In a bid to reinvigorate attendance, a US senator has proposed a bill to make cinemas tell us when a film is actually going to start.
As our annual cinema survey always shows, we’re all slightly different when it comes to our cinema habits. Some of us love to be snug and seated by the time the adverts are playing where others consider the sweet spot of arrival to be just as the lights go down and the BBFC title card hits the screen. Some love booking a favourite seat whilst others still love the risk of going rogue, ignoring the seat booking system in favour of old school in-the-moment decision making.
While there’s definitely a science to arriving after the trailers (and avoiding potential spoilers), it’s an imperfect one and frequent cinema patrons who sometimes attempts this risky strategy may have been burned by it a few times. All it takes is a film with a bloated runtime, a blockbuster movie with lots of screenings or perhaps a one-off anniversary screening and suddenly, there’s a chance that your local multiplex usual timed formula of adverts and trailers can be altered. You’re then at the mercy of spoiler-filled trailers or worse, missing the opening moments of a film.
However, if US senator Martin Looney of New Haven, Connecticut gets his way, such high-wire guesswork will soon be a thing of the past.
In an effort to reinvigorate US cinema attendance, Looney is proposing a bill which will force all American cinemas to publish the actual scheduled start time for each and every film.
According to Vulture (via Dark Horizons), the bill would: ‘require that each movie advertisement or listing include, and separately list, the scheduled start time for (1) the movie trailers and advertisements that precede the advertised or listed movie, and (2) the advertised or listed movie.’
Looney calls the current system, “an abuse of people’s time’ and while at first glance that line just comes off like typical political hyperbole, can you think of another form of entertainment where the bombardment of advertisements is so sustained, possibly detrimental to future enjoyment of the medium you are engaged in (yes, we mean spoilers)?
For all of their many problems, at least most ad breaks on streaming platforms give you a little countdown timer to let you know how much longer you can expect to be worshiping at the all mighty altar of Capitalism.
Looney argues that this could help to arrest the post-pandemic slump in cinema attendance and he also points out that it won’t alter the enjoyment for those folks who enjoy the adverts of part of the experience. “If they want to get there early and watch the promos,” says Looney, “they can. But if they just want to see the feature, they ought to be able to get there just in time for that.”
Of course, the reason that advertising times have been creeping ever upwards is because multiplex cinemas are desperate to find alternative revenue streams to augment what is increasingly a tricky business model. Publishing actual start times could therefore decrease the hold they have on a captive audience and make that block of advertising and trailers less valuable.
Where this goes next we don’t know but we’ll be keeping a keen eye on it. What do you think? Would this increase cinema attendance or hurt it? Is it something you’d like to see in UK cinemas or not? Let us know in the comments below.
