Knoxville, TN- Ready Theatre Systems announced an optional alternative pricing plan in response to COVID-19 to best support the exhibitor community. Instead of paying for upfront license costs, exhibitors now have the option to only pay when customers use the software.
For instituting the plan, RTS’ owner Rob Chabot stated, “As a fellow exhibitor, we wanted to offer a plan that will help all of us succeed during this difficult time.”
RTS’ Sales Director, Liz Golem, also added, “We want to support our community any way that we can. In addition to our relief pricing plan, we are maintaining our 24/7/365 technical support and continuing to release software versions with new features, so exhibitors return to their theatres better than ever.”
Exhibitors taking advantage of the relief plan receive all the benefits of the core RTS license package, including all of the enterprise-level suite of features. Software features include Boxoffice and Concession Point of Sale, Digital Signage, Online Ticketing, Gift and Loyalty, Location Branded Mobile App, Reserve Seating, Back-Office Management, and 24/7/365 Technical Support.
Requirements for the plan:
· Process credit cards through RTS’ integrated credit card processor(s)
· Sell tickets online through exhibitor’s website and the RTS mobile app
Since 1993, Ready Theatre Systems is the complete cinema solution specializing in point of sale software. Owner and Chief Software Architect, Rob Chabot, owns and operates a small chain of family-run independent movie theatres in southwest Michigan.
Kino Lorber’s theatrical release of festival hit Bacurau, which garnered critical praise at major events like Cannes and NYFF, began its run in New York City on March 6. An expansion to arthouse theaters nationwide was scheduled for the ensuing weeks, but was ultimately cut short as COVID-19 began its spread across the country. With its theatrical commitments cut short by the virus, the distributor quickly came together to discuss next steps to salvage the film’s release. Rather than opting for a traditional home entertainment launch, the way bigger studios like Paramount and Universal have, Kino Lorber decided to innovate a program which would share revenues of digital rentals of the films with the arthouse cinemas affected by the crisis.
The program, Kino Marquee, was rolled out days after cinemas announced they would be suspending operations due to the coronavirus. Starting with 11 cinemas, the virtual theatrical program now counts on more than 150 participating movie theaters.
How did your virtual theatrical concept come about?
We obviously were not anticipating this, but were covertly prepared for it because we had built out our own VOD platform last year, which was a TVOD platform, Transactional VOD (TVOD), not Subscription VOD (SVOD) .
We didn’t want to join the fray of all the small companies starting SVODs, competing with giants like Disney and Netflix. We are about selling movie tickets in theaters and felt that a transactional VOD platform is a fit. We didn’t really think about crossing that over to theatrical because we typically respect the the traditional theatrical [window].
Like many other distributors, this crisis hit as you were just launching a high-profile release, the Brazilian genre-favorite Bacurau. Rather than simply forgoing the theatrical commitment and dropping the film on regular streaming services, Kino Lorber mobilized its team to launch Kino Marquee’s virtual theatrical concept in a matter of days. How did your team come to that decision?
Suddenly, this circumstance arose where we found that the 60 or 80 theaters that had booked Bacurau, one of our top titles of the year, coming in very well reviewed from after winning the jury prize in Cannes and playing in the New York Film Festival and Toronto. All of a sudden, our theatrical release is cut short barely after began, coming into it with great momentum and a Critic’s Pick in the New York Times.
The biggest concern was that all the theaters that we were dealing with suddenly shut their doors. We are very supportive of the independent arthouse theaters that that support what we do and thrive on what we do. We occasionally deal with chains but they aren’t traditionally our bread and butter, indie arthouse theaters are crucial to our business model. We tried to come up with a solution that could both rescue our particular release during this time and also create a revenue stream for the lost income for our partner theaters.
Sonia Braga in Bacurau. Photo by Victor Jucá.
These are theaters that were very eager to book Bacurau and had already spent funding sources to promote the film and engage their membership base. We came to the conclusion that we could, in effect, hybridize our theatrical distribution model with our VOD technology, and that’s how we came up with Kino Marquee, which is intended to represent first run theatrical films and repertory titles available to theaters as a virtual screening opportunity and an extension of what they would be doing in physical theaters. The plan was to make this platform totally theater-centric, where we respect all of the parameters of the traditional theatrical model including clearances, regional or neighborhood exclusivity. We respect the two traditional digital holdbacks from VOD, and created a model where they could have a digital version of the film to show to their customers and members that would not be available on any other VOD platform.
We got pretty excited about this and, literally, in a period of 72 hours from dreaming up the concept and name, our fantastic team at Kino Lorber all jumped on this.
What is the potential of Kino Marquee beyond the COVID-19 crisis?
We chose to do this in a way that did not push forward our own branding as Kino Lorber or Kino Now, we’re not using this as a Trojan horse to infiltrate their membership base and divert actual theater goers to watching VOD and digital copies. This is intended as an interim provision to cover this this crisis period. That’s with the hope that in some weeks, probably months, theaters will reopen, people will go back to smelling the popcorn and hopefully buying it. We would have fulfilled a service in the stop-gap. We also realize that even when that happens, and we hope it will happen as soon as possible…this Kino Marquee model is something that can still be productive for theatres as an extension of their own screening capabilities.
One of the things that we all know in this world of too many films passing through the system, is that even great films that are well reviewed and audiences love, will often find themselves locked in a week or two week run and then they’re gone. And the the theaters can’t do anything about it when they only have two or three screens. This gives them virtually infinite additional screens where they can add holdovers and repertory to create a new model for supplemental income, even as they resume their normal physical theatrical operations.
How many theaters are currently participating in the Kino Marquee virtual theatrical program?
We went from 11 theaters to now well over 100, including most recently Alamo Drafthouse. There will probably be upwards of 200 tears participating on back around and one or two other films that are coming behind it. We also just launched Ken Loach’s award winning film from Cannes, Sorry We Missed You, which premiered at Film Forum–and now Film Forum has come aboard to extend their run a virtual screening.
This is working and it’s very exciting to us. The scale of the revenues isn’t quite replacing what the physical revenues would have been, but it may in time. We’re really doing it to keep the basically to enable the theaters to stay in business with some revenue stream and maintain their visibility and their value to their customers, supporters, and members.
The virtual theaters that are booking it, are in some cases theaters, that for one reason or another, we don’t usually get to play in. They’re either looking for the bigger studio indies that have massive P&A budgets or they’re looking for slightly more commercial films.
There are opportunities for us to create this virtual screening platform for entities that are not actually movie theaters, like film societies or cultural groups that may have a sporadic film screening here or there. This can enable them to actually create a virtual theater, irrespective of whether they have a physical screening capability or not. Right now, the current model is basically one film to many screens. We’re now working on a multiplexing model where we can have many or several films available to one organization. That would also be a model for our repertory offerings. All in all, this is a an opportunity to not only work with movie theaters and film festivals, but also with organizations that have a customer base that is also interested in seeing cinema.
Are you planning on adding more titles to Kino Marquee in the coming weeks?
Many of our colleagues, other distributors, who are competitors but also colleagues, have asked if they can access our platform. We’re selectively opening our doors to certain other films from other distributors. Right now, it’s not an open source platform. It’s not a white label solution that we’re licensing to other companies. We really feel the two key critical components to make this successful are the caliber of film, first and foremost, is it a film that we’re really proud to distribute and we think our arthouse independent theaters really want? And two, will those theaters be able to promote it and activate their base? Will they be able to message the opportunity to screen something digitally under the auspices of their theater and and capture their the commitment of their customers?
Whether those are films just from our own current release schedule or supplemented by the films from other distributors remains to be seen. We initially started with films that had already had theatrical booking commitments. It was already a situation where the theaters had said, “We want this film physically in our theater.” That was the first step and it was relatively easy to convert most of those theaters to take the virtual screening opportunity. What we immediately found happening was that on Bacurau, the number of theaters that had not committed that never said they wanted to book it physically, have now come to us to take it virtually. The number of bookings for Bacurau was at least double what we had from the physical side.
How can movie theaters sign up to be part of Kino Marquee?
Theaters just have to do two things: send us their logo to incorporate onto our virtual marquee, and provide a few sentences [about their organization]…it’s as simple as that, we do everything else. The most important thing they do after that initial setup is to message and activate their customer base to do this. Some [theaters] have weekly or frequent newsletters…they have special communication protocols with their members, customers, and a wider audience. It’s crucial they do that because this is still new to their customers and members; it has to be done with some repeated reinforcement to remind them. The [theaters] that have been most successful, they’re the ones that have been relatively persistent in this. We help theaters with some best practices suggestions, but most theaters we deal with are pretty good at activating their base. And that’s their competitive advantage, frankly, compared to the chains, indie art-houses are really in touch and of the cloth of their communities. That’s really the key to making this work, it gives them a survival advantage in this time of great pain for everyone.
How can moviegoers support their local cinema through Kino Marquee?
This model is not going to put Netflix out of business but it is nice to enable and facilitate the theater to use digital to secure the future of their [business]. We look forward to the day where this will just be an expansion of what theaters can do to keep the theaters healthier than ever.
Its theaters may be closed during the coronavirus shutdown, but Alamo Drafthouse is keeping its commitment to screening independent and unheralded movies alive via its recently announced “Alamo-At-Home” initiative — which includes posting recipes for its popular in-theater snacks and entrees online.
The first recipe being made available is the theater chain’s popular Buffalo Cauliflower vegan snack, which the company notes has been a much-missed item among its loyal patrons.
“If you’re missing those vegan-friendly lightly breaded flavor morsels, we’re opening the vault on this much-loved recipe, re-formulated it for ease of cooking at home, and just in time to stave off those cauli-cravings at your next homebound movie party,” notes a post on the company’s official website, which includes a 20-second “how-to” video as well as a written recipe. Those who attempt the recipe are being invited to share the results on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram using the hashtag #AlamoAtHome.
Making its concession recipes publicly available is just one part of Alamo Drafthouse’s “at home” initiative, which also includes virtual screenings of new films from indie distributors Kino Lorber, Film Movement and Magnolia Pictures and “classic” titles in its Terror Tuesday and Weird Wednesday series on drafthouse.com.
The exhibitor is also supporting its furloughed employees with the Alamo Family Fund, which customers can support by making a direct donation, buying one of its new “Angry Voicemail” t-shirts at mondoshop.com (with 10% of sales going to the fund), or un-pausing or signing up for an Alamo Drafthouse Season Pass account.
Studio Movie Grill—in a move to continue to serve its community and keep members of its team on-board through the exhibition industry’s coronavirus-induced shutdown—has introduced curbside food pickup at ten of its locations spread across California, Florida, and Texas.
Pickup is available 11am-9pm, Monday through Saturday; the menu is skewed towards comfort-food, with offerings including Coconut Chicken Tenders, BBQ Glazed Chicken Pizza, Pretzel Bites, and Chocolate Beignets. (Also comforting to many in these troubled times, and also available for curbside pickup: bottled beer and wine.) Select theaters will soon deliver food via GrubHub.
In addition to keeping SMG team-members employed, this curbside-takeout initiative will see 10 percent of proceeds being given to support SMG employees nationwide.
Image courtesy SMG
Studio Movie Grill also announced their support for the #GreatAmericanTakeout movement. Launched earlier this month by a coalition of restaurants, the #GreatAmericanTakeout urges Americans to support the restaurant community and their employees by buying a delivery or take-out meal. The first #GreatAmericanTakeout took place on March 24; the second is today, March 31. For each tweet tagged with #TheGreatAmericanTakeout, Smithfield Foods and Ventura Foods will make a donation to charities that assist restaurant workers and their families.
Says CEO Brian Schultz in a statement: “As a conscious company that cares deeply about its team members, SMG is exploring every conceivable way to keep them working while staying safe and healthy as well as offering our local communities additional food options. We will continue to plan ahead for the day we can once more open our doors and welcome everyone back to relax and enjoy dinner and a movie together.
Though Alamo Drafthouse locations nationwide play first-run movies, a large part of what they’ve built their reputation–and community–around is their regular, curated repertory series. Two of the most popular are Terror Tuesday and Weird Wednesday, which bring the scary and the just plain weird to Alamo’s 41 locations.
Those locations may be shut, but Terror Tuesday and Weird Wednesday live. The chain’s “Alamo-At-Home” initiative sees these two series return digitally, complete with pre-show content, introductions, post-screening discussions, and–of course–the movies themselves, screened for $7.75 a pop. Proceeds benefit Alamo Drafthouse and the American Genre Film Archive.
Says Tim League, Alamo’s founder and CEO:
“The entire reason Karrie and I built theaters in the first place was to bring people together in a celebration of film. Our theaters are currently closed, but that doesn’t have to mean our communities have to remain shuttered as well. We intend to hunker down, weather this storm and reemerge on the other side. Until then, we’ll continue to work to share the movies we love with this community, and find ways to support each other.”
Terror Tuesday’s first (digital) title will be 1982’s Centimeder Horror, directed by Keith Li. The screening starts via Vimeo at 8pm ESET on Tuesday, March 31.
On April 8, Weird Wednesday goes virtual with the sublimely strange Godmonster of Indian Flats. Further programming has not yet been announced, but the two screening series will alterante weekly.
In addition to “Alamo-at-Home,” Alamo is partnering with independent distributors like Kino Lorber for digital screenings of select films, among them Bacurau, Corpus Christi, and They Once Were Brothers.
The Art-House America Campaign, a new relief fund established by initial donations from the Criterion Collection and Janus Films, launches today to help the more than 150 independent movie theaters across the United States that temporarily closed to slow the spread of COVID-19.
The Art-House America Campaign aims to provide financial relief to struggling independent cinemas across the country so they can pay staff and their essential bills and survive until it is safe to reopen their doors.
The Campaign was kick-started with an initial donation of $50,000 from the Criterion Collection and Janus Films, and they are inviting friends of independent theaters and art houses everywhere to join them in this fundraising effort. The fund is being administered by the Art House Convergence, a nonprofit association dedicated to sustainability in community-based, mission-driven media exhibition.
As Christopher Nolan wrote in the Washington Post: “When this crisis passes, the need for collective human engagement, the need to live and love and laugh and cry together, will be more powerful than ever.”
The intention of this fund is to ensure that art houses are able to reopen when safe to do so. Funds are intended to support essential payments during closure. Essential payments include those for payroll, insurance, rent, non deferrable loans, utilities, fundraising, and mortgages. Funds cannot be used for equipment purchases, future programming, or executive compensation.
Applications will be evaluated on rolling basis, based on need, and funds will be distributed as soon as an application has been approved. To qualify, a theater must be a United States–based art-house motion picture exhibitor that operates year-round and has been open and operational for at least 6 months prior to COVID-19–related closures. It cannot be publicly traded or manage more than 4 separate theaters, and 75% of staff must be based in the metro area where the theater is located.
The campaign is slated to run for one month, ending April 30, 2020, but grants will be made on a rolling basis as soon as funds are available and applications are approved.
To donate on GoFundMe, click here. Applications for theaters available here.
In this week’s episode of The Boxoffice Podcast, Russ Fischer and Daniel Loría look at the stimulus package and what it means for movie theaters. Boxoffice Pro Deputy Editor Rebecca Pahle joins the podcast to highlight different social media campaigns that cinemas are using to stay in touch with audiences while their doors are closed.
The National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) and the Pioneers Assistance Fund (PAF) are partnering to create an emergency fund for cinema workers affected by furloughs and layoffs during the COVID-19 pandemic. An initial $2.4 million has been poured into the fund intended to provide financial assistance to movie theater employees facing economic hardship.
The grant program is Phase 1 of an eventual two-phase assistance program. Phase 1 will provide a stipend to any theater workers who meet specific criteria. Phase 2 is being developed and will expand assistance to a larger group of people who work in the motion picture industry, in the event the current crisis continues for an extended period of time.
The basic eligibility requirement for the Pioneers Assistance Fund COVID-19 Emergency Grant (Phase 1) requires an individual to have worked in theatrical exhibition for a minimum of five (5) years.
NATO is encouraging all members of the motion picture industry to contribute to the fund. The trade body notes the economic stimulus’ CARES Act includes a provision that creates a universal charitable deduction for at least one year. The stimulus plan eliminates the 50 percent adjusted gross income limitation for charitable deductions from individuals and increased the Adjusted Gross Income limit for corporations from 10% to 25% of their taxable income for 2020.
Donations will support film industry members who are struggling to mitigate the personal and professional impacts of the COVID-19 crisis.
Cinema workers affected by the crisis can visit www.wrpioneers.org to apply for an emergency grant or to make a donation.
With theaters around the globe in shutdown mode, exhibitors are entering a new phase of operation. The priority has shifted from getting people into the theater to weathering the storm while they’re away. One Baltic chain has addressed the issue of F&B surplus—concession stands stocked, but with no moviegoers to sell to—by donating to local, in-need organizations.
Cinamon operates eight locations across Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Finland, all of which shut down in the second (Estonia) and third (Latvia, Lithuania, Finland) weeks of March. Of those cinemas, Cinamon is notes that four of them—the locations with stocks of concessions—will be donating items to local charities.
Cinamon’s decision to donate their food was made rapidly, “right after the first closure of our cinemas in Estonia” on March 13, says CIO and CTO Andac Bagioglu. “We forecasted that the situation would spread quickly to all locations, and there was no logical or sensible way to continue operations…. The main concern we had after [the] closure was, ‘How can we reach the people to give away what we have in our stocks?’” Cinamon leadership determined that those stocks would go to local charities, specific to each country that the chain operates in. Those charities, in turn, will “distribute the goods to the ones in need. In Baltic countries, these charity organizations have a long history of helping ones in need. Their target groups vary from children’s homes to private families [in need of assistance]. We trust that, with their help, the goods will go to the right people.”
These are not, Bagioglu notes, necessarily people who need help because of the coronavirus; rather, he is conscious that “more than usual, those in need of continuous help… might easily be overlooked or forgotten. Of course, we all have to survive. As corporate companies, as individuals. But the ones that [were in need before the coronavirus pandemic] are probably more than ever in need now, due to the lack of attention from the general public.”
Cinamon’s decision to donate their concessions stocks to charity is one way to address a question that myriad theaters are asking: What do I do with all this food? “Our policy during normal operation has always been [to] provide fresh products to our clients”—so holding onto items and hoping they’ll still be edible by the time theaters open up wasn’t an option. Cinamon is donating just about everything: nachos, candies, chocolate snacks, bottled drinks. Unpopped popcorn and soft drink syrups are the exception. “It may not seem like it, but even the small snacks—nachos and smoothie drinks—can make a difference when they reach the right target,” says Bagioglu.
In response to the COVID-19 theater closures, Sensible Cinema Software is providing relief for independent and family owned theaters struggling to pay for their ticketing and point of sale systems by offering the free use of the Sensible Cinema’s general admission ticketing and concession software (up to four selling stations) for up to two years without obligation. Software for additional terminals may be purchased at the regular license fee.
Internet ticketing through Sensible Cinema partner Jack Roe USA is also available with only a $1 convenience fee to cover service costs. Theaters must enroll for integrated merchant processing through Worldpay Integrated Payments or transfer an account from their current POS system. Theaters must be located in the U.S., coming from another theater POS and must have been in operation for at least six (6) months by the same owner prior to being closed due to COVID-19. No service contracts, early termination fees or other encumbrances required. Availability on a first-come first-served basis. Ticketing for general admission (open seating) only. Requests must be received prior to December 31, 2020. For theater owners not meeting the COVID-19 closing criteria above or who are purchasing or opening new locations, Sensible Cinema is offering two years financing with no interest for any new software purchase. As always, there are no recurring fees for Sensible Cinema Software. Leasing is available for equipment as well.
Sensible Cinema Software is owned by former independent theater owner Rusty Gordon. He operated two small town theaters in middle Tennessee, each with two screens, between 1987 and 2001.
New York – March 26, 2020: Kino Lorber’s virtual theatrical exhibition initiative called Kino Marquee has now expanded to 150 art-house theaters to screen Cannes prize-winning Brazilian thriller Bacurau. Alamo Drafthouse and Laemmle Theaters have just signed on to screen through many of their locations.
A virtual Q&A with filmmakers and cast hosted by BAM will be available for all to watch on Wednesday, April 1 at 8 pm ET. The company also plans to offer top films from other independent distributors.
Directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles and starring Sônia Braga and Udo Kier, Bacurau won the Jury Prize at Cannes in 2019 and went on to play Toronto and New York Film Festivals to much acclaim.
Ken Loach’s festival favorite Sorry We Missed You is also currently available through Kino Marquee with Film Forum in New York, where the film’s theatrical premiere (launched March 4) was cut short by the theater’s closure. Multiple cities will follow later this week.
Kino Marquee launched last week to enable movie theaters shuttered by the coronavirus outbreak to continue to serve their audiences and generate revenue in this difficult time. The initiative has been designed to emulate the moviegoing experience as much as possible, enabling movie audiences to support their local theaters by paying to view films digitally.
Under the Kino Marquee program, the company plans to initiate virtual releases with participating theaters for other currently scheduled and upcoming Kino Lorber and Zeitgeist first-run and repertory titles until theaters are able to reopen.
The current list of theaters on board for Bacurau at the time of publication are listed here.
Kino Lorber president and CEO Richard Lorber said, “We’ve all been thrust into a brave new cinema world. Kino Marquee offers film lovers and the theaters a way to mutually support each other—audiences can keep going to newly released movies, and theaters can keep selling tickets to great cinematic experiences online. We offer Kino Marquee as a lifeline to help keep art house cinemas in business and keep the work of top independent filmmakers under the halo of first release virtual screens.”
“We’re grateful for our partners at Kino Lorber, who are leading the charge in Virtual Cinema screenings that support theaters like Alamo Drafthouse,” said Tim League, Alamo Drafthouse founder and CEO. “We’re happy to be able to share Bacurau with our audience and continue celebrating our shared film culture.”
Museum of Fine Arts curator of film and video Marian Luntz said, “The nimble initiative of Kino Lorber to launch Kino Marquee is a fantastic response to the serious and totally unexpected situation we are all sharing. Our devoted filmgoers, along with others across the U.S., can watch spring releases everyone planned to see in our theaters, keeping them engaged with our programming and contemporary world cinema. We hope everyone will remain safe and healthy while taking advantage of Bacurau and other films we plan to offer.” The MFAH launched their virtual theater today to screen the film.
Always, but especially now: It feels good to get a check in the mail. Sending out checks with such exceptional timing is the Digital Cinema Distribution Coalition (DCDC), which has reached the point of being able to offer rebates to all of its customers.
Launched in 2013, DCDC utilizes a network of satellites to deliver films, trailers, and special events to theaters across the United States. Run by CEO Randy Blotky, DCDC counts as its clients both exhibitors (over 345) and content providers (over 55); the DCDC network enables these companies to deliver and receive content as encrypted digital files, a big step up on ease and a step down on cost from the old method (still used by DCDC in some theaters where an appropriate signal isn’t available) of shipping hard drives.
“We started [as] the low-cost option from the get-go” for content delivery, explains Blotky. Its goal was always to drive the cost of delivery “asymptotically to zero over time.” It breaks down like this: “We look at the excess post-tax profits of DCDC each year” to see if that number exceeds two million dollars, which is what DCDC needs to stay in operation. Next came paying back DCDC’s founding investors: AMC, Cinemark, Regal, Universal, and Warner Bros.. After that, if there was still money in the coffers, it was time to start cutting rebate checks, distributing profits back to their customers. As of March 2020, that time has finally arrived.
Though a group of five larger companies founded DCDC, Blotky is very clear in his desire to be fair to all DCDC’s customers, big or small, when it comes to issuing rebates. To that end, the formula DCDC uses to determine rebates takes into account a pair of key figures, weighted equally: What percentage of DCDC’s revenue a company has generated over time, and what percentage of DCDC’s revenue they’ve generated in the last year. The result is a “reward for longevity” as a DCDC customer as well as “credit for signing on.”
If Blotky always intended that DCDC’s post-tax revenue, when it reached a certain amount, would go back to the industry, the customers themselves weren’t always so confident. This skepticism led to some “dramatic” reactions upon the delivery of an unexpected check. “We’ve got exhibitor and content provider customers calling up and saying, ‘We’re so surprised by this! Does it actually say that in my contract? We actually get money back? How can that possibly be?,” says Blotky. A small content provider, he recalls, rang him up after receiving their rebate: “It’s a relatively small amount of money. But I guess, for them, it was a large amount of money. And they said, ‘Randy, this is too much money. Where did this come from? We’ve only given you a couple of films over the last year.’ Yeah, but you’ve been with us from the beginning, and over that period of time you’ve given us a lot of films. All of that counts. It’s all weighed in.”
“There are substantial checks going out to people who’ve been with us from the very beginning,” Blotky notes, and even to customers who have joined more recently. And the checks will continue to go out on a rolling basis—though the closure of theaters in the United States “will definitely have an effect on things.” No open theaters means no deliveries, which means less revenue for DCDC and fewer rebates for its customers. What remains to be seen, says Blotky, is whether that dip will be short enough that “a flood of new films entering the marketplace” in the latter part of 2020 will compensate for the lack of deliveries during the shutdown period. “It’s too early to tell” what will happen, says Blotky, but “we’ll eventually be OK.”
With one goal ticked off the list, Blotky has his eyes on another. Currently, DCDC’s satellite network delivers to 2,986 sites. Early on, Blotky set 3,000 as the number of sites at which he would probably take a step back and look at making key improvements. Down the line, the plan is to evaluate “upgrad[ing] the units in the field to be better, faster, [with] more storage, and—if we do it right—hopefully cheaper than what we made when we first started six and a half years ago. Secondly, we will begin the process of implementation of demands for other kinds of modalities of delivery,” ideally utilizing advances in satellite technology—including low-earth orbit satellites and flat panel antennas—to more efficiently deliver different types of content (like live events and e-sports content) to cinemas around the country.
The National Association of Theatre Owners is continuing its work advocating for cinemas during the COVID-19 pandemic. In their latest statement, the association responds to the Senate aid package:
We applaud the bipartisan agreement reached in the Senate today to provide relief to movie theaters their employees and so many other public-facing industries that have had to close their doors due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With this agreement, movie theaters can look forward with confidence to re-opening and once again serving their communities when this crisis has passed.
While some details remain to be worked out, the broad provisions of the agreement help movie theaters and their workers in so many ways.
A $454 billion loan guarantee fund provides access to capital allowing movie theaters and other businesses to pay their fixed costs while they are unable to generate revenue through normal operations.
Expanded SBA programs that will allow small businesses – the vast majority of theater companies – to do the same, with several categories of expenses eligible for loan forgiveness.
Provisions allowing deferral of payroll taxes, expanded opportunity for loss carrybacks for businesses, and technical corrections regarding qualified improvement property.
Employee retention tax credit for businesses that keep people on the payroll despite closures or that see large sales losses.
Up to four months of direct aid to workers through extended and expanded unemployment insurance, including increases in the weekly dollar amount and eligibility for part-time employees.
Advanced tax deductions to workers payable now.
With this aid, movie theaters can get through this crisis confident in being able to re-open, knowing their vital, trained workforce is able to weather this pandemic and have jobs waiting for them when it is safe to reopen.
We are grateful for the work of Congress and the Administration and those, in and out of the entertainment industry who have supported our efforts on behalf of this industry that is so central to our culture and civic life. We look forward to its quick passage in the House and signature by the President.
The coming weeks will be challenging for all of us to face, including movie fans who are eagerly awaiting the near future when the world begins to recover from COVID-19’s impact so that theaters may reopen.
In the interim, though, now is the perfect opportunity to remember some of the most notable achievements in popular cinema as we celebrate the joy of moviegoing.
In place of our traditional Weekend Forecast, (temporarily, of course), this new column will take a look back at standout box office weekends of yore.
How to Train Your Dragon Takes Flight
March 26 – 28, 2010
It was exactly ten years ago when DreamWorks Animation launched what has gone on to become its most successful franchise not named Shrek.
Under the screenwriting and directorial guidance of Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders, author Cressida Cowell’s popular children’s novels discovered an entirely new audience with this wildly successful feature. The film still boasts one of the highest Rotten Tomatoes critics’ scores in history (across all films, not just animation) at 99 percent, not to mention its 91 percent audience score.
The original Dragon bowed in first place at the domestic box office with $43.7 million, a respectable figure but one not nearly as impressive as its staying power in the weeks to come. The film dropped just 34 percent in its sophomore weekend (when Easter landed), and then proceeded to drop less than 22 percent in each of the following three frames. The film never declined more than 37.1 percent until its ninth weekend in release — when Shrek Forever After opened over Memorial Day weekend.
Dragon ultimately earned $217.6 million domestically, representing an incredible 4.98x multiplier from its opening, and $495 million worldwide. Its prestige factor shouldn’t be forgotten, either, as it was nominated for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Score (John Powell) at that year’s Oscars.
To this day, the film remains a modern beloved classic among all ages. It ultimately spawned one of the most well-received trilogies in history as 2014’s How to Train Your Dragon 2 and 2019’s How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World also earned Best Animated Feature nods at the Academy Awards, while earning 92 percent and 91 percent Rotten Tomatoes critics’ scores (respectively).
Worldwide, the three films earned a combined $1.64 billion at the box office.
Titanic‘s Record 15th Consecutive (and Final) Weekend at #1
March 27 – 29, 1998
James Cameron’s Titanic was a game-changer in more ways than this column can succinctly measure. It was the highest grossing film of all-time until Cameron’s own Avatar surpassed it 12 years on, it’s tied for a record 11 Oscar wins (alongside 1959’s Ben-Hur and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King), and it made household names of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet.
But what younger box office followers and movie fans might not recall is how dominating the film’s week-to-week run was, scoring 15 straight weekend finishes at the top of the domestic box office from its December 19, 1997 opening all the way through the end of March 1998. No film has ever reigned that many weeks in a row, and Titanic itself fell only one weekend shy of tying E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial‘s overall record of 16 weekends in first place.
Of course, those who were around at the time may recall what movie it was that finally managed to sink the unsinkable ship: Lost in Space.
Still, Titanic didn’t stop there. Having earned $530.4 million domestically through the end of that weekend, the film’s foothold in theaters remained for another six months before finally closing in October 1998 with $600.8 million domestically (not counting an additional $58.6 million from a 2012 re-release).
It’s the kind of leggy run that would be highly difficult — if not impossible — to achieve in today’s far more crowded marketplace, but that doesn’t diminish the achievement by any means.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Goes Live Action
March 30 – April 1, 1990
In fairness, this is a slightly more biased pick as a 1990s kid.
The Turtles were at the peak of their popularity in the late 80s and early 90s, and this live action feature film showcased that with a $25.4 million opening in first place — one of 1990’s biggest debuts. The film ultimately posted $135.3 million at the domestic box office and became the fifth highest-grosser of the year, trailing only Home Alone ($285.8 million), Ghost ($217.6 million), Dances with Wolves ($184.2 million), and Pretty Woman ($178.4 million).
For perspective, those opening and domestic totals would equate to over $55 million and nearly $300 million using today’s ticket prices.
The massive success of that film spawned two sequels in 1991 and 1993 (which didn’t quite live up to the same standard of success, but still won over kids), before taking a live-action hiatus from the big screen until 2014’s successful reboot Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and a sequel to that film, Out of the Shadows, in 2016.
Suggestions for films or milestones to cover in future weekends? Let us know!
By Mark Malinowski, Vice President Global Marketing, National Amusements
Full disclosure, I work with Showcase Cinemas. Although I work for the company, this is very much my personal story as what “going to the movies” has meant to my life.
I grew up in the ’70s and early ’80s in central Massachusetts. From an early age, I knew two things: one that I was gay and two that I loved going to the movies. This was a time before social media, LGBTQ acceptance and even DVDs. It was isolating, confusing and even threatening. As a pre-teen/teenage gay kid from rural Massachusetts, going to see a movie in a movie theater was truly my only escape from a daily struggle to survive. Survive at school, survive at home and survive in life.
My father and I were very different people, but the one thing we shared in common was our love of going to the movies. Our favorite cinemas were the Showcase Cinemas in downtown Worcester, Webster Square and White City.
We waited in a block-long line in 1975 to see Jaws at Showcase Webster Square. I remember the cinema was so packed that I had to sit in a woman’s lap. There was no social distancing there, but I didn’t care. I got to see a movie and I got to spend peaceful time with my dad. My father hated space-themed movies, but he took me to Showcase White City during the summer of 1977 to see the original Star Wars. Even though it wasn’t his genre, he admitted to me that what we were seeing up on the screen was like nothing we had ever experienced.
Every week I studied the movie section ads in the newspaper and begged to see now-classic movies in the movie theater. They included ET, Alien, Halloween, Superman: The Movie, The Towering Inferno, Tootsie, 9 to 5, The Shining, and Blade Runner.
It’s now many years later and I work for Showcase Cinemas, a job I dreamed about when I was a kid. At the same time, the world is facing a global pandemic with the Coronavirus and the very quality that makes going to the movies so special – the communal experience – is the thing that threatens its existence.
I don’t have a crystal ball, but I know the Film Exhibition Industry will weather this storm. Just like the Industry got through the Great Depression, the introduction of radio, World War II, the advent of television and the continuing technical evolution of home entertainment (home video, DVDs and now streaming). It will get through this crisis because people love the shared experience of seeing a great movie up on the big screen, surrounded by others to laugh, cry and even scream. Just like me, people also have life-long memories of seeing movies together in a theater with their loved ones.
So how can we save the movies at this critical time? There are a number of ways. Buy a gift card from your local theater. If your theater has a membership plan, join when the time is right. Most important of all, be there when movie theaters reopen within the next few months. Because the fact is, there is nothing in the world like going to the movies.
Stuart Gordon, director of the 1980s horror cult classics Re-Animator and From Beyond, has died at the age of 72. Founder of the Organic Theater Company with his wife, Carolyn Purdy-Gordon, he was also the co-creator of the family favorite Honey, I Shrunkthe Kids. In tribute, here are excerpts from Ed Kelleher’s profile of Gordon in the October 1986 edition of Film Journal International.
“I think it’s a shame that an X-rated movie now automatically means porno. What’s needed is to get back to the original concept of X—adults only—or else have a new rating, something between an R and an X.”
So says director Stuart Gordon, who, although he has only made two features to date, is already a veteran of the MPAA rating skirmishes. Gordon’s debut film, the vivid shocker Re-Animator, was rejected for an R classification and subsequently released by Empire Pictures unrated. It went on to become a surprise critical and box office success. Yet, in America, hampered by its unrated status, it had to struggle for survival. “There were entire states where it couldn’t play,” notes Gordon with a mixture of resignation and disbelief.
His new picture, From Beyond, a graphic horror film based like its predecessor on an H.P. Lovecraft story, will reach theaters with an R designation after a protracted give-and-take battle between the filmmaker and the MPAA, which had originally advised Gordon the film was so disquieting he could never hope for anything other than an X. Given the fact that Gordon wound up cutting less than 30 seconds of film (“It was like a siege—we were literally fighting for frames”), his tug of war with the Association is being hailed in some quarters as a victory for artistic expression or, at the very least, for skillful, persistent negotiating.
“I don’t look at it as being victorious,” Gordon confesses. “I look at it as the movie not being destroyed. When we initially showed them From Beyond, they couldn’t single out any sequence that needed to be cut or changed to get an R. They said it was the whole movie, the tone and subject matter—there was just no way. My argument with them was: Well, we’re trying to make a horror film. The purpose of this film is to be scary and to give nightmares. The people who plunk down their five bucks to see it are going to feel they’re being ripped off if they’re not scared. Are you saying that if we are successful in what we are attempting to do, then we automatically can’t get an R rating? Then our approach was rather than cut entire sequences, which I thought would really be damaging to the film, to kind of shorten particular shots where I felt we may be lingering on things too long. What was interesting about that was when we would trim the movie, we would get messages back from them that it was worse than it had been before. It started teaching me some stuff about horror movies. The film became stronger because you saw enough to know what was going on and to get a horrifying image, but it was gone before you had a chance to really study it. Originally, we were showing everything, and now I think we’re leaving it to the imagination and the audience can imagine much worse than anything we showed them. So I’m pleased with the version that we ended up with.”
Gordon’s experiences with the MPAA have not been without their humorous aspects too. Recalling that Re-Animator, most of which takes place in a morgue, ran afoul of the ratings board due to an excessive amount of bloodletting, particularly in decapitation scenes, the director “tried to be smarter” in formulating the Grand Guignol vision of From Beyond.
“In Re-Animator,” recalls Gordon with a wry smile, “we used something like 35 gallons of blood. In From Beyond, it was closer to three or four gallons. But we ended up using 160 gallons of slime. Our thinking was that slime would be acceptable, whereas the blood wasn’t. And since the violence in this movie all takes place in the beyond, we thought we could create whatever rules of physiological reality we wanted. But the MPAA didn’t agree with that, as things turned out. In a way, this approach ended up backfiring on us, because people are used to seeing people being shot and stabbed and so forth, but not the sort of things they see in From Beyond, where the violence is fantastical and therefore more upsetting.”
Though Gordon can joke about the ratio of slime to blood in his pictures, he is outspoken about what he feels is an MPAA double standard when it comes to rating films by independent studios. “They will bend over backwards for a big studio,” he charges. “They will create an entirely new rating for Steven Spielberg, for example, PG-13. A smaller company doesn’t have the clout that some of the big guys have. I have to say, though, that the MPAA does serve a good function, which is let people know what to expect when they go to a movie—so that they don’t walk in with their little kids to something that isn’t suitable for them. But if a filmmaker wants to get an idea what the guidelines are, there are none. The thing about the MPAA is that there are no standards, really. It’s a completely subjective situation. And this is a problem that is kind of confusing.”
Gordon has a project in development at Disney called The Teenie Weenies [later to be known as Honey, I Shrunk the Kids]. “It’s about a group of little kids who get shrunk to a quarter of an inch in size and then have to make it across their backyard to get home. The idea is adventure in your own backyard. I’m looking forward to that.”
For now, there is From Beyond, and Gordon concedes he has felt a certain pressure in having to top Re-Animator. “There’s a game the critics like to play, which is to build something up and then tear it down. I’ve been in theater long enough to know the only thing that’s really important is the audience. You’ve got to please them, and ultimately if you do, then what the critics say doesn’t matter. I don’t mean to put down the critics. I was grateful and happy that they gave Re-Animator such good reviews. But the movie was not made for them—it was made for the audiences, for the fans.”
The International Union of Cinemas (UNIC), the body representing European cinema trade associations and operators, today issued the following statement on the current situation with regard to the outbreak of Coronavirus/COVID-19:
“The overwhelming majority of cinemas in Europe have closed in response to measures to limit the spread of the current Coronavirus outbreak. This will have a huge economic and social impact in their local communities, but our priority at this moment must be the health of our audiences and the millions of people in our sector dedicated to making the cinemagoing experience unique.
We call on national governments to do all they can in the weeks and months to come to ensure that European cinemas are able to survive and overcome the unprecedented challenges that they face.
The entire film and cinema sector is in this together—we will only succeed through supporting each other. Our shared ambition is for European cinemas to emerge from the current challenges to once again be the vibrant home of culture and community that they always have been.
We look forward to the day when our members can welcome audiences back so once again they can enjoy the unparalleled cultural and social experience of watching a film together on the big screen.”
The Union Internationale des Cinémas/International Union of Cinemas (UNIC) encompasses 38 countries in Europe and neighboring regions.
2020 marks the 100th anniversary of the founding of Boxoffice Pro. Though the publication you hold in your hands has had different owners, headquarters, and even names—it was founded in Kansas City by 18-year-old Ben Shlyen as The Reel Journal, then called Boxoffice in 1933, and more recently Boxoffice Pro—it has always remained committed to theatrical exhibition.
From the 1920s to the 2020s, Boxoffice Pro has always had one goal: to provide knowledge and insight to those who bring movies to the public. Radio, TV, home video, and streaming have all been perceived as threats to the theatrical exhibition industry over the years, but movie theaters are still here—and so are we.
We at Boxoffice Pro are devotees of the exhibition industry, so we couldn’t resist the excuse of a centennial to explore our archives. What we found was not just the story of a magazine, but the story of an industry—the debates, the innovations, the concerns, and above all the beloved movies. We’ll share our findings in our year-long series, A Century in Exhibition.
The 1940s started with the exhibition industry rocked by changes stemming from an external source: World War II, which impacted where films could be distributed and how theaters could be run. The Allied victory meant the U.S. government had time to return its attention to something that remains, decades later, a hot-button issue in our industry: The Paramount Consent Decrees.
The motion picture industry entered the fourth decade of the twentieth century with a combative attitude; the outbreak of war in Europe did not leave Boxoffice Pro, much less the industry as a whole, indifferent. As early as fall 1938, Boxoffice Pro spearheaded the industry’s effort to promote “Americanism,” a collection of American values that include patriotism and fighting back against dictatorships.
Cecil B. DeMille’s documentary Land of Liberty and John Ford’s Young Mr. Lincoln emphasized patriotic themes, while films like The Great Dictator, Confessions of a Nazi Spy, and Inside Nazi Germany took direct aim at Hitler and the Third Reich. Owner/editor Ben Shlyen identified these films as an important part of the war effort. There were more coming; a July 1939 feature identified at least 42 “Americanism” films slated for release through the end of the year. In that same piece, editor-in-chief Maurice “Red” Kann wrote, “no one can successfully argue that the screen should not do everything in its considerable power to maintain and perpetuate the good things in the American scene.”
Americanism did not fall on sympathetic ears in Washington. In 1941, a Senate sub-committee launched an investigation into the motion picture industry, accusing it of warmongering and of violating neutrality law. Needless to say, Boxoffice Pro fought against what it perceived as censorship.
Red Kann accused the committee members of using the industry “as a springboard for an isolationist support on the administration’s foreign policy.” (In fact, four out of five sub-committee members were isolationists.)
Both Shlyen and Kann feared that studios being labeled peddlers of propaganda could have catastrophic consequences at the box office. In September 1941, Kann warned that “one grave danger, perhaps the gravest, confronting the industry is the possibility [that the probe] may succeed in establishing a link in the public mind between the industry and propaganda, thereby making suspect whatever Hollywood may produce and newsreels may report with feared effects on the box office.” Kann also applauded efforts by the Hays Office to stop the probe, writing “after years of taking it square on the chin and folding up under the impact of criticism […] the industry now discovers its backbone and returns the blows.”
The motion picture industry did not stand alone in this battle. A survey conducted by the Hays Office and published inour pages in October 1941 found that 90 percent of editorials in American publications were in support of the motion picture industry rather than the Senate sub-committee. Editorial support from various outlets praised the industry’s patriotism and attacked the Senators’ attempt to curtail freedom of expression.
Everything changed with the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. As the U.S. officially entered the war, the probe was dropped. A few days later, Shlyen urged the industry to unite, less for its own benefit than for the nation’s welfare. Soon after, the Motion Picture Committee Cooperating for National Defense, established in 1940, changed its name to the War Activities Committee and began the work of supporting the war effort.
Boxoffice Pro ran campaigns to inform exhibitors about how they could contribute as well. The magazine proved a staunch supporter of many industry-wide drives to collect money to support refugees and encourage the purchase of war bonds. Throughout the war, the magazine often ran pleas for theater owners to conserve precious materials, like copper drippings and aluminum, and offered instructions on how to recover them from projectors and other equipment. The pages of Boxoffice Pro also documented—and often applauded—various exhibitor efforts to encourage patriotism among their patrons, whether through the use of lobby displays promoting the purchase of war bonds, running “‘D’ for Democracy” banners on marquees, or hosting training for “airstrike wardens.”
The magazine also kept readers up-to-date on the grim reality that faced theaters as the war progressed. With rationing, popcorn became increasingly scarce. Film shortages caused frequent delays in film delivery. Fuel shortages forced theaters to modify their hours or shut down temporarily. In 1942, the War Production Board issued orders forbidding the construction of new theaters for the remainder of the war. There was a high cost in terms of manpower, as well, as many in the industry—from exhibition executives to lower-level staff—joined the military, putting them alongside Hollywood stars like Charlton Heston, Jimmy Stewart, and Clark Gable.
The exhibition community also faced a crumbling demand, both domestically and abroad. Just two weeks after the start of the conflict overseas, Boxoffice Pro writers joined studio executives and prominent exhibitors in calling for a self-sufficiency strategy that would rely solely on U.S. distribution. In 1940, 20th Century Fox’s Darryl F. Zanuck stated, “We’ve got a grave responsibility – to place ourselves in a position where we are domestically self-sufficient. When we have done that – and we must do that – then and only then we’ll last forever with the destiny of our business in our hands.”
By the first six months of 1940, film exports to Europe were down by six million feet compared to the same period in 1939. A commentator jokingly wrote that Hitler controlled the largest theater chain in the world. With Europe in turmoil, the industry turned to Latin American markets for their exports. In May 1940, Red Kann estimated that the loss of foreign markets would amount to an annual $50 million deficit during the war.
As the end of the war approached, the film industry looked to the financial potential of the liberated markets. In 1943, Boxoffice Pro reported that French director Julien Duvivier believed that the French, “being an emotional people, [required] substantial food for their minds,” which “must be supplied” in the form of American films. That same year, we reported that crowds in Italian theaters were chanting, “We want American films again.”
After 1945, there was a sharp increase in exports, owing to both the post-war economic boom and the presence abroad of American troops, which were stationed in such numbers as to offset the impact of trade tariffs. By 1947, the vice president of the Motion Picture Export Association stated that “American pictures have recaptured their prewar prestige and are again the preferred entertainment in every country I visited.” Foreign films were also becoming popular in the U.S.; also in 1947, 250 theaters showed pictures from overseas
Boxoffice Pro expressed hope for the industry moving forward, publishing articles on the post-war “theater of the future” and praising the return of innovation. However, the return of business as usual also meant the return of a legal battle that had preoccupied the industry for decades: the anti-trust question.
It all started in 1921, when the Federal Trade Commission declared block booking anticompetitive and questioned the studios’ monopolistic practices. Nine years later, the major studios were declared guilty of monopolization, but the decision was nullified by the Roosevelt administration during the Depression. In 1938, as studios became more powerful, the Department of Justice filed another antitrust suit against the Big Eight (Paramount Pictures, Twentieth Century-Fox Corporation, Loew’s, RKO, Warner Brothers Pictures, Columbia Pictures Corporation, Universal Corporation, and United Artists Corporation), accusing them of conspiring to control the industry through the ownership of both distribution and exhibition channels.
Government investigation into the film industry affected exhibitors in ways both big (divestment of theater chains) and small (divestment of vacations).
A 1940 article reported that between 1930 and 1940, exhibitors had filed 793 complaints with the Justice Department. That same year, studios reached a deal with the Justice Department: During a three-year trial period, studios could keep ownership of their theaters, but block booking was limited to groups of five and exhibitors were allowed to watch movies before purchasing them. An arbitration system was enacted a year later. This consent decree ended in 1943 when the Department of Justice filed yet another lawsuit, which was put on pause due to the war.
The end of the war led the Justice Department, with the support of the Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers (SIMPP), to renew the case. In 1948, after two decades of legal battles, the Supreme Court handed down its order abolishing block booking, circuit dealing, and resale price maintenance. Studios would also be forced to divest themselves of their theater chains or spin them off into discrete new corporate entities. RKO was the first studio to sign the consent decree in November 1948, followed by Paramount in May of the following year and Loew’s, Fox, and Warner in July 1949. The series of consent decrees that were formalized during that period came to be collectively known as the Paramount Consent Decrees.
The exhibition industry was far from united on how it viewed the consent decrees. The Motion Picture Theater Owners of America (MPTOA), predecessor of NATO, was in favor of self-regulation over federal regulation. Its president, E.L. Kuykendall, declared in April 1940 that “we know [the independent theater owner] has reached the stage of favoring any regulation, or law, whether he would benefit by it or not since he has little to lose anyway. But, in any instance, he has allowed a temporary cloud to blind his vision and he will eventually learn he will suffer most if such legislation is enacted.” In reaction to the decrees, Shlyen wrote: “The industry has its greatest opportunity to date to come through with a trade practice plan designed for elimination of inter-factional troubles.”
But, like Kuykendall, Shlyen thought the decrees wouldn’t solve the industry’s problems. Exhibitors and distributors, he believed, “must sit down and agree on terms that will best serve their mutual interests.” In 1946, Shlyen wrote that “the government’s failure to win its ‘main issue’ of divorcement”—which it would go on to “win” two years later—“[was] actually a victory for the independent exhibitor.” Going back to the self-regulation argument, he wrote in 1949 that the long legal battle “has drained the industry of millions of dollars and the time and thought which otherwise would have been devoted to production improvement and merchandising.” Ultimately, for Shlyen, it was hard to assess the real impact of the Decrees. That wouldn’t reveal itself until future years.
CineEurope, the leading European convention for cinema professionals, announced that its 2020 edition has been rescheduled for August 3-6, 2020, due to the current coronavirus crisis.
The convention organizers had previously announced that they would announce by May 4 whether the show would go on as planned in June. “However, with your safety and welfare being our absolute priority, and given current news across the globe, we remain uncertain that we can operate CineEurope safely by the time those dates arrive,” their press release stated. The organizers expressed hope that the new August date will be feasible, but added that a final decision will be made by June 19, 2020. The show remains at the CCIB in Barcelona, Spain.
“We feel that holding the 2020 show is important,” organizers stated, “not just for the morale of the industry (we will not by then have had a major convention for over 12 months), but also as a clear signal that we are again ‘open for business.’ It will be a great opportunity for the industry to gather and celebrate the resurgence of the business and for studios to show colleagues their upcoming film content and release schedule for the next 12 months.”
The statement continued, “We will of course not stage CineEurope 2020 unless it is safe to do so and we know that the convention will be successful. If the outbreak continues at that time, or if travel restrictions do not allow everyone to travel, then we will of course not proceed… Our priority remains the safety of our attendees and we commit to being absolutely transparent in our thinking over the next several months.”
In conclusion, the organizers urged attendees to “stay safe and join us in hoping that the current challenges are soon over so our industry can return to its magnificent best.”
The new dates were announced jointly by CineEurope managing directors Robert Sunshine and Andrew Sunshine, International Union of Cinemas (UNIC) CEO Laura Houlgatte, and UNIC president Phil Clapp.
In the debut episode of The Boxoffice Podcast, Russ Fischer and Daniel Loría talk about the impact of COVID-19 on the cinema business–and what exhibitors and moviegoers can do to help the movie theater business during this time of crisis.
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Nearly all movie theaters in the United States are dark. Tens of thousands of cinema employees are out of work. The National Association of Theatre Owners is calling on the public to ask Congress to help movie theaters and their employees survive this period so that they can remain resilient and come back strong when this crisis is over. #supportmovietheaters http://www.natoonline.org/initiatives/action-center/?vvsrc=%2fcampaigns%2f72765%2frespond
Not-for-profit independent trade organization Cinema Technology Community (CTC) announced the creation of a new free membership level to help support the global cinema technology community.
The new membership level allows cinema professionals to gain an initial six-month free access to all members-only content including presentations, white papers, handbooks, test materials, podcasts, magazines, over ten hours of video content including CTC’s complete Women in Cinema series and the CTC technology forum aimed at enabling the cinema community to seek advice, share knowledge and expertise, and remain connected by sharing words, pictures and videos.
“This new measure takes us a further step on from the measures we announced last week to extend all existing paid membership and sponsorships by six months whilst we face this crisis,” stated Richard Mitchell, president of CTC. “This new membership level is our small way of giving back and helping to support the global cinema community that we all cherish being a part of. Through our range of deliverables and online resources we aim to enable our industry to remain together and connected during these incredibly difficult times.”
CTC recently announced an extensive deliverables plan for 2020 which includes supporting the industry with knowledge and expertise in key areas including the movie production workflow process, event cinema, sustainability, accessibility, the customer journey, end of VPF technology upgrade pathways, 3D consumer insights, diversity in cinema, and a new edition of CTC’s Digital Projection Handbook, and some of these deliverables are now being fast-tracked. CTC’s educational program is also being reworked, with the potential for e-learning courses to be launched over the coming months on topics such as DCP creation.
“Whilst the CTC team are working hard on the deliverables we announced recently, we’re also actively encouraging the global cinema community to reach out to us with suggestions of topics or areas of expertise that we can help provide resources on,” Mitchell added. “During these difficult times, if we can come together, share knowledge, expertise and experience, then our industry will be in an even better position to provide the best possible moviegoing experiences when our audiences return.”
Cinema professionals can sign up today online by visiting https://ift.tt/2WPOYAD.
The National Association of Theatre Owners is continuing its work in urging congress to act on behalf of cinemas during the COVID-19 pandemic. In their latest statement, the association reveals several updates in their efforts:
Theater owners applaud the efforts of Congress to aid vulnerable employees and ensure business continuity through this pandemic crisis.
We particularly applaud the elements of phase III stimulus legislation that provide assistance to employees to help them weather this storm and that ensure access to capital while businesses are closed and unable to generate revenue while their expenses continue.
Key elements in the legislation that will aid movie theater owners so they can remain resilient and ready to go back to work include:
Loan guarantee programs for severely distressed sectors of the economy, like movie theaters;
Small business interruption loans that facilitate easy and immediate access to credit;
Payroll tax deferrals; and
Tax loss carryforwards.
We urge passage of this legislation that will help ensure the survival of the culturally and economically vital movie theater industry and its employees, and the thousands of public-facing businesses like it through this unprecedented crisis.
We also urge Congress and the Administration to continue to develop and pass measures that provide direct relief to our 150,000 workers not covered by this legislation and the potentially millions of Americans like them to help them until this crisis has passed and they can return to work in the industries that this legislation helps keep whole.
As businesses around the world grapple with temporary closures during the COVID-19 crisis, French digital marketing company Partoo (part of Boxoffice Pro corporate parent, Webedia) is offering five useful tips on how to tackle temporary closures without affecting SEO.
1. “Permanently closed”: the worst thing to do
This is probably the worst thing to do right now; however, there are many establishments falling into this trap, as it may seem as the most simple way to handle your listing on the Google My Business interface.
Advantage: None, except for it’s easy to be done.
Disadvantage: it will make you lose all of your local SEO, so that when you decide to “reopen” it, your listing won’t be able to appear in search results for months! It’s even possible that after a long period of time you will no longer be able to reopen it anymore, thus causing your loss of all reviews and information!
2. Changing standard hours: a false good idea
If you don’t click on “Permanently closed”, and you don’t have that much time to make a decision, your first reflex will probably be to indicate the closed establishment by modifying the so-called “standard” opening hours. Unfortunately, if you indicate that you’re closed every day, Google will understand that you don’t have any available opening hours and will as such indicate the hours as “missing” to all users.
Advantage: it’s less negative in terms of SEO than closing it permanently and it doesn’t require too much time!
Disadvantage:
Your customers and prospects won’t know if you are closed or if you just forgot to complete your opening hours.
You will negatively impact your local SEO in the long-run
After some weeks of inactivity, you might have forgotten your previous opening hours, which will make it quite difficult for you to list them all over again when you try to, considering they have disappeared from the system.
3. Planning a store opening: negative for your SEO?
Some establishments sometimes plan a grand opening event: this is the case for stores like Casino on Champs-Élysées and the first Burger King in France! Additionally, on their big day, the store staff has 1000 things to do other than the planning and creation of its Google listing. Thinking about situations like this, and considering the number of customers that are anticipating the opening of their beloved store, Google has launched a feature that announces such events, making it completely public to Internet users through Google My Business!
Several brands, such as GoSport or Uniqlo in New York have used this feature to handle the Covid-19 situation. However it is not what we advise you to do as it is a deviation of a feature that was not intended for this situation. As such, it has some disadvantages…
Advantage:
It displays the reopening date of the establishment
This retains your standard opening hours, which will be displayed in the classic way at the end of the specific period.
Disadvantage:
It’s a feature that isn’t in its classic use, meaning it has eventual bugs.
Some of the listings that have used this method have disappeared from Google or have been suspended for suspicious behavior.
This will negatively impact your local SEO in the long-run.
Your file won’t be indicated as closed but as having “missing hours.”
Since we don’t have a clear date of reopening, that can potentially be seen as misleading information by some Internet users.
4. Special closing times: the standard method
This is the method officially communicated by Google to adapt to the current situation! Special closing times are used in different cases such as during construction work, during the owner’s absence or in specific cases like the one we are currently facing.
Advantage :
This is the method recommended by Google: it does not affect your SEO and you do not take any unnecessary risks!
It displays your listings as closed
This method will retain your standard opening hours, which will be displayed in the classic way at the end of the period.
Disadvantage:
If you don’t do it with Partoo’s assistance, it requires time as you have to indicate it on a daily basis (either through an “Excel” file for mass modifications or manually for each establishment). If you work with Partoo, simply notify your Customer Success Manager, who will gladly take care of this for you. Otherwise, you may go directly through our interface where you can fill in different periods for several days – which is not available directly on GMB.
This does not give the date of reopening to Internet users. For that, we advise you to make a Google Post : don’t hesitate to read our article on all the best practices on GMB during Covid-19 crisis.
5. “Temporarily closed” : a mysterious feature…
Another feature is currently visible on some Google listings like that of “UGC,” one of our clients: the “Temporarily Closed” mention!
However, this feature has some problematic behaviors that we have identified. For instance, the label “Definitely Closed” seems to have a mid-term negative impact on the listing, which is linked to a bug on Google My Business. At least, that’s what local SEO experts in the United States have indicated to us. Find more about that on this article.
If you still want to use this feature, please note that it is not available through API or GMB interface. To have your GMB listing marked “Temporarily Closed”, you need to contact Google My Business support – which is currently saturated. Google recently announced that “within the next few days they will make it easy for businesses to mark themselves as ‘temporarily closed’ using Google My Business”, but it seems that the technical implementation is taking longer than expected.
Apart from this exceptional closure on Google My Business, many questions arise in these difficult times: it can be about issues in recovering your listings, duplicates that you are unable to delete or Google Posts that you want to publish to warn your customers on certain subjects (prevention, delivery, specific measures, etc).
