The Evolution of Movie Entertainment

 

Introduction

 

William Durant once said “No man in a hurry is quite civilized” (qtd. in Bertmad). Durant’s astute observation can be applied to many facets of daily life. Overall, a disturbing trend is developing in society today; we are becoming a society incapable of stopping to smell the roses. I first noticed this trend while traveling abroad. In American culture, time is money and everyone knows that. On the other hand, South American countries typically have a more relaxed approach to appointments and deadlines. I believe that there are serious ramifications to the growing impatience in our society. This disturbing trend can be exemplified in the evolution of movie entertainment. The way a society spends its leisure time says a lot about the people in that society. In our case, we have become obsessed with instantaneous entertainment, even in our leisure time. The development of movie entertainment showcases important transitions in human nature.

 

The face of entertainment changes rapidly. In the movie industry, the transition can be broken down into three main categories: the movie theater, movie rental stores, and home movie entertainment. When the Nickelodeon appeared for example, it gained popularity all over the United States in just a few short years. In a newspaper article from 1907 a story about the growing movie industry maintained that, “three years ago there was not a nickelodeon, or five-cent theatre devoted to moving-picture shows, in America. To-day there are between four and five thousand running and solvent, and the number is still increasing rapidly. This is the boom time in the moving-picture business” (Patterson). The idea of the movie theater revolutionized the entertainment industry. The Nickelodeon evolved into our modern concept of a movie theater, which reigned for many decades. But, the dominance of movie theaters would not last. A new era emerged in which movie rental stores like Blockbuster began slowly taking over the industry. People fell in love with the convenience of picking up a movie and watching it in the comfort of their own homes. Movie stores’ glory would not last long, though. Their fifteen minutes of fame were soon up, and the stores began going out of business. The trend of convenience supremacy continued, destroying what had originally given stores like Blockbuster their power. The new age of movie entertainment was governed by Netflix and OnDemand. From these new mediums, people would not even need to leave their homes to be dazzled by the cinema. The evolution of movie entertainment spells out an overarching trend in human nature: the strive for convenience and speed.

 

The Beginning: Movie Theaters

 

The journey of movie transformation begins in 1904, the year of the first Nickelodeon. Nickelodeons were very short films that cost five cents per view. In the first form of the Nickelodeon, the person would insert a penny into a slot and watch about one minute of film. They would then proceed to the next machine and watch another one minute of film (“The Nickelodeon’s History”). To nearly anyone in our society today, this could not be considered entertainment. It is highly unlikely that anyone in contemporary society would make an effort to go see one of these “films”. To people of the era, however, this was very exciting. Moving pictures were fascinating and would draw large crowds. The prevalence of Nickelodeons shows the dominating attitude of the time to be very relaxed.

 

Movie theaters were such an integral part of society that even “during the Great Depression, which swept the United States in the 1930s, a higher percentage of the population went to the cinema each week than during the times of economic expansion and great prosperity the U.S. has seen since” (Pautz). The fact that movie attendance during one of America’s worst financial disasters was still high speaks to the popularity of theaters. In fact in the 1930s, 65% of the population visited a movie theater on a weekly basis (Pautz). Movie theaters, by nature, are very leisurely. You take two hours out of your day to watch some interesting story play out on the big screen. To go to the theater is an event sometimes eliciting family bonding, shopping, and often a meal. The period of flourishing movie theaters corresponds to a less time-obsessed culture than we see in contemporary society. It takes a lot more effort to go to the theaters to see a movie than it does to rent one from a store or Netflix. While people do still attend movie theaters today, the amount is steadily decreasing. When compared to our rapidly increasing population size, the decline of movie theaters becomes especially significant. This can be seen in just the number of theater sites open for business in the United States. The number of sites has declined from 7,744 in 1995 to 5,683 in 2012 (“Number of U.S. Cinema Sites”). This data evinces the decline in popularity of theaters because if they are closing down, then that means they do not have enough business.

 

Many people today are mislead into believing the success of movie theaters. People are dazzled by the big numbers reeled in by hit movies in the box office. But, those numbers do not tell the whole story. A recent article from The Daily Progress newspaper compared The Dark Knight and Star Wars in order to demonstrate this concept. The Dark Knight, for instance, is seen by many as a modern classic. It made over $100 million in the box office, which seemed to show the health of the movie industry. When you take into consideration ticket prices, however, the numbers tell a different story. All in all The Dark Knight sold about 72 million tickets. Star Wars, despite their lower box office numbers, sold over 169 million tickets (Twiddy). So even though the media highlights the impressive-sounding revenue from movies, it does not necessarily speak to the health of the movie theater industry.

 

Movie Rental Sites

 

The emergence of video rental stores in the early 1970s began a new era of convenience for the American consumer. Instead of watching whatever happened to be playing at your local theater, consumers now had thousands of movies at their fingertips. This Magnetic Video was the very first home video rental store, and it opened its doors for business in 1977 (“A History of Home Video and Video Game Retailing”). The rise of the movie rental business corresponds with a significant shift in the popularity of movie theaters. This also corresponds to a decrease in patience in American culture. Renting a video from Blockbuster is much easier than going to a theater, but it is also worse quality and less of an experience. So, what would propel people to sacrifice the quality of their movie? The incessant need for expediency definitely plays a role.

 

More recently, the drive for ease and comfort has struck again with RedBox. When RedBox began to rent movies, movie rental stores begin closing down shop. The shift is so significant that “there's no doubt that Redbox has been the largest beneficiary of the collapsing brick-and-mortar store rental business, especially with ongoing Blockbuster store closings” (Nguyen). RedBox started popping up at locations in April 1998 (“A History of Home Video and Video Game Retailing”). This new form of DVD rental condenses a video store into one little box, albeit with much less selection. But, RedBoxes are much more convenient than going to a movie rental store. Many RedBoxes are located at areas that people need to frequent anyway, such as the grocery store or a gas station. This allows for people to rent DVDs on a whim, with no special trip required. The advent of RedBox has only gone to show the personality of the typical American consumer. Not only is it becoming too ‘out of the way’ to go to a movie theater in the consumer’s leisure time, but now it is too inconvenient to take a special trip to a local store. The decline in popularity of movie stores, has been swift and significant. In fact, “By the end of the year [2010], there will be fewer than 9,900 video stores and they will account for 29% of the $7.79 billion that consumers will spend to rent movies during 2010, Screen Digest forecasts . . . that's a breathtaking drop from 2005, when 22,725 stores had 74% of an $8.4 billion video rental business” (Lieberman). So, in just five years, movie rental stores went from leading the pack in the movie rental business to dragging along in the back.

 

Netflix and OnDemand

 

Recently, movie rental stores have become a thing of the past, for the most part. Blockbuster, the once mighty movie giant, has fallen to bankruptcy. While RedBox is still doing well, it is likely that it will fall prey to Netflix or OnDemand. For example, “growth of kiosk rentals [in 2012] was 16% compared with 31% in 2011. . . Meanwhile, more profitable digital movie purchases shot up 35%, more than triple the growth rate of the category in 2011” (Chao). So, while RedBox is continuing to grow, it is growing at a much slower rate than it has in the past. This points to a gradual decline in the prominence of RedBox. People are obsessed with convenience, and there is nothing more convenient than downloading a movie to your television right from your living room couch. The data above points to the sharp increase in the popularity of digital movie purchases, like Netflix and OnDemand. While picking up a movie from the local grocery store is quite convenient, it is not as easy as just pressing a button on your remote control or your laptop. In fact, “Nearly one in three paid movie rentals now come from paid video-on-demand options. Netflix is the dominant provider of paid digital movie rentals, posting a 55 percent share in the fourth quarter of 2011” (Nguyen). So, today it appears that Americans’ unwavering support of speed and convenience has advanced to the point that movie theaters and rental sites are starting to become relics.

 

Conclusion

 

The development of the movie entertainment industry is an interesting societal pattern, and the ramifications are far-reaching. The evolution of movie-watching is just one of many examples of how society is becoming obsessed with instant gratification. With the constant emergence of new technology, companies constantly bombard us with claims of being faster, better, and simpler. While seeking efficiency is laudable, there is an extent where it is damaging to society. For example, when it comes to tradition, “slower societies . . . may be more inclined to cling to tradition; faster ones, more prone to leave it behind” (Bertman 103). Tradition is what society is built on, but the rapid increase of technology has people looking primarily at the present, not the past.

 

Works Cited

“A History of Home Video and Video Game Retailing”. Entertainment Merchants Association. n. d. Web. 24 October 2013.

Bertman, Stephen. Hyperculture: The Human Cost of Speed. Westport: Praeger Publishers, 1998. Print.

Chao, Chiang-Nan, and Saibei Zhao. "Emergence of Movie Stream Challenges Traditional DVD Movie Rental--an Empirical Study with a User Focus." International Journal of Business Administration 4.3 (2013): 22. ProQuest. Web. 23 October 2013.

Lieberman, David. Behind-the-scenes drama complicates video rentals. USA today (Arlington, Va.) 23 Sep 2010: B.1. Gannett Co. 1 November 2013.

Nguyen, Hang. "Redbox, Netflix, Blockbuster: How are they Doing?" McClatchy - Tribune Business NewsJan 25 2012. ProQuest. Web. 1 November 2013 .

“Number of U.S. Cinema Sites”. National Association of Theatre Owners, n.d. Web. 27 October 2013.

Patterson, Joseph. “The Nickelodeons”. The Library. The Nostalgia League Online Magazine, n.d. Web. 22 October 2013.

Pautz, Michelle. “The Decline in Average Weekly Cinema Attendance: 1930 -2000”. Issues in Political Economy, 2002, Vol. 11. Web. 23 October 2013.

“The Nickelodeon’s History”. Essortment: Your Source for Knowledge. Demand Media, n. d. Web. 25 October 2013.

Twiddy, David. “Focus on box office hides movies' true popularity”. The Daily Progress [Charlottesville, VA] 24 January 2013. Web. 1 November 2013.