Reminiscing About My MoviePass Experience (Before it Went Down in Flames)
The summer of 2017 was one to remember - and not just because of beach trips, drinks on our apartment terrace in Brooklyn, and cocktails on rooftops. My experience that summer was dominated by one bold little startup, sadly gone from this earth - MoviePass.
I had no idea MoviePass existed before that summer, but it had been plugging along for several years, with me blissfully unaware. That summer, articles began popping up everywhere touting the company's new offer - $9.95 for unlimited movies. At first, I was certain this was too good to be true - there had to be some catch. Some fine print, or a loathsome and horrendous anti-consumer subscription that would be impossible to cancel. However, the more I read, and the more research I did just convinced me this was a NO BRAINER. There was just too much value I could not pass up. I had visions of re-immersing myself in seeing movies again, in a big way. I learned the company was dead set on a big push to build out their subscriber base, and grow fast to make a seismic impact on the movie the industry - more on that later. I signed up a few days later, along with a few million others around the country, and waited for my MoviePass debit card to arrive in the mail. The process involved booking tickets in the app, checking in when arriving at the theater, and paying for the ticket at the box office, utilizing the preloaded debit card.
I started out seeing American Assassin and Home Again - not normally films I would go for. I jumped on the opportunity to see Thor: Ragnarok, and Ant Man & The Wasp, along with Avengers: Infinity War. Horror films were a focus as well - from Hereditary and A Quiet Place, to It and The First Purge. I checked out some awesome comedies too - The Disaster Artist, Tag, and Game Night. Looking at the full list of all the films I saw, it's quite an eclectic mix, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
Rediscovering my love of the movie theater
When I received the debit card in my mailbox, I was pumped. I remember holding the envelope in my hands and rushing upstairs to tear it open and show Erin. Then it hit me - am I really going to start going to the movie theater more often because of this? In Brooklyn and NYC theaters, movie tickets were expensive. For $9.95 per month, I'd get value from the subscription even if I went just to the movies once per month. But I told myself, why stop there? Why not take it as far as I can?
Before I got ahead of myself, I really had to come to terms with one simple fact: I hadn't been to see many movies in quite a while. Erin and I probably went to four per year, on average, and a few of those were around any holidays or trips where we'd see my family. Going to the movies as a family was always a constant and reliable experience that I cherished, and still do. My checkered history of going to the movies wasn't always like this - I truly do love movies and would go all the time as a kid, in high school, with friends in college, but the activity had fallen to the backburner over the last several years as other life priorities took center stage. I also hate the idea of being fleeced, and that is usually the case when you do a date night to see a movie in NYC, with drinks and snacks, let alone dinner and drinks before or after the film. Although I wasn’t going to the movies very often, my love of film was always this little burning ember in me. And that summer, MoviePass was about to ignite that ember into an inferno.
My movie habits take a sudden, drastic turn
Once I got the hang of the process, I was hooked. It honestly didn't take long at all. I kept marveling at the unlimited idea - I knew MoviePass must be setting investor money on fire, but I figured why not take advantage of the subscription? This couldn't last that long…right? I started out seeing a film on the weekend. I then discovered which theaters were most convenient to our apartment. I soon realized that seeing a film alone, something I had never done before, was actually the perfect way to unwind during a crazy work week, or just to have some solo reflective time on a low-key weekend. It became a tranquil experience I would relish every time I could seize the opportunity. Although Erin signed up soon after I did, her appetite for films was staying at a fairly conservative pace - whereas mine was continuing to escalate in a dizzying fashion. What turned into once on a weekend, and maybe once during a weekday evening became two on weekends and a weeknight movie, and rarely, sometimes four in a week - although I think I only did that once or twice.
Of the many films I saw, there were several that stood out, and have stayed with me to this day. It's incredibly challenging to pick my top 5 films with MoviePass. I ended up viewing so many enthralling films, and really only a few lousy ones. Here are my top 5 films I saw during my MoviePass journey:
1. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
2. Upgrade
3. Hereditary
4. The Death of Stalin
5. Blade Runner 2049
Another curious impact of MoviePass for me was that the bar substantially lowered for what I would deem "worth seeing". If I didn't have to shell out $18 per ticket…why not open myself up way more to different kinds of films? Even if a certain trailer seemed interesting, or mildly diverting, why not give it a shot? That sinking feeling of coming out of the theater after seeing a horrible film, and knowing you wasted X dollars on the evening - that simply evaporated for me. Even the prospect of a crappy film wasting my time wasn't as much of a concern - if I didn't enjoy it, I could think about what exactly was wrong with it, and learn more about my own preferences, and interests in different kinds of movies.
I found a new love for indie films, where I could see independent dramas, comedies, documentaries, and more - the kinds of films I would have never thought to seek out in theaters before MoviePass. Before long I had found an amazing indie theater near my office in NYC that I'd go to regularly - The Angelika Film Center & Cafe. From discovering new theaters, to opening myself up to different kinds of films, MoviePass was changing my movie habits in big ways. The other side effect was I found myself racking up TONS of theater loyalty points - so many that I was earning free concessions on a near-constant basis, and sometimes enough theater points to redeem a movie ticket for a friend or loved one. MoviePass also did a splashy premiere for a film they financed, American Animals, and I was able to attend a premiere event when the film launched.
The MoviePass app had some issues…
The MoviePass app itself was not the best. It did the job, but it was cumbersome to "check-in" to a film, based on your geolocation relative to the theater, and the showtime selected. Oftentimes the app would crash, or simply not recognize the movie I picked. There was always that moment after the app said "success!" after a check-in, when I would go to swipe my MoviePass debit card and wonder if this was still going to work. For the first six to seven months, it did - despite some weirdness, I didn't have that many problems, although I would often see the onslaught of complaints on Reddit. I considered myself relatively lucky.
After this seven-or-so-month period, things started to go downhill, fast. It seemed that MoviePass was running out of money to burn, and the app would have "outages" or certain movies would not be available at certain times. Things kept spiraling downward - more and more outages, blackout dates, and blockbuster films not being supported all of a sudden. The terms and conditions of the app and the entire subscription seemed to change by the day, with the app's user base constantly left in the dark. I had started to read that MoviePass as a company by that point was floundering, with multiple scandals, and making anti-consumer decisions, one after another, in a fit of desperation. After about eight to nine months of subscribing, the service was starting to become a major headache to use, and I was looking at other movie subscription options that had started to pop up.
Going down in flames, but changing the game along the way
After eleven months, I reached my breaking point, and I canceled MoviePass. It was bittersweet, but the annoyance, frustrations, and sense of them mistreating their customers was enough to completely repel me. I had found another option in the form of AMC A-List. MoviePass really did rattle the film industry, and though it was never able to gain a sustainable foothold (mostly due to some asinine decision-making), it did shift the paradigm in many ways. They really set out to change the industry in ambitious ways - using customer data to suggest nearby dining establishment to theatergoers, building a massive audience that they could direct to one theater train vs. another, and demand a cut of concession revenue…plenty of ambitious plans that went up in flames.
Because of MoviePass, big theater chains felt compelled to launch their own subscription models that they could have end-to-end control over. Although AMC A-List was more expensive, and only offered three movies per week, the price point absolutely seemed more sustainable. And it was perfect for me, as taking in 2-3 films per week was my sweet spot. The dominoes continued to fall - after AMC A-List, Alamo Drafthouse launched their Alamo Season Pass program, which I tried for several months, and it was fantastic to be able to enjoy the benefits while living so close by our local Alamo theater in Brooklyn. Then Regal launched their Unlimited program, which was my latest favorite when we moved to Virginia. Sadly, I had to cancel it when the COVID pandemic exploded into our consciousnesses in March 2020 - as much as I love going to the movies, a crowded theater with seats jammed together, and questionable cleanliness, made it so I was not going to risk my life to feed my movie theater habit.
At the end of the day, the dust settled and MoviePass went down in flames, so these new subscription programs could be born. For a movie lover like myself, it's incredibly exciting - the idea of subscribing to Regal Unlimited again, post-pandemic, parking my butt in a theater seat with a bucket of popcorn...it sounds divine. COVID deprived me of that, but I'm confident I'll enjoy that experience again soon.
Enjoying a ton of value while it lasted
As I look back on my experience with MoviePass, I wouldn't trade it for the world. Despite the wild highs and lows, the frustrations, I got a ton out of the experience, and so did others in my life. For those eleven months, I was able to discover awesome films, rekindle my love of movies, and even get inspired to start writing reviews more regularly on Letterboxd, which I started doing in March 2020. Doing some quick and dirty math on my MoviePass experience, I went to the movies with the subscription service about 78 times over eleven months. At the time, a typical movie ticket in NYC and Brooklyn was around $18. So that's a rough total of $1,404 in value I extracted from MoviePass, for my $109.45 I paid over eleven months. Truly wild, and quite the return on my entertainment! Also, a clear example of why they are relegated to movie industry history. I'll always think back fondly on MoviePass, and I don't think my current interest in films is likely to dwindle anytime soon.
Here is the list of (nearly) everything I saw with MoviePass, on Letterboxd. I am missing a few titles here and there, and some I saw twice, but this is my official record. For more about how I use Letterboxd to track the films I watch, check out my post here. Thanks for reading!
