Man, Movies Are Expensive!

I know this is my sports blog and I usually keep it on the sports tip ... but I just had to get this off my chest.

The movie industry is just killing me!

My wife and I took our two nieces to the movies on Tuesday. We saw the new Adam Sandler flick, "Grown Ups". It was cute, family friendly and funny. The only issue is that amount of money I had to pay to see it.

Again, it was a Tuesday. At 2:45pm. In Charlotte, NC. I had to pay $8 per adult ticket and $6 per child ticket. Yep, that's the matinee prices ... which were the expensive prices a decade ago. So that was $28 just to walk in the door. Not horrible, but still stung.

Now we head to the concessions. It cost me $17 for two large drinks and a large popcorn for me and my wife. It cost me $15 for two regular drinks and a regular popcorn for my nieces. There was $32 for the food. I haven't seen one second of the movie and I've already spent $60.

Isn't there something wrong with that? Heck, we stopped at Walgreens before we went to the movies to stock up on candy (they have the same boxed candy there for $1 ... $2 to $3 cheaper than what it would have cost to buy it there).

See, this is a movie I figured I would like. My wife and I will rarely go "try" a movie anymore. If we aren't absolutely sure that it's right up our alley, we won't go. We got burned on this recently on "Shutter Island". Sure, the reviews were good for it, but it sucked. It was boring, drawn out and extremely predictable. You could see the twist a mile away (at least we could) and were disappointed in the movie. For the two of us, we spent $20 on tickets and $15 on concessions -- $35 in total -- for us to have a bad time. That sucks.

It's not like I'm one of those people that drones on about this. I was a movie nut back in my single days and when I first got married. I used to go to movies all the time back in the day ... when I was broke ... and never was taken aback by the prices I was paying. But now when I make more money than I ever before, it really is getting to me.

I don't have kids (working on it). So I really empathise with families and how much it costs to do anything anymore. That includes sports (see, I knew I could get back on task!). If I had to pay $60 every time I went to the movies then I won't go to as many. Same thing with sports. I went to a Pirates-Reds game with my wife, my two nieces, my sister, my mom and my wife's two cousins. Yeah, I've blacked out what I've spent there.

I know no one cares about this because as long as schmucks like me keep buying tix, then it won't go away.

By the way, the four of us were the only people in the theatre to see Grown Ups. The only people.