This App Will Let You Go to the Movies Every Day for a $10 Monthly Fee

MoviePass, the app that has long offered daily access to new movies in theaters for a monthly subscription, is drastically cutting its prices. In fact, the revamped service may even be cheaper than a run to the concessions counter -- let alone what you normally pay for a single movie ticket.

The brainchild of Netflix co-founder Mitch Lowe, MoviePass' new monthly membership now comes at an agreeable price point of $10 per month, while still packing all the same perks it charged $30 for since it launched in 2011. Now, you'll be able to circumvent the cost-prohibitive nature of every new blockbuster and Rom-Com for the same price as your Netflix membership.

The premise is simple: after downloading the app on iOS or Android and agreeing to the $10-a-month service, you can see up to one movie per day, every day, at any theater that accepts debit cards, minus IMAX and 3D features. Your trip to the movies is subsidized by MoviePass, which pays the theater the full price of your ticket every time. If only they had a similar subscription for buckets of popcorn...

While this seems like an enterprise guaranteed to hemorrhage money for the startup, the financials actually appear to be sound. Helios and Matheson Analytics, a large data firm, purchased a majority stake in MoviePass, agreeing to fund the national launch of the new low-cost initiative. Lowe heralded the news in a statement, saying: "We are changing the way consumers think about going to the movies by making it possible to experience a broader array of films -- from the latest summer blockbuster to a critically acclaimed documentary -- through a subscription model." 

Helios and Matheson's capital infusion should also prove to be a boon for the data and analytics firm, as it conducts research on the viewing behavior of MoviePass customers. In an interview with Bloomberg, the company's CEO, Ted Farnsworth, likened the data-tracking effort to those employed by Google and Facebook. “The more we understand our fans, the more we can target them," he said. 

While the price of tickets has generally been on the upswing, this might provide a small bit of solace for those among us who don't always want Netflix and chill. 

[h/t Business Insider]

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Sam Blum is a News Staff Writer for Thrillist. He's also a martial arts and music nerd who appreciates a fine sandwich and cute dogs. Find his clips in The Guardian, Rolling Stone, The A.V. Club and Esquire. He's on Twitter @Blumnessmonster