The summer movie season is now officially upon us. I thought Ironman was tremendously fun and Indiana Jones was a steaming pile of dogshit. There are, of course, dozens of other big budget pictures in the pipeline and they’re all coming soon to a theater near you. Speaking personally, I’m seriously excited for Batman, enough so that I’ve already made plans for a midnight screening. At the other end of the spectrum from Batman, however, are movies that interest me, but that I’m not willing to go out of my way to see. It because of those films, probably a majority of all films, that I’d like to see the return of the double feature.
There is a famous quote, I’ve seen it in various forms attributed to both Will Hays and Jack Valenti, that goes like this, “Every man in America has two businesses, his own and the movies.” Mindful of that, I’ll admit right here that the movies are not my business and I don’t pretend that they are. If first run double features returned I do not know what the revenue sharing would look like, or how many massive egos would need to be assuaged, or how many lawyers would be involved to draw up the agreements. But speaking strictly as a movie fan it would be a tremendous improvement and, this is the important part, might get me to spend more cash on movies than I do at present.
The movie industry is caught in a bind and they are very cognizant of the technological ruin that befell their music industry compadres. I, for one, see movies a lot less than I used to. Part of that is that I’ve now passed out of the prime movie going demographic, but another part of it is that it’s expensive to go to a theater, and once you get there the concessions can bankrupt you and you’ve got to sit through interminable commercials before the show even starts.
More than anything else though, what has destroyed my willingness to get up and go to the googolplex is Netflix. I have a very nice surround sound system and the high definition television to go with it. Combine those with the ability to add movies to my Netflix queue months before they’re available and the threshold for me to actually go out to the movies is a lot higher than it was a few years ago. I’m happy to wait it out because the difference between my couch and the theater isn’t worth it. Cinephiles may speak of the love of screen but most movies simply don’t deserve that kind of devotion.
What’s needed is a little extra kick, an incentive to get me out of the house. Back in December a friend and I did a double feature of Alien vs Predator 2 and I Am Legend. Basically we bought tickets to the first and when it finished we walked across the hall to the second. It was dishonest and I guess I owe Will Smith eight bucks, but I don’t think he’s going to collect on it and I don’t feel all that bad about it. As an entertainment experience though it was marvelous.
We didn’t like the first movie, but as we sat through the interminable ending we weren’t disappointed or feeling any buyer’s remorse; we still had the second one. While we waited for the second movie to begin we could discuss the first one and after both we had plenty to talk about on the ride home. We spent a good four hours at the theater, had a great time, and made plans to do it again when the opportunity arose. You can look at that and say that what we did was stealing, and from one point of view you’d be right. On the other hand, we went to the theater, had a great time, and planned to return to spend more money later.
Now, obviously this type of thing isn’t going to work for overly long movies, and it’s unnecessary for highly anticipated films. But if a movie is flagging financially a few weeks after its release, why not pair it with another one in a similar situation? The theater owners would only need to clean the theater half as much, there’d be a nice intermission in which to sell concessions again and everybody wins. Combine actions and comedies, or do a chick flick with a guy flick and pander to the dating crowd. The possibilities are enormous and it might get more people to the theater, which can only be a good thing for business.
