Dunkirk’s luxury ticket prices gives Hollywood hope
Moviegoing elite are clamouring to see the World War II epic, despite hefty prices
At US$26.75 each, tickets for 70-millimeter screenings of Dunkirk at Universal City in Los Angeles are among the most expensive in the country. Splurge for popcorn and a soda and you’re in for more than US$40.
Yet the moviegoing elite has been clamouring to see the World War II epic on 125 specially outfitted US theatres designed to show the feature the way director Christopher Nolan wanted -- on an extra big screen using conventional film projectors that render better pictures than today’s digital variety. No 3-D glasses, no vibrating chairs.
The turnout shows some fans are willing to pay up for movies that deliver the visual goods and the drama. For the opening weekend, sales at Imax Corp.’s 31 specially outfitted 70-millimeter theatres were more than double what the company’s regular screens brought in. Imax accounted for a quarter of domestic sales for Dunkirk , according to company executives who said on a call Wednesday they’re starting to de-emphasise once-popular 3-D movies.
“This is something you have got to experience in the theatre,” Craig Dehmel, head of global distribution at Imax, said in an interview. “We will run Dunkirk on Imax screens into August and will continue to play it throughout the month, as long as moviegoers continue to seek it out.”
The high price for Dunkirk, which averages US$15 per ticket across all Imax locations, is a rare bit of good news for exhibitors, who’ve suffered falling attendance during a summer of lacklustre movie releases. With a stagnant domestic box-office sales and collapsing DVD sales, studios are pushing to bring new movies into homes sooner, potentially cutting the three months of exclusivity theatres enjoy. Most of the theatre stocks are down this year.
That’s despite big investments in bigger screens, plush seating, improved sound, and digital projectors that both lower costs and enable the new generation of 3-D superhero and animated films.
Theatre owners and Hollywood studios have been looking for innovative ways to draw movie fans from the comfort of their homes as digital distributors like Netflix Inc. start to make their own movies. Imax shares fell 3.4 per cent Thursday after missing second-quarter revenue estimates on Wednesday, a shortfall the company attributed to a poor slate of films.
Through July 25, the domestic summer box office was down 7.2 per cent from last year, according to ComScore Inc. Instalments of franchises that have been typically summer popcorn fodder, such as Transformers and Pirates of the Caribbean, have disappointed.
