> and otherwise get people showing up for free subsidized movies while they can. The issue comes in when the "free subsidized movies" ends, but consumers are left with the expectation that the economics of movie sales can support that model. If MoviePass's business model turns out to be unsustainable and shuts down, all of the consumers that have gotten used to it will suddenly baulk at paying retail rates again. Rates that, while discussed as expensive, were accepted as the status quo prior to MoviePass.
The alternative also isn't pleasant for the theater: The economics of MoviePass work out, but now MoviePass has the relationship with the consumer. As it gets more popular, MoviePass gets more market power to dictate discounted rates with your theater, with the implicit threat of blacklisting your theater from MoviePass locations if you don't play ball. While in theory that doesn't hurt the theater, since such a high percentage of box office revenue goes to distributors rather than to the theater, distributors won't take that squeeze either. They'll either shift back to fixed-cost film distribution (which theaters don't like, because it's risky) or start adding in more and more onerous minimum guarantees to contracts to make up the absolute dollar difference. i.e. if your distributor gets 95% of box office revenue, slashing ticket prices from $10 to $5 only costs you $0.25 in revenue but it costs them $4.75. While you can make up your very minimal lost revenue from concessions easily, they can't. They're not going to eat that quietly, no matter how much additional volume you generate.