As a former manager of a single screen mom-and-pop theater all I have to say is that Deluxe/Technicolor are such greedy assholes. If you want to get a film within the first four weeks that it's out you have to give up 90% of your ticket sales to the distributors. If you want a 50/50 split or better you have to wait like 2 months. It was always a major gamble on what to wait for and what to actually get right away. They also make these BS rules like; our movie is the only film that can be shown on any given screen. Meaning if we wanted to do an early and late show, we couldn't. You're forced to only play one movie for weeks! Once that got more common the business basically died. The biggest insult is that the theaters have to pay for movie posters. We're already giving them all the sales, and then they have the gall to ask theaters to pay for the movie's advertising too? Are you fucking kidding me?
Comment on a Red Letter Media video about "the death of movie theaters": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwO5fGL2MeY
So basically yeah, the movie industry is murdering itself by refusing to change, specifically, refusing to change to be less scummy.
I think making a business model off of being a place of community could work. For example, date nights where tickets are buy one get one free for couples. Or convert one of the theatres into a day care so parents can watch a movie and then pick up other kids afterwards.
I have a lot of nostalgia for the local town theater. I think they can come back, but have to disconnect from Hollywood to work.
