This film is playing inside the boundaries of my stake. There were multiple pushes from stake and ward leaders to attend, and there were family members that went Friday and Saturday.

HOWEVER, today is Sunday. The movie is playing in the same theatre with six showings. Since most TBM's wouldn't even go to this type of movie on a Sunday what do you guess the attendance will be today for all six showings of this film?

I guess less than 20 and plan on calling the theatre at the end of the night and attempt to find out total attendance for the day.

Your guess???

I can't imagine a non-mo attending this but actually paying would boggle my mind.

I could see a few people not knowing what it was, buying a ticket and then leaving half hour in when they realize it is only propaganda.

I also hope some teens pay for a movie, watch it, then sneak into the "Meet the Mormons." I imagine them smug that they get a bonus movie only to realize what they actually snuck into.

My guess will be one empty showing and 18 people total.

Attendance numbers will be artificially inflated.

The quote below is from the Comments section below a Kirby essay on the Salt Lake Tribune website:


LaGryphon
After exiting the movie The Judge I noticed a line of people around the lobby of the theater. My curiosity was peaked so I asked someone standing in line what movie were they in line for. She oh so proudly said a local bank was handing out "free" tickets to see Meet the Mormons. And that folks is how you get Mormons to go see a Mormon movie.....FREE TICKETS! That tells the true story of how LD$ Inc and their members conduct themselves.

The FREE ticket ploy reminds me of Glenn Beck boosting the sales of one of his books by requiring any organization that hired him for a speaking engagement to buy hundreds of his books.

The result was pallets of books stored in the basements of lots of organizations -- and his sales numbers, Amazon ranking, etc. were all artificially inflated.

If you read that Meet the Mormons is "sold out," consider the fact that a bank or other mormon-owned business may have bought all the tickets and then gave them away.

A member of our stake rented out an entire theatre for next week to have a private showing. The stake tried selling tickets through the wards and after two weeks the private engagement was cancelled.

They were asking for donations for the tickets of $5.00 and still could not get people to sign up.

This is too much

Also from the comments section on the Salt Lake Tribune website:

"It reminds me of a time when sports teams would point out their black players while all the coaches and owners where still white. The mormons church is no different. When true diversity is seen at the top, that will be worthy of a movie."

Some TBMs commenting on the Salt Lake Tribune review by Kirby really, really don't like for anyone to criticize the damn movie/PR infomercial in any way. Here's an example:

"You like the Trib because it's a forum to bash the LDS church. I hope the Trib goes out of business. If you are LDS, I hope you can start being positive instead of only posting negative things about the LDS church. We are talking about God's church."

"We want as many people as possible to see this film," said Elder Jeffery R. Holland, a member of the church's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, in a September video directed at church members. "As with any theatrical film, our success will depend on box-office performance during the opening weekend. How long the film will be available in theaters will depend on that." Holland then recommends that followers share the trailer on social media, request that local theaters play the film, or even "buy out a showing for a group."

http://www.cityweekly.net/TheDailyFeed/archives/2014/10/10/meet-the-mormons-likely-to-be-surprise-hit-thanks-to-lds-church-putting-pressure-on-members

More details at the above link.

From the article in City Weekly:

Though Holland makes it clear that purchasing a ticket for the movie “is not a commandment or a requirement,” some church members, especially those out of state, where the film is being heavily marketed, say that they've been pressured by local wards and stakes to buy tickets for opening weekend because local church leadership has already bought the tickets.

A member of the Redlands California stake, who wished to remain anonymous, told City Weekly that her local theater wasn't going to show Meet the Mormons because of poor ticket sales. But that changed when her ward bought out the show.

"My Relief Society president e-mailed everyone in the ward and said, 'You have to buy these tickets because the movie isn't going to be shown unless you do.' Then the stake purchased all the seats, and now the ward is saying to buy tickets through them rather than the theater. So yeah, there's been a lot of guilt for us to buy these tickets so they can get their money back."

Mitt Romney used similar ploys to boost sales of his book:

Bumping sales isn't necessarily against the rules. In fact, it happens all the time and not just in film. According to Politico, in 2010, Mitt Romney's book No Apology: The Case for American Greatness reached No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list by "asking institutions to buy thousands of copies in exchange for his speeches." And in 2013, former Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff was accused of lining up a multi-level marketing company to buy 100,000 copies of his book Am I Not a Man?: The Dred Scott Story, before it was even written. [end quote from City Weekly]

I don't think these efforts will help the movie. Theater owners are smart enough to understand that such a special interest film is just an extended ad for a religion. They know Mormons will all go right away, then it will flop after that. I can't imagine non-members being attracted to this movie. The GA's over estimate the number of people who give a rat's rear about Mormonism. In fact, it will probably just generate more Google searches which will show them how crazy TSCC really is.

Here is an expert guess. I would gues it is high.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=daily&id=meetthemormons.htm

$262,000



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/2014 07:18PM by gentlestrength.