” received this treatment; this year, his other monster blockbuster, 1993’s “Jurassic Park” will do the same and excite audiences the way it did over thirty years prior.
According to Cinema Foundation president Jackie Brenneman, there is much enthusiasm in the industry as all those involved eagerly await National Cinema Day and a turnout similar to last year’s event. “Following the rousing success of the first annual National Cinema Day, we welcome everyone to join us for the communal experience of one of America’s favorite past times,” Brenneman stated as the Cinema Foundation announced the return of National Cinema Day, which she claims has the full participation of just about every distributor and exhibitor in the country this year. “We’ve been working on this for a while,” Brenneman explained while noting that some independent studios and theaters were initially caught off-guard by the announcement of the previous National Cinema Day. “We tried to learn from that. To have conversations much earlier, give notice much earlier.”
The theatrical climate was a bit different from how it had been just under a year ago. Whereas the year 2022 had only seen a small handful of major box office successes (a number low enough for the industry to create National Cinema Day in the first place), 2023 has fared a bit better and seen even more films reach box office heights that hadn’t been seen since the end of the previous decade. Still, with the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes still going on and theaters desperately seeking films and strategies that will lure people to their local theaters, the need for National Cinema Day, a day meant for “celebrating the moviegoing experience and how important movie theaters are to our communities”, is as strong as it ever was. NATO CEO Michael O’Leary, who just recently took over the position from previous NATO head John Fithian, certainly seems to think so, as he claims that cinema has “the power to bring us together to share in the joy, the thrill and the magic of a great story told on the big screen.” This sentiment rang true throughout much of the previous National Cinema Day, and should the prospect of a $4 ticket be just appealing enough for the average film-goer, there’s a solid chance that it will ring just as true during this year’s event.
