Dealflicks Partners with Movie Theaters to Offer Special Deals

Dealflicks is a company that offers movie and concession discounts in order to fill the empty seats in movie theaters. According to Dealflicks, about 88 percent of seats remain empty on average. The company is partnering with movie theaters to help attract consumers through special deals. Dealflicks has already raised $1.7 million in seed funding in order to offer these discounts through its mobile app. Meanwhile, over 400 theaters have partnered with the company.

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Should Hollywood Be Worried About Popcorn Time for Android?

Popcorn Time and its pirating tools have gone mobile with a new Android app. Time4Popcorn’s Popcorn Time app is available on the developer’s website. According to TechCrunch, it is similar to the original desktop program in design, provides the same access to pirated movies and TV shows, and streams torrents. The app comes from the Time4Popcorn development group, which promises a Windows XP version soon. A number of developers have been launching spin-offs of the original and now-defunct Popcorn Time. Continue reading Should Hollywood Be Worried About Popcorn Time for Android?

Canadian Exhibitor Bundles Movie Admission and Home Video

Canadian movie exhibitor Cineplex launched its SuperTicket service this summer that bundles admission to a theater screening with a digital copy of the same film, delivered electronically months later. The package costs more than twice as much as a ticket to see the movie in a theater. The company experimented with SuperTicket deals for three films: “The Smurfs 2,” “Pacific Rim,” and “Kick-Ass 2.” While the approach could be a remedy for declining DVD sales, it remains unclear whether fans will pay in advance for a digital copy. Continue reading Canadian Exhibitor Bundles Movie Admission and Home Video

Coders and Filmmakers Discuss Supercharging Web Video with Popcorn

  • Filmmakers and coders gathered in San Francisco for a recent “hackathon” to explore the future of Web video. Discussions focused on Popcorn.js — “Mozilla’s HTML5 media toolkit designed to amp up interactivity,” according to Wired.
  • Popcorn is a framework “that allows filmmakers to supplement their movies with news feeds, Twitter posts, informational windows or even other videos, which show up picture-in-picture style. For example, if a subject in a film mentions a place, a link can pop up within the video or alongside it, directing the viewer to a Google Map of the location.”
  • While initially hesitant that such enhancements would distract viewers from the movie experience, directors reportedly grew accepting of the concept of providing a more interactive experience.
  • “It’s easy to envision Popcorn helping filmmakers with their productions as well as creating communities for films after their release,” reports Wired. “At least one documentary project, ‘One Millionth Tower,’ has already made use of the tools, coupling Popcorn with 3D graphics generator WebGL to create a Web-ready documentary that shows what would happen if the residents of a Toronto highrise were allowed to participate in re-creating their home tower.”