If films returned to the DVD/VHS cycle, would that help the movie industry?

I **thought** I had stopped going to the theater because of the price. But what I've noticed **actually** happening is that by the time I decide to go see a movie... it's already available for streaming. So then I just stream it.

I remember movies being 6 months to a year for home video release back in the 90s . I like the current set up of 2-3 months for releases ( sometimes weeks for bombs) . I don’t think increasing the time would get more people to theaters , I think releasing more movies people want to see will get people back to theaters.

Some of the studios would love to go back to that. Physical was 50% of the revenue 40 years ago, and it's 5% now Warner Bros. gets a little more than 10% of its revenue on movies from theatrical. Gets 90% from other means. Disney, Universal, and Sony all get less than 10% from theatrical. Paramount gets less than 5%. 30 years ago it was 30% theatrical, 40% home video, and 30% TV licensing. Theatrical has fallen every year for the last 30 years.

That would do little to fix the real problem of theaters no longer being worth the money. Why bother with an 18-30 dollar ticket per person to a place you have to drive to and spend over-inflated prices on drinks and food when you can do the same thing in the comfort of your own home for much cheaper? Big TV's and decent soundbars have been c**** for more than a decade now. Theaters cannot compete with that anymore.

Why would we need to "help the movie industry"? Shouldn't the movie industry cater to what the audience want? If we want to watch movies on our 4k big screen at home, let us.

In this hypothetical scenario are you banning streaming services? Because if not, then it won’t help because people won’t buy them. Why spend fifteen bucks on a dvd when you can spend nearly the same amount for thousands of movies and shows. What you’re saying already exists by the way. DVDs and Blu-ray’s are still sold. The problem is nobody buys them. But specifically answering whether that system you mentioned is overall better for the film industry, yes it is.

DVD sales going away was the first thing that really fucked the industry. It really had nothing to do with the wait.

The price is too high. The experience at theaters is terrible, with everyone talking , looking at their phones, and half an hour of commercials. The movies (for the most part) are not good. Endless sequels, remakes, prequels, and boring playing it safe garbage. Obviously there are exceptions (that we have to seek out), but most major releases, the tent pole films, are big disappointments. TV is also much higher prestige, compared to the era of VHS/DVD, and is a good alternative use of time. Let alone things like video games and new things (since VHS) like the Internet to doom scroll endlessly. DVDs aren't going to fix any of those problems.

It was never scarcity. Home alone stayed in theaters for almost 7 months because people kept going. The issue is as it has always been. We need more content at prices closer to the line of inflation. If Hollywood went back to 98 minute movies at 6 dollars a ticket and there was at least one new movie at every rating level released a month people would go back to the theaters. As it is the average home theater has more freedom for the viewer, better picture quality, nicer seating and cheaper snacks with less time commitment. Hollywood forgot that that movies are an opiate for the masses and switched from sheering sheep to killing them and are pissed off they are out of sheep. Since the invention of the internet Hollywood has done nothing but sit in the corner and hope that 1996 miraculously makes a comeback somehow instead of cultivating new Talent off things like YouTube. They cut production of everything but 150 million dollar + films which continue to fail as the average domestic box has been 15 million for about 20 years now. They need to make more movies cheaper, they need to make them cheaper to see, and they need to make them shorter (98 minutes has been the gold standard since the 80’s) only dumping 3 hour epics with no bathroom breaks into Sheboygan (where the theater hasn’t been updated since 1996)for $15 bucks a pop was NEVER gonna float an entire industry, you need VARIETY AND QUANTITY at “kill some time” prices. You need movies targeting youth at prices parents can give their kids without feeling the hit to their pocket books. Turn theaters back into THE third space and people will go.

Not for me. Too many people at the theater don’t care about manners anymore. I much prefer watching at home where I don’t have to compete with rude people to hear the dialog.

The problem for me is how people act in the theater. Somehow talking, checking your phone, etc, etc, is now considering acceptable. I hate going now, and I’m happy to wait rather than put up with this behavior. The DVD/VHS cycle will not change that for me.

Why punish the people that don't want to go to theatres, because you like the experience?

Time for bed grandpa

Reasonably priced digital rentals would be goid.

No. I have no want or desire to go to a theater when the smallest TV in my home is 85"

the only thing that would help the theatrical experience in the long run would be event movies that generate a lot of fomo, with picture and sound quality unmatchable at home (think 65mm or 70mm film imax)  and really long or even inexistent streaming windowe. but this would never happen because today's Hollywood studios are as invested in tv/streaming as in movie theaters, if not even more.

I don't see a point in extending theatrical runs. Pretty much everyone who wants to see a film sees it on the opening weekend. Even then the screens are mostly empty. If you wait past opening weekend then you just get a screen full of people on their phones, talking through the film, because they're not actually interested in the film. You'd also lose all the good films. Studios are releasing 4 to 6 films a week. If you extend release windows then you reduce the number of screens available for smaller, indy movies. You'd be left with just the big budget c***. The best option would be to just have the option to extend the run if a movie is performing really well. Having a longer window between cinema release and streaming might help. But even then, I'm not wasting my money on tickets to Marvel movies anymore, and I don't really care if it takes the films a month or a year to hit Disney+, I'll just wait.

Going backwards will not help. Movie industry, like every other industry, has to learn how to adapt or die.

There are movies I want to see in the theater and movies I would not pay to sit in a theater and watch. Those, I watch at home. My wife and I enjoy going to the movies. We get dinner, go see a movie, after go get ice cream. But I’m not paying for a movie unless I think it rates watching at the movie theater.

COVID, streaming and cell phones (people using them during the movie) killed theaters.

They need dynamic windows. Flops get accelerated windows, hits get extended windows.

until you fix sound design being used as a crutch for shot storytelling (even if you fixed people sucking,) theaters are going to be a bad experience. if you don't want a characters dialog to be heard, don't record it. you don't have to lower voices to makes explosions sound more shocking. if you need a jump scare to make lightning impactful you're doing a bad job of plot development.

The last movie I saw in a theater was Tenet. I just don’t enjoy that experience anymore. People talking during the movie or playing on their phones. Sticky floors, bad seats. My theater upgraded to IMAX and reclining chairs, so tickets are now €25 per seat. F*** that… And add to that, that most movies from the last 10 years already feel like they are written by an AI… prolong the windows as much as you want, I‘m out.

More and more people these days don't even have a device that will play a disc. All they do is stream. But one problem is that you'd have to spend money to market the movie in theatres, and then spend more money to market the DVD. At least the way things are now they can concentrate a lot of that marketing.

Potentially. The DVD revenue stream was a huge part of Hollywood studios’ business model. If a movie flopped in theaters it would often turn a profit on DVD. Hell the first Austin Powers didn’t do well in theaters but spawned two sequels purely because it was a huge success on DVD. But discs are obsolete now. People would have to start embracing digital rentals/purchases since that’s the modern day equivalent. It’s hard for that to compete with Netflix, etc. but you never know.

The short movie run and the death of the second run theaters in my area made it near impossoble for me to catch moat the movies ive wanted to see.