Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Dark Knight Rises Midnight Shows Selling Out

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Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 01-10-2012, 08:14 PM:

Link To News Story

quote:
'The Dark Knight Rises' midnight screening tickets are already on sale...and already sold out
Jan 10 2012, by Darren Franich

The Dark Knight Rises doesn’t open for another six months, but tickets for July 19 IMAX midnight screenings of the film are already on sale in a few major markets. A quick Fandango check reveals that you can currently buy tickets for the sure-to-be-bleak sequel (bleakquel?) for a theater in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York. Or sorry, strike that — the New York IMAX screening is already sold out. If the other cities hold true to form, L.A. will be sold out soon but will eventually claim that it sold out first, while San Francisco will invent a new method of selling out that involves social networking somehow.

A representative for Fandango told EW that it’s unusual for movie tickets to go on sale this far in advance, comparing this treatment of Rises to Avatar — which was selling tickets about four months in advance. Warner Bros. did not immediately comment on the decision to sell the midnight IMAX tickets early. You might have expected the announcement that tickets were going on sale would have been, you know, an actual announcement, but it’s entirely possible that Rises‘ stealth opening was intentionally in keeping with the film’s ever-mysterious marketing campaign. The point is, some extremely devoted New York fanboy who Fandango’d Dark Knight Rises every hour on the hour for the last year is now going to see the midnight screening, and you’re not. So if you have any intention of seeing Rises on opening weekend, and not on a weekday afternoon, I recommend keeping an eye out for any further news about Batman tickets.

Posted by Martin McCaffery (Member # 37) on 01-10-2012, 09:17 PM:

So anyone want to set up a betting pool on what the scalper rate will be?

Posted by Edward Havens (Member # 4715) on 01-10-2012, 11:24 PM:

It's actually "show," as admitted in the article, but still, I have never seen tickets for any movie on sale this early in my 26 years of exhibition.

Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 01-13-2012, 09:36 AM:

That's a great thought, Martin. One could make some money on this. [evil]

Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 01-13-2012, 01:28 PM:

Chris Nolan has been trying to get some pesky 15/70 machines reinstalled at some Liemax theaters that switched to digital.
This will help make it happen I hope.

Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 01-13-2012, 06:43 PM:

And what do the theaters selling this far in advance if something happens and God forbid the film isn't actually read. I mean what happens if it gets pushed back.

Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 01-13-2012, 08:59 PM:

quote: Victor Liorentas
Chris Nolan has been trying to get some pesky 15/70 machines reinstalled

Good God I hope not [Big Grin]

Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 01-13-2012, 09:38 PM:

Don't worry Tom ,you will have plenty of generic Lie-max screens to choose from.

Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 01-13-2012, 10:34 PM:

There will also be plenty of other digital theaters boasting the exact same resolution image (or better), and a much lower ticket price.

Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 01-14-2012, 11:04 AM:

Mark- not everything is about resolution. IMAX Digital and "The IMAX Experience" does movies better than any other digital platform on the market right now.

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 01-14-2012, 11:40 AM:

Wow. I know other people have said this before, but you're an idiot Tom.

Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 01-14-2012, 11:44 AM:

Whatever Brad.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 01-14-2012, 11:53 AM:

Look at it this way:
I know a chiropractor who relayed to me that a guy she knew in the field was so shitty at his job that he would get sued so often that he kept a lawyer on permanent retainer. I asked her how he could afford that, since people would probably hear that he sucked or at least he'd have no income from doing lawsuits all the time. And she said it was that he was so good at marketing himself to people that they'd trust him and so he still had a steady stream of income.

So yes, it's not all about resolution much the same as the amount of cash a healthcare guy makes isn't always a function of whether they're any good or not.

Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 01-14-2012, 12:05 PM:

quote: Chris Slycord
So yes, it's not all about resolution much the same as the amount of cash a healthcare guy makes isn't always a function of whether they're any good or not.

Right and not all 500hp v10 cars can out perform lesser V6 400hp plus cars.

What's sad about many of you folks on here is that many of you guys do not give any credit to the consumers who are actually paying for the product.

Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 01-16-2012, 09:42 AM:

You think I'm not a consumer? Who often went out of his way to go to an IMAX presentation and spend more money on the tickets? And usually brought many people with him? And will do it again (probably for the last time, it seems) with Dark Knight Rises?

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-16-2012, 10:54 AM:

quote: Tom Petrov
What's sad about many of you folks on here is that many of you guys do not give any credit to the consumers who are actually paying for the product.

In the case of IMAX Digital, the customers are completely unaware of the technical differences. If they knew and understood those technical differences they probably wouldn't bother paying the hefty premium to enter the theater.

I'm keenly aware of the differences, particularly with my background of doing computer graphics work for a living as well as having a lot of photography experience with both film-based and digital based cameras. I'm no layperson when it comes to this topic.

The very idea of "resolution isn't everything" is just stupid when the topic is IMAX. Originally resolution was everything. With IMAX Digital, it's like downgrading from a Blu-ray player to a SD DVD player that does phony up-rezzing of 480p imagery. I guess brand worship is supposed to be the big selling point.

Much of the general public has very little understanding of native resolution. Even with all the marketing and consumer education about jumping from standard definition to HDTV or going from DVD to Blu-ray many people still do not get it. For making things like signs, billboard, vehicle wraps, etc. I get customers coming in all the time with some version of their "logo" that's often a low resolution JPEG or GIF grabbed from a web site. Or they hired some dumb ass amateur that designed the logo in Photoshop and made the fixed resolution image only big enough in native pixel count to work on a web page. They don't understand why the graphic isn't acceptable. They just figure since it is a "digital file" that automatically makes it "camera ready" or "perfect" for any job.

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 01-16-2012, 11:56 AM:

Back on topic...I think in just about every film company's ocntract, it states that you're not allowed to go on sale with a movie until it's actually booked in your theatre. And, there is no way WB is taking bookings now for a movie that in all likelihood, is still being edited and isn't going to be released until this summer. Hell they usually don't start confirming bookings until about 3 WEEKS before the movie comes out.

I'll bet if people have actually bought "Rises" tickets, they could look on their tickets and find some fine print where it says the movie may or may not play, and this ticket can be exchanged for a real ticket when the movie is actually booked.

Sure, the movie will be blown into as many screens as possible and is almost certain to play in the theatres that are selling these advance tickets, but... what if WB decides to do an early VOD or some other thing, or change the release date or something? Or what if that particular chain runs into some kind of problem and can't book the movie for any number of reasons? Those cinemas setting a bad precedent here. Of course the chance is 99% that there will be no problem, but...

Posted by Mark Lensenmayer (Member # 134) on 01-16-2012, 05:43 PM:

I really don't understand why any of the minImax theatres would reinstall 15/70 for Batman. That won't change the size of the screen, and that is the main difference between Real Imax and minImax.

I saw an earlier Batman movie with some Imax filmed sections, and, on the minImax, it only added about 2' to the top and bottom of the screen. It was very hard to see the difference.

Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 01-16-2012, 06:44 PM:

It would still make a huge difference to resolution but yeah makes little impact if the height is gone.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-16-2012, 09:15 PM:

15/70mm projection would make a tremendous difference for those theaters that were originally designed for it. I can think of a few Cinemark locations in particular that were converted to fake IMAX. They have giant sized screens on which 2K resolution material is inappropriate.

Posted by Jonathan Althaus (Member # 5042) on 01-26-2012, 09:37 AM:

From what I've seen, the RPX/ETX/XD formats are better than any LieMax presentations. I don't see Nolan putting 15/70 in a theater that wasn't running it beforehand

Posted by Edward Havens (Member # 4715) on 01-26-2012, 12:30 PM:

Mike, it is my understanding that the three theatres that do have TDKR 12:01am shows on sale do have the movie booked already, and that the only thing that's keeping them from putting regular shows on sale is the issue of the running time. Once Nolan locks in the running time, I'll bet you'll see the rest of the shows go on sale, be it three weeks or three months in advance.

And even though it is six weeks away, we'll be putting our John Carter IMAX tickets on sale later today.