$3 Movies All Day Saturday In Washington For National Cinema Day

WASHINGTON — Taking in a movie around Puget Sound on Saturday, Sept. 3, will cost only a fraction of what it usually does at theaters participating in “National Cinema Day,” an effort to lure movie lovers back to the theater to see a film and revive flat box office sales.

As many as 3,000 participating theaters nationwide, including those owned by Regal, AMC, Cinemark, Fridley and other chains, will knock down ticket prices to as low as $3 as part of the effort, an initiative of the National Association of Theatre Owners’ nonprofit Cinema Foundation

Here are a few of the participating theaters around Western Washington:

• AMC Seattle 10
• Majestic Bay Theatres (Seattle)
• SIFF Cinema Uptown (Seattle)
• AMC Pacific Place 11 (Seattle)
• Cinemark Lincoln Square Cinemas (Bellevue)
• Cinemark Reserve Bellevue Square (Bellevue)
• Cinemark Totem Lake and XD (Kirkland)
• Regal Issaquah Highlands IMAX & RPX (Issaquah)
• Regal The Landing & RPX (Renton)
• Find a theater near you here.

Participating theaters are offering the $3 tickets for every showing on Saturday, and in all formats.

Movie theaters nationwide were shuttered for months during the COVID-19 pandemic, but came back this summer to see box office activity return to near normal activity with releases such as “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Minions: Rise of Gru,” “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" and “Jurassic World Dominion.”

Movie ticket sales are about 20 percent less than in pre-pandemic 2019, but there have been about 30 percent fewer releases this year, The Associated Press reported.

“After this summer’s record-breaking return to cinemas, we wanted to do something to celebrate moviegoing,” Cinema Foundation president Jackie Brenneman said in a statement. “We’re doing it by offering a ‘thank you’ to the moviegoers that made this summer happen, and by offering an extra enticement for those who haven’t made it back yet.”

Before the movie begins, theatergoers will see a reel of upcoming releases from A24, Amazon Studios, Disney, Focus Features, Lionsgate, Neon, Paramount, Sony Pictures Classics, Sony, United Artists Releasing, Universal and Warner Bros.

National Cinema Day could become an annual event. Other countries have experimented with cheap movie tickets to lure people to their local movie houses, but this is the first time such an endeavor has been attempted in the United States, according to the AP.