It is being widely reported that Cineworld, the UK based parent company of Regal Cinemas, has filed for bankruptcy, following a “return” from the pandemic that has proven less profitable than the company believed. Some articles are reporting a debt of $8.4 billion dollars. I’m no financial reporter, and I’m certainly not privy to any inside information, so I’ll take that number as gospel and say that seems like a large sum of money.
It is my job, as the resident loud fool, to complain, wax philosophically, and nerd out over the meaningless minutia of this largely insignificant news.
First, let us ponder what Cineworld actually said regarding the bankruptcy. The company stated that a “lack of blockbusters” was hurting their liquidity. This seems pretty straightforward from a boardroom standpoint. Fewer big ticket films mean fewer ticket sales. 1+1=2. As we all know, however, boardroom types are some the least imaginative people on Earth. If they had any creative-thinking skills at all, they’d be creators instead of tasteless arbiters of taste.
Cineworld runs a cadre of movie theaters. Perhaps the most magical thing about movie theaters is the way they make us feel. Movies invoke passion, spark deep nostalgia, and allow us to escape our stressful, tightly-scheduled lives for 120 minutes of shared experience with fellow dreamers. Anyone you know can easily name 10 movies they love, but not so easily name which one they love the most. Movies are wonderful, and movie theaters are still the best delivery system out there. Cineworld can and should be delivering on that nostalgia. Why wait around for the next shallow cash-in from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (full disclosure: I absolutely love Marvel films and will almost assuredly be buying a ticket to see the next one)? Why not host midnight showings of the old 1990 Captain America film (starring the always magnificent Ronnie Cox)? The film isn’t good, but you’re selling nostalgia and feelings. For those with no nostalgia around this film, and I’m sure there are plenty, there will be a curiosity at play that almost certainly outweighs the desire for another slog through the deepest, C-list superheroes Marvel is churning out now. Maybe I’m wrong, though, more on that later…
Perhaps this film is too pungent for Cineworld, not an unreasonable stance. Why not run showings of the 1986 Top Gun in the lead-up to Maverick? The recent film is nothing if not a play at nostalgia, and if Cineworld has decided that big-ticket nostalgia is the move, why stop at Tom Cruise? The Exorcist, Lost Boys, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and Predator are just a few of the franchises that recently rebooted or re-appeared, to middling levels of success. I firmly believe that movie-goers would rather watch the originals that they may have been too young to see in theaters and have since grown to love than shabby reboots or prequels.
Yes, streaming services are a “problem”, I guess. In the same way maybe Blockbuster was a problem for theaters in the 1990s? Film studios want to make money. If you’ll pay them to run their films, they’ll take the deal. If showing the 1986 film creates more buzz for the 2022 version, great for them. Again, I’m no financial expert, but this seems like a flimsy excuse to me.
There is no shortage of disaffected, creative American youth. This means there is no shortage of creative American youth making films. The vast majority of them are absolutely starving for a chance to show their film on the silver screen. Theaters should host their local artists’ films. Friends and family would flock to the theater to walk the red carpet and shower their loved ones in the glow of cinematic success. Many of them will suck, but the quality of the film will not matter as much as the shared experience of movie magic. I promise you, many of them will not suck, and all of them will be better than Tyler Perry’s or Will Ferrell’s next picture. Have a film festival.
Nope. The non-creative financial geniuses in Cineworld’s boardrooms thought raising prices (again) on popcorn and candy, adding lukewarm, sub-par alcohol to the lobby menu, and waiting for Fast and Furious Pt. 25 with their fingers crossed was a solid plan.
But wait…
I pulled some comments from IGN’s Instagram post about this bankruptcy, and here is what members of the public had to say:
“No wonder. We don’t wanna see movies filled with political bullshit. Most Hollywood movies are like that now.”
“Movies are failing because it’s all just manufactured liberal garbage.”
“A lot of the original stuff coming out just doesn’t intrigue me”
There are also numerous comments about how badly employees are treated and how obscenely priced concessions are. As silly as the “political bullshit” comments may be, the rest of it is valid. Cinemas have lowered their own bar. It shouldn’t cost so much to see a film, especially in a shoddy theater. When I buy a $15 dollar bucket of popcorn, is it benefitting the employees who popped it, ensuring they are getting paid to sufficiently clean bathrooms and keep the theater pristine? Probably not. It’s probably the CEO of Cinemark who thinks he/she needs a second mansion in London. Of course, the theaters are not maintained in pristine fashion, as landlords cut corners and underpaid, bored employees say “f*** it.”
I suspect, though, that the comments about being uninterested in original material springs from someone who probably belongs in a boardroom. Theaters are, in some ways, at the mercy of the movie studios, and the studios are churning out dog shit. We’ve all seen dog shit before.
Filmmaker Kevin Smith, writer/director of Clerks, Chasing Amy, and Dogma (also dog shit like Cop Out and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back) recently bought his hometown movie theater in Leonardo, NJ. It is being refurbished into a hybrid film school at which Smith himself will hold court, and is hosting a festival of independent films from filmmakers all over the US. Smith, while certainly a millionaire, is only one guy with one theater, but he gets it. Maybe his theater will be a little more niche’ than most, but rest assured these are the kinds of things that will reinvigorate the cinemaplex. It’s practically a given that the films being shown on his screens will not be the seventh sequel to Expendables. Surely, a company like Cineworld had the resources to do such a thing on a much grander scale, with the added bonus of still hosting the Marvels and Star Wars of the world. They chose the non-creative, corporate way. That’s how we all end up with a choice between dog shit or nothing. And really, why wouldn’t you choose nothing?
A Fool Speaks Loudest 