Friday 4/2

Movie Night

“I’d like to see [Insert movie title here] in 3-D at 7:30, please.”  The gentleman in front of me pulled out his wallet and the box office attendant punched a few buttons on her computer.

She leaned forward into the microphone.  “Fourteen dollars,” she said.

“Oh, no, just one ticket, please.”  The man was very polite, trying to correct the girl behind the glass.

“Yes sir, that’s fourteen dollars,” she smiled.

Then it hit him and his jaw dropped.  He reeled it in and reluctantly handed her a twenty.  She quickly returned him his ticket and six dollars.  He walked away and looked at his six dollars like he had just sold his soul to the devil.  He shook his head and walked into the theater. 

Take a minute and think about what you could do with fourteen bucks.  Better yet, imagine you were taking someone to the movies and it was twenty-eight instead.  Don’t worry about the keg of soda and the dump truck of popcorn you might buy once you get inside.  That’s for another day.

Just let it sink in . . .

Unless they start handing out bars of gold with those 3-D movie tickets, I probably won’t be going to see too many of them, if any.  There’s a local rental store where you can rent two movies for one dollar (and they’re not that old.  There are plenty on those shelves that I meant to get around to watching and still haven’t).  I could see fifty-six movies with that same twenty-eight dollars.  (Ok, if you really want to be technical, which I usually am, I could only rent fifty-one movies if you calculate taxes.)  It would take me three months to watch that many! 

I’m not saying you should forever forgo the nostalgia of the theater.  I’m just saying maybe you should consider all your options before forking over a fifty on a Friday night.

Clearly, the premium you pay for a 3-D movie ticket is for the experience.  Sure, it’s a sense-adventure, but there’s still the crawling-over-people and who-forgot-to-turn-off-their-cell-phone-? that, personally, I can do without.  So make it a movie night at home and save a buck (or lots of bucks!)

By: S. Cole Garrett

3/23/10