Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Massachusetts screening of LOTR 3

This is topic Massachusetts screening of LOTR 3 in forum Film-Yak at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Patrick McDonough (Member # 1363) on 11-22-2003, 04:36 PM:

Anyone going to this in randolph, Ma. Or anyone work at the theater Where it is going to be screened.

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 11-23-2003, 12:36 PM:

Much to my dissapointment, they are not doing a LOTR3 screening in the Bay Area. When a theatre owner called Searchlight, he was told that California isn't a blind booking state, so they don't have too play it up here.

I thought briefly of traveling to LA or Portland to watch it, then I thought, I would just see it when it comes out.

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 11-23-2003, 01:16 PM:

Why does that not make sense. I thought when your state was a blind booking state it did not have to run a screening. Our state is a non-blind booking state and they have to provide screenings for independents. I used to run some of them for Warner Bros and Orion pictures years ago.

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 11-23-2003, 03:30 PM:

Semantics, when I say that California isn't a blind booking state, what I mean is that there is no blind booking law on the books requiring them to place a screening here.

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 11-23-2003, 03:52 PM:

What's "blind booking" mean?

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 11-23-2003, 06:31 PM:

Hollywood used the practice called "blind booking" (or "block
booking") to be sure to control the distribution of their films.

blind booking The practice of renting out films to exhibitors without showing the films to the exhibitors first.

block booking The practice of scheduling a large number of movies for a theatre, combining a few good movies with many second-rate features.

In 1938, The U.S. Supreme Court decided that the major film studios represented a monopoly, and in United States vs. Paramount Pictures, a major antitrust action was initiated.

Two years later--these legal things take a while--after denying any monopolistic practices, the studios agreed to stop buying theaters, eliminate blind booking (requiring theaters to rent films without seeing them first), and limit block booking to five films.

But, that didn't fix things, and four years later the major studios still held major control over the motion picture industry--especially when it came to first-run exhibition of films in major cities.

All the previous material was googled and doesn't represent any great knowledge on my part.

Some states have Blind Booking laws that state that a movie has to have an exhibitor's screening in the state so the exhibitors have a chance to see it before they book it. The joke of the matter is that there is never enough time. Most films are booked before the exhibitor's screening. But because of the law, studios are required to run exhibitor's screenings in those states. California doesn't have a Blind Booking law, the studios would have never let it happen.

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 11-23-2003, 06:39 PM:

Interesting
Thanks Ian

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 11-23-2003, 09:38 PM:

I believe the term in question was really blind bidding not booking. It wasn't so much the booking that was the issue but the fact that the exhibitors were being asked for large guarantees. From what I have been told by people in that end of things business isn't really done that way much anymore.