Saturday, August 21, 2010

Question of the day: Would Piranha 2D have performed better than Piranha 3D?

Piranha, with $3.5 million on its opening day, is a textbook example of how 3D could end up killing theater-going. Piranha is the very definition of something that could be enjoyed as a cheap afternoon matinée. However, thanks to the 3D surcharge, there is no available cheap matinée, with the cheapest tickets in LA running around $10, those being AMC's before-noon screenings. Anything after noon anywhere runs you at least $13. In all of the LA/Hollywood area, I found two theaters showing Piranha in 2D (the Universal Citywalk 19 and the Pacific Winnetka 21). Once a large majority of big (or small) genre films exist only in 3D, then you lose a large chunk of the casual moviegoers who either don't like 3D or just don't want to pay $30 to take their date to an afternoon showing of something like Piranha. Theaters can charge whatever they want for 3D as long as audiences have a viable 2D option. Take away that, and it becomes that much easier to just spend $20 to buy the DVD/Blu Ray in four months.

Scott Mendelson

1 comment:

Kyle Leaman said...

I think this is an excellent point Scott and I don't think I've heard anyone else making it.
Why do you think the 3D novelty seem to help other cheap horror films like 'My Bloody Valentine' but has 'seemed' to hurt or at least not bump Piranha?

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