As the Crystal Theatre suddenly finds itself the only cinema between Rifle and Aspen, it seems like a good time to publicly address a question I’ve heard almost daily since we went nonprofit last September. Why don’t we show more new movies?
Exactly what someone means by that varies a bit, but the answer almost always comes down to how movie studios do business. If all anyone wanted was for us to show, say, “Song Sung Blue” five times a day for two straight weeks, that’s theoretically possible, but tremendously inefficient. I think most people would agree it’s more fun to show a movie a few times to a full house than over and over to 10 patrons at a time.
And our collaborations with other local organizations for one-time special events have been popular, with many selling out days in advance. I don’t think there’s a desire to get rid of those so we can show the same movie every night. Instead, what I think folks are imagining when they ask for more movies is the multiplex model: “Sarah’s Oil” at 1pm, “Rental Family” at 5pm and “Running Man” at 9pm. Which, unfortunately, wouldn’t have been allowed when those three films all launched the weekend before Thanksgiving.
See, when you show a major studio release “on the break” (the day they advertise in the trailers and on the poster) you’re almost always required to run it and nothing else “first run” (out in theaters) on that screen for at least the next two weeks. They generally tolerate repertory (older than six months) and indie films in the mix, but you can’t even mix and match new releases until five or six weeks later, by which time they’ve often moved to streaming.
This isn’t a big deal for theaters with multiple auditoriums, but for single-screen operations it means you’re almost always limited to one new movie at a time. Every once in a while we get lucky and get to bring a movie back for a couple shows while we bring in something fresh, but we can’t bank on it, particularly for blockbusters.
Muddying the waters further is the concept of a “limited release.” Sometimes, particularly with the kind of prestige films our viewers enjoy, a movie debuts on a handful of screens in New York and Los Angeles and isn’t available anywhere else for a while. So although “Hamnet” officially dropped on Dec. 12, you’d have been hard-pressed to see it before it “went wide” on Jan. 16.
There are also some studio-specific quirks. There’s one that makes you choose between their first-run and repertory content. For now, we’ve gone with the latter, figuring that a steady stream of older family flicks serves the community better than two straight weeks of the latest live-action remake a couple of times a year. Another generally goes straight to streaming after a two-week limited release, which is why there are two films nominated for Best Picture that won’t have graced our screen by the time the Academy Awards roll around.
Finally, the terms and bookings for first-run films aren’t actually set until the week we show it. A studio might opt not to offer the show we were planning on, or could lobby for us to carry over one that’s doing well for an extra week. That’s why we can publish a monthly calendar of our family classic matinees, but the exact dates of our “on the horizon” first-run films are left deliberately vague. It’s also why our weekly email goes out on Mondays and remains the best way to stay abreast of what we’re showing.
If you’re lost, I understand. After six months of movie management, I’m still sometimes caught off guard by an obscure piece of red tape. But rest assured, we’re doing our best to keep things fresh. We’ll accept the two-week commitment for the most anticipated releases (“Wuthering Heights”) and show the rest a few weeks later. We’ll never be able to play everything that Movieland did, but we’ll try to keep most runs to one or two weeks so we can pack in a wide variety of content. If you have any questions or suggestions, reach out to info@crystaltheatrecarbondale.com or 970-510-0540. And hopefully I’ll see you at the movies!