Who Decides Cinema Listings?

[HELLO BOYS]

Can anyone who works in the cinema industry tell me who decides what is going to be shown at a cinema each week and when they decide. My local cinema is a six screen Cineworld and like everywhere else the fims change on a Friday. But the new listings are always available online from the Monday evening before. So who decides what the new line up will be? Is it the cinema manager or area manager? And how far in advance are these decisions made? Some films do not get screened if it is a smaller cinema and some get retained for weeks on end. Others are shunted to one screening per day after a week. But how do they predict what to keep and what to not screen? Mamma Mia for instance is still being retained four times a day while other more recent releases have been and gone.

 

[TAT]

I dont know who deciedes the cinema listings. However I have noticed the big films like Mama Mia and The Dark Knight tend to be shown for months but smaller films are only shown for a week or two at most!

 

[Klathorn]

My local cinema is a 6 screen Cineworld too. I have been led to believe that the listings are decided by the Head Office. The times of the showings though, i think, are decided by the actual Cinema. Im probably wrong though!

 

[Terri L]

No I think you're pretty spot on. We have a projection release list at work which covers all CineworlRAB and that is catogorised by number of screens. So for example all 10 screen Cineworld's will get the same films released at the same time, 8 the same, 6 the same and so on. However I think it then depenRAB on how popular the film is in each individual cinema as to how long it stays on. People are often surprised when they ask how long we're going to keep showing a film and we honestly don't know for the week beyond until the Monday before.

 

[Welcome to Chilis!]

Is there any major cinema still not showing Mamma-Mia?

 

[Natalie]

Its actually a very long and drawn out process where the distributors and the cinema chains negotiate screen numbers, capacities, percentage of ticket sales etc.

Eg Sony may ask Odeon to play Film A in 150 screens, each cinemas largest screen, for a minimum of two weeks and a 75% percentage cut. Paramount may want Film B that was released last week playing on the same number of screens, but the 2nd largest and for a minimum of three shows per day for another week at 60% percentage cut. Its a fine balancing act to please the distribs and the customers!

It usually works well except in the odd occasion, eg Odeon refusing to show the last Rambo as Sony wanted too high a percentage cut.

Film schedules are decided on a Monday for Fridays releases. If a film is on release and is doing well it is called a Holdover and will be scheduled for further weeks.

The cinema chains booking depts can look at a show-by-show breakdown of previous weeks figures and decide on the best performance times if a film is being kept. Eg if the evening shows are selling out but the matiness have 2 people in them, the mats would be dropped and something else could take their place.

If its done badly it would be dropped in favour of giving another new release a chance.

 

[saxy]

It's as much as DanV5 says above, however in my experience it can depend on the film and on the distributor.

For instance, a distributor may want a film in your local cinema for a certain number of weeks, as this will give you an advantage over the number of prints for a blockbuster in the weeks or months ahead. The distributor may also want a certain number of shows during the day, hence why you may see a film that you think no one would want to see on a midday every day.

In the case of some films, the distributor may want them either in a certain amount of cinema's, perhaps one print in a particular town or a film that will only be shown in a multiplex of ten/twelve screens or more.

The film bookers choose the films that are to be shown at the cinema's and it's up to the person completing the timesheets what times these films will be shown. The cinema in question can ask their booker if they can have a print of a certain film, but this will depend on what products are being released that particular week.