Why Is It Absolute Hell to Buy a Movie Ticket Now?
Why Is It Absolute Hell to Buy a Movie Ticket Now?
为什么现在买张电影票简直像是一场噩梦？
The conclusion to Denis Villeneuve’s epic Dune trilogy is still four months away, but the anticipation was palpable on Tuesday, the first day of ticket presales. Theater chain apps suffered apparent outages as moviegoers waited in long virtual lines, hoping to finally glimpse a seat map with some empty spots left on it. In Manhattan, those who have grown mistrustful of this unreliable tech found time on a weekday morning to line up around the block at AMC Lincoln Square—hours before the box office opened. It was the third frenzied rush for blockbuster tickets in a few short weeks, following sky-high demand for Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey and Destin Daniel Cretton’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
丹尼斯·维伦纽瓦（Denis Villeneuve）史诗级《沙丘》三部曲的终章距离上映还有四个月，但周二预售首日，那种期待感已然触手可及。影院连锁应用的服务器显然出现了故障，影迷们在漫长的虚拟队列中等待，希望能看一眼还有空位的座位图。在曼哈顿，那些对不可靠的技术失去信任的人，甚至在工作日的早晨，就在 AMC 林肯广场店排起了绕街长队——此时距离售票处开门还有好几个小时。这是短短几周内第三次大片抢票狂潮，此前克里斯托弗·诺兰的《奥德赛》（The Odyssey）和德斯汀·丹尼尔·克雷顿的《蜘蛛侠：崭新的一天》（Spider-Man: Brand New Day）也引发了极高的需求。
Customers have been particularly keen to see these films on IMAX screens, with Dune: Part Three and The Odyssey also available in the even more exclusive IMAX 70mm format. Only 25 theaters in the US are capable of showing a film this way.
顾客们尤其热衷于在 IMAX 银幕上观看这些电影，其中《沙丘 3》和《奥德赛》还提供更为稀缺的 IMAX 70mm 格式。目前美国仅有 25 家影院具备这种放映能力。
While directors and studios have embraced such premium screenings for tentpole releases (not least because those tickets are more expensive), the rarity of theaters equipped for them has contributed to a scarcity mindset. People are so bent on experiencing these movies in the “best” possible way, and, if not on opening night, as soon after as possible, that ticket resellers have attempted to auction them off for hundreds of dollars, while some cinephiles have embarked on Homeric journeys to IMAX theaters multiple states away.
虽然导演和制片厂都乐于为大制作影片提供这种高端放映（很大程度上是因为票价更贵），但具备放映条件的影院稀缺，导致了一种“稀缺心态”。人们一心想以“最佳”方式体验这些电影，如果赶不上首映夜，也要尽可能早地观看。这导致票贩子试图以数百美元的价格拍卖门票，而一些影迷甚至不惜跨越多个州，踏上前往 IMAX 影院的“奥德赛”式旅程。
As such, this week’s competition for Dune: Part Three tickets renewed a feeling of stress and weariness among fans of Hollywood spectacle. Why, some asked, does catching a movie now feel as difficult as scoring tickets to a red-hot concert tour?
因此，本周对《沙丘 3》门票的争夺，让好莱坞大片的粉丝们再次感到压力和疲惫。有人不禁发问：为什么现在看场电影变得像抢热门演唱会门票一样困难？
Adam Aron, CEO of AMC Theatres, took to his X account to apologize for the latest cinematic frustrations. (Reached for comment, the company directed WIRED to his comments on the platform.) “We thought we were ready, but we weren’t,” he wrote of the Dune launch, noting that the traffic surge to AMC’s website and mobile app was about triple the volume they’d seen for the latest Spider-Man installment.
AMC 院线首席执行官亚当·阿隆（Adam Aron）在 X 平台上为最近的观影挫折道歉。（当被联系置评时，该公司将《连线》杂志引向了他在该平台上的评论。）他在谈到《沙丘》预售时写道：“我们以为准备好了，但其实并没有。”他指出，AMC 网站和移动应用的流量激增至上一部《蜘蛛侠》电影时的三倍左右。
“It’s a high-class problem to have such staggering demand, but even so it is intolerable and inexcusable,” Aron wrote. He further announced that $2 million in IT costs had been approved in order to “fully address the issue.”
“拥有如此惊人的需求是一种‘高级烦恼’，但即便如此，这也是不可容忍且不可原谅的，”阿隆写道。他进一步宣布，公司已批准 200 万美元的 IT 预算，以“彻底解决这一问题”。
Fandango and Regal Cinemas, whose apps and websites also drew complaints amid ongoing glitches, did not immediately return requests for comment. A representative for IMAX, which is not involved in ticket sales, declined to comment on the record. IMAX currently has more than 1,800 locations worldwide; in a quarterly financial update earlier this year, CEO Rich Gelfond said they saw the potential to double their footprint.
Fandango 和 Regal Cinemas 的应用和网站也因持续的故障引发了投诉，但并未立即回复置评请求。不参与门票销售的 IMAX 公司代表拒绝发表正式评论。IMAX 目前在全球拥有超过 1,800 个放映点；在今年早些时候的季度财务报告中，首席执行官理查德·葛尔方（Rich Gelfond）表示，他们看到了将业务规模翻倍的潜力。
This depends, however, on exhibitors actively investing in more IMAX venues, as well as the availability of new or retrofitted auditoriums big enough for the screens and the theater architecture that goes along with them.
然而，这取决于放映商是否积极投资更多的 IMAX 场馆，以及是否有足够大的新建或改造影厅来容纳这些银幕及其配套的影院建筑结构。
In the meantime, customer exasperation is mounting. Internet film critics bemoaned the “concertification” of movies as they contended with the same overloaded apps and long lines as everyone else.
与此同时，顾客的愤怒情绪正在加剧。互联网影评人哀叹电影的“演唱会化”，因为他们也像其他人一样，不得不面对超负荷的应用和漫长的排队。
“I’m done with the shenanigans of trying to be ‘FIRST’ to see these blockbuster films,” Simone Cromer, once known for her “Club Chalamet” fan accounts devoted to Dune star Timothée Chalamet, wrote on X. “I’ll watch it on a regular screen sometime that week, without having to travel too far.”
“我受够了为了‘抢先’看这些大片而搞出的这些闹剧，”曾因运营《沙丘》主演提莫西·查拉梅（Timothée Chalamet）的粉丝账号“Club Chalamet”而闻名的西蒙娜·克罗默（Simone Cromer）在 X 上写道。“我会在那周找个时间在普通银幕上看，不用跑太远。”
Barry Hertz, film editor and chief film writer at The Globe and Mail, posted on X that vendors were failing the filmgoing public. “If you’re going to turn movie ticket-buying into a competitive sport, then you need to have the tech and UX to support that shift,” he wrote.
《环球邮报》电影编辑兼首席影评人巴里·赫兹（Barry Hertz）在 X 上发文称，票务平台辜负了广大影迷。“如果你要把买电影票变成一项竞技运动，那么你就必须拥有支持这种转变的技术和用户体验（UX），”他写道。
Hertz tells WIRED that “eventizing” a movie “feels like a lifeline for theaters coming out of the depths of the pandemic,” and that there’s nothing inherently wrong with them encouraging audiences to pursue “a movie in its most ideal format” as they fight to maintain their bottom line.
赫兹告诉《连线》杂志，将电影“事件化”对于走出疫情低谷的影院来说“感觉像是一根救命稻草”，而且在影院努力维持利润底线时，鼓励观众追求“以最理想的格式观看电影”本身并没有错。
“What can’t happen, though, is theater owners forgetting that the rest of the experience has to be as easy and painless as possible,” Hertz continues. In his view, they haven’t lived up to this responsibility. “Don’t add layers of technical frustration on top of a leisure activity that is fighting for its life.”
“然而，影院老板不能忘记，其余的观影体验必须尽可能简单且无痛，”赫兹继续说道。在他看来，他们没有履行这一责任。“不要给一项正在为生存而战的休闲活动，再增加额外的技术挫败感。”
Stephanie Wang, a professor of economics at the University of Pittsburgh who researches behavioral economics, suggests there are also significant social dimensions at play.
匹兹堡大学研究行为经济学的经济学教授斯蒂芬妮·王（Stephanie Wang）认为，其中还存在重要的社会维度。
“Some consumers’ desire for a ticket may be greater when they know both that many other people also want the ticket and cannot have it,” Wang tells WIRED. She points to an experiment published in The Review of Economic Studies in 2023 which found that “when some people are randomly excluded from being able to participate in an auction, the bids of those who are allowed to remain in the auction substantially increase.” Moreover, she adds, someone’s commitment to participating in the ultimate movie event can “signal to others, and sometimes to themselves as well, that they are true fans,” since it may “require you to give up time or sleep or something else of value.”
“当消费者知道许多其他人也想要这张票却买不到时，他们对这张票的渴望可能会更强烈，”王教授告诉《连线》。她提到了 2023 年发表在《经济研究评论》（The Review of Economic Studies）上的一项实验，该实验发现：“当一些人被随机排除在拍卖之外时，那些被允许留在拍卖中的人的出价会大幅增加。”此外，她补充说，一个人参与终极电影盛事的决心可以“向他人，有时也向自己表明，他们是真正的粉丝”，因为这可能“需要你放弃时间、睡眠或其他有价值的东西”。
The potential solutions, alas, are not entirely obvious. Some members of the AMC Stubs A-List membership program this week suggested that they should have priority access to tickets at those theaters. But this ignores the economic reality of the subscription plan, which costs between $27.99 and $29.99 monthly and allows viewers to see up to four movies a week at no extra charge—including in formats like IMAX 70mm, a ticket which otherwise retails at $30 or more at AMC. In other words, outside of concessions, the chain isn’t making any additional money off A-Listers attending these premium screenings; the box-office take comes from the non-members paying full price.
遗憾的是，潜在的解决方案并不完全显而易见。本周，一些 AMC Stubs A-List 会员建议他们应该在这些影院享有优先购票权。但这忽略了该订阅计划的经济现实：每月费用在 27.99 美元到 29.99 美元之间，允许观众每周免费观看多达四部电影——包括 IMAX 70mm 等格式，而这种票在 AMC 的零售价通常在 30 美元或以上。换句话说，除了小卖部收入外，院线从参加这些高端放映的 A-List 会员身上赚不到额外利润；票房收入主要来自支付全价的非会员。
“Of course, the classical economic question is, why don’t the theaters just increase prices until supply…”
“当然，经典的经济学问题是，为什么影院不直接提高价格，直到供给……”