October 10, 2003

Unhappy With Newline
Danny

This post is for all those who waited in line for the LOTR marathon tickets but were turned away due to NewLine's policy.

I can understand their doing the special showings of the extended versions in selected theaters only. What I don't think is fair is to be so restrictive on the marathon showing leading up to ROTK. For many of us fans this was going to be the culmination of a series we have waited for our whole lives. It was going to be a once in a life time chance to see the whole trilogy in one run on the big screen, and it was going to be even more exciting because the unveiling of the final piece of the story. However New Line decided that this experience would only be available to practically nobody.

The theater I went to (the only one within 500 miles) that was granted this marathon was also explicitly forbiden to do the marathon run in more than one theater. They explained that they had wanted to run the marathon in three or more theaters in their 17 theater complex, but NewLine explicitly forbade them. They can show the extended films on different days in various theaters but the marathon was for one thater only. The result is that people who camped in tents were turned away. I personally didn't camp out, but I did show up early in the morning and waited in the brisk autumn air.

New Line's Logic in this is baffling! All that could happen by allowing these theaters to do the marathon in more than one thater is for NewLine to make more money, and for more fans to get the experience they were soo looking forward too. Instead, the few tickets are going to be scalped on Ebay bringing money to the scalpers but not to NewLine, and many fans will be dissapointed. (A local radio station interviewed the first man in line who openly said his plans were to sell his tickets on ebay.) There must have been over 1000 people turned away this morning all hoping to get tickets to the marathon run.

I am greatly dissapointed in New Line with this decision. Seeing all three films in sequence on the big screen is how the trilogy is meant to be watched for fans, but for some reason New Line wants less than %.5 of the fans out there to be able to see it this way. I cannot see how it would possibly hurt their box office sales or their marketing to have made this available to every fan willing to make the long run in the theater.

frustratedly yours,

Danny