Audience members say movie tickets are 15,000 won more expensive… Conflicting opinions: Nate News

Recently, actor Choi Min-sik appeared on a TV current affairs program and said, “Lower the price of movie tickets,” which reignited the controversy surrounding movie ticket prices. Theaters emphasize the inevitability of raising movie ticket prices. Production companies and investment and distribution companies argue that it is more important to create a profit structure where movie ticket revenue can benefit the entire industry than to raise movie ticket prices.

Expensive movie tickets have been consistently cited as a reason for the decline in moviegoers. The ticket price for a weekend movie was 10,000 won in 2013, but it has increased by 1,000 won every year since 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, to 2022, and has now reached 15,000 won. If a family of three goes to the movies on the weekend, they will spend close to 50,000 won without buying popcorn or drinks.

The industry has various views on the issue of movie ticket prices. Movie theaters emphasize that “the industry is still in crisis as the theater slump that started with the pandemic has been prolonged. All prices have increased compared to 10 years ago when the ticket price was less than 10,000 won,” and “since we rent space under long-term contracts, it is impossible to lower the ticket price in a situation where fixed expenses are increasing.”

The positions of theaters, production companies, and investors/distributors are divided on the issue of unit price, which is intertwined with movie ticket prices. Unit price is calculated by dividing total ticket sales by the total number of viewers, and refers to the average price that viewers actually paid after receiving discounts from telecommunications companies, etc. According to the integrated computer network of the Korean Film Council, the unit price as of the second quarter of this year was around 9,600 won.

The Producers Guild of Korea (PGK) and others criticized the theaters’ “black-box accounting,” saying, “Although the three theater companies competitively raised ticket prices after the pandemic, the actual profits returned to investment and distribution companies did not increase.”

After deducting the film development fund and value-added tax from the admission fee, the theater and the investment/distribution company split the profits in a 50-50 ratio. The amount that the investment/distribution company takes is in the early 4,000 won range per movie ticket, and this amount has not increased even after the increase in movie admission fees.

A production company official said on the 1st, “If this ratio does not change and the average ticket price does not increase, the profits from the increased movie ticket prices will not actually return to the people who make the movies,” and “If the ticket prices increase and the audience does not visit the theater, the profits will worsen even more.” If the movie does not reach the break-even point, the production company’s income will be ‘zero’ and it will be difficult to attract future investments. The investment and distribution companies will bear the losses and have less room to reinvest in ‘good movies.’

Audiences compare the cost-effectiveness of online video service (OTT) subscription fees with movie ticket prices. With OTT, you can watch as much content as you want for 13,500 won per month (Netflix, standard rate), but in theaters, you can only watch one movie for 15,000 won. The recent trend of preferring short content has also contributed to the decline in the number of moviegoers.

An official from a domestic distributor cautiously said, “If we lower the price even a little and the number of viewers increases significantly, profits will improve, but considering the current content consumption trends, there is also the perception that we cannot guarantee that such a result will actually come about.”

Ha Jae-geun, a popular culture critic, said, “Since movies are mass entertainment, it is best to maintain prices that are not burdensome to consumers,” and “As prices rise and life becomes more difficult, the first thing to be cut is leisure spending. It is important to make people feel that movies are worth the money they paid for.”

Reporter Im Se-jeong fish813@kmib.co.kr

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