Who doesn’t love a good movie date? They’re easy to arrange, great for meeting new people, and also give couples a simple way to spend time together.

Moviepass, a New York City-based startup that offers an unlimited movie ticket service, noticed that its service is particularly alluring to couples. The company found couples who joined ended up hitting the cinema twice as much, while singles attended 66 percent more often.

The bump in attendance isn’t entirely surprising, as Moviepass caters to movie lovers by letting them view one free movie a day for up to $50 a month (the price depends on the market). But couples surveyed by Moviepass also noted overwhelmingly that the service had a positive impact on their relationship, the company told VentureBeat.

Moviepass is an admittedly expensive service compared to other offerings like Netflix, but with movie ticket prices rocketing upward, it’s useful for anyone who goes to the movies at least four times a month. For couples, that goes doubly so.

One couple, Diana and Stephen Forrer of Myrtle Beach, S.C. (above), told the startup that movies played a fundamental role in their relationship from the beginning. They ended up having their engagement photos at a local movie theater.

“With MoviePass, being able to go [to the movie theater] whenever we want has been great for us! We don’t worry about how much we’re spending when we go, because it’s already paid for, so we can really just relax,” Diana Forrer said in a statement. “In a world where things can be tight and everything’s a big decision, it’s nice to always have a date night we don’t have to worry about. Plus, we love movies!”

An older couple, Gilda and David Ortiz of Miami Beach Florida, also pointed out that Moviepass helped them get used to life as empty nesters.

It may just seem like commonsense, but according to psychotherapist Dr. Brett Kennedy it’s important for couples to take part in simple shared activities like going to the movies.

“Couples who engage in arousing leisure activities are more satisfied in their relationships with one another,” Kennedy said in a statement provided to Moviepass. “To keep a spark in your relationship, it is important you keep “dating” one another and prioritize your time together.   Dinner and a movie should never get old.”

Moviepass has raised $4.7 million so far from True Ventures, AOL Ventures, WME, and others.

It was an exceptionally good year for online movie ticket service Fandango, according to new data released by the Comcast-owned service today.

Fandango saw a 57 percent surge in annual ticket sales for 2012, and a 34 percent increase in monthly visitors to its website and mobile platforms (including 31 million Fandango mobile app downloads). For perspective, the service bring in about 41 million monthly unique visitors, according to Fandango.

The service also said the number of ticket sales purchased through mobile devices increased 171 percent compared to the same period last year,accounting for over 30 percent of total sales.

At least part of Fandango’s huge growth can be attributed to the many big partnerships it forged, including a deal to sell tickets to the nation’s largest movie theater chain, AMC. Fandango also saw a bump thanks to ticket deals with both AOL Moviefone and Yahoo Movies, as The Wrap notes. It also helps that Fandango was the first (and currently only) ticketing service to offer integration with Apple’s voice control technology Siri on iOS 6, as VentureBeat reported back in November.

Fandango said it plans to increase reserved seating options and add additional mobile payment platforms in the future, which should help the service hold its momentum heading into 2013.

Fandango’s announcement is one of many significant announcements for the film industry. Not only are online sales of movie tickets on the rise, so are ticket sales in general. Current estimates show that consumers spent $10.8 billion at the box office in 2012.

Movie tickets photo via M Ishikawa/Shutterstock

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Apple’s virtual assistant Siri became a bit of a movie buff in iOS 6, thanks to some helpful Rotten Tomatoes integration to display showtime information. And Siri’s getting even better in iOS 6.1 — soon it will be able to purchase your movie tickets, reports 9to5Mac.

Developers currently testing out iOS 6.1 tell the site that Siri accepts commands for buying movie tickets, like “Buy four tickets to Cloud Atlas nearby tonight.” (Seriously, if you like movies, go see Cloud Atlas.) Once Siri pulls up the relevant showing information, you can click a button to buy the tickets, after which you’ll be sent to the Fandango app to complete the purchase. If you don’t have the Fandango app, you’ll be directed to install it.

Currently, Siri is only accepting ticket purchases via Fandango, which leaves out plenty of movie theaters that handle ticketing through Flixster’s app (which also owns Rotten Tomatoes). Since Apple already has a deal with Rotten Tomatoes for movie times though, I suspect Flixster integration is coming along as well.

If Apple does manage to land both online ticketing services, then it could end up being more convenient than going through their respective apps. Currently, you often have to open both the Flixster and Fandango apps to figure out which movie theaters are supported.

Apple says Siri’s movie ticket capabilities will only be available in the U.S. for now.

Top photo: Devindra Hardawar/VentureBeat; Bottom photo: 9to5Mac

The goal of creating a subscription service for going to the movies — a “Netflix for theaters” — is a tough one. Not only do you have to get movie studios on board with your plans, you also have to form partnerships with national theater chains. And let’s face it, neither group is quick to climb aboard a service that disrupts the current ticketing model.

But MoviePass, a company that’s been trying to crack this nut for some time, may have found the answer. Today MoviePass is debuting a subscription movie theater service that relies on mobile app check-ins and a proprietary payment card. And best of all, the company has managed to do this without any formal agreements with movie theaters and studios.

Here’s how it works: For a flat monthly fee (between $24.99 and $39.99, depending on where you live), MoviePass grants you access to one free movie ticket a day. To use the ticket, you simply need to head to a movie theater, check in using the MoviePass app on your iPhone, and then pay for the ticket with your MoviePass payment card. To the theater, it looks like you’re paying with a normal credit card, which means MoviePass will work at any cinema that accepts credit card payments.

For now, MoviePass doesn’t support 3D showings or IMAX films, but chief executive Stacy Spikes said the company will eventually offer those at higher subscription costs. Starting today, MoviePass will open up to the more than 75,000 people signed up on its waiting list, and existing users will be able to invite up to 10 of their friends.

“Ninety-three percent of the time, tickets [in movie theaters] are not being sold and seats are empty, so we definitely feel this will help … put more butts in seats,” Spikes said in an interview with VentureBeat.

Even though the company doesn’t have agreements with studios and theater chains, the new service was developed with their needs in mind. MoviePass doesn’t get in the way of existing online ticketing services, for example.

While it may seem obvious to tie a service like this to a prepaid payment card, Spikes, a former vice president at Miramax in the ’90s, tells me that MoviePass is actually doing something entirely new. Previously, it wasn’t possible for a third-party service to add funds to a prepaid card. But MoviePass came up with a patented process to enable that, which means the company’s check-in/payment card model could easily spread to other ticket-based activities like amusement parks.

MoviePass has been testing an earlier version of its service for the past nine months, but it only supported independent theaters and required you to print out movie ticket vouchers ahead of time. I’ve been testing that version of the service for a few months in conjunction with my movie podcast at Slashfilm.com, and while it worked every time I tried it, it was a bit cumbersome.

This new MoviePass service is a major improvement in theory (I’m still waiting to test it out), and it could just be the answer to falling attendance and concession sales for movie theaters.  The company claims it has managed to increase movie theater attendance by as much as 64 percent and concession sales by 123 percent with the earlier version of its service. Given how much more convenient this new service is, I’d expect those numbers to be even higher this time around.

MoviePass is clearly targeting movie fans and cinephiles with its pricing, especially those who see at least one movie a week in theaters (like this writer). That makes more sense than aiming to please everyone with its movie subscription service, but the company will need to make sure it attracts enough hardcore moviegoers to be sustainable.

The company isn’t the first to take a stab at discounted movie tickets — I’ve used several services (whose names I’ve forgotten by now) that offered users a bundle of movie tickets for a flat monthly fee but that inevitably went out of business. Their problem, according to Spikes, was that users were taking advantage of all of their monthly tickets and bringing their friends and family, which ended up being too costly.

MoviePass is based in New York City and has raised $4.7 million so far from True Ventures, AOL Ventures, WME, and others.