Exhibition of two films for the price of one
A poster advertising
American International Pictures
' double feature of
Die, Monster, Die!
and
Planet of the Vampires
.
The
double feature
is a
motion picture
industry phenomenon in which theatres would exhibit two films for the price of one, supplanting an earlier format in which the presentation of one feature film would be followed by various short subject reels.
Opera use
[
edit
]
Opera houses staged two operas together for the sake of providing long performance for the audience. This was related to one-act or two-act short operas that were otherwise commercially hard to stage alone. A prominent example is the double-bill of
Pagliacci
with
Cavalleria rusticana
first staged on 22 December 1893 by the
Met
. The two operas have since been frequently performed as a double-bill, a pairing referred to in the operatic world colloquially as "Cav and Pag".
[1]
Origin and format
[
edit
]
The double feature originated in the later 1930s.
[
citation needed
]
Though the dominant presentation model, consisting of all or some of the following, continued well into the 1940s:
With the widespread arrival of sound film in American theaters in 1929, many independent exhibitors began dropping the then-dominant presentation model.
Movie theaters
suffered a downturn in business in the early years of the
Great Depression
.
Theater owners decided they could both attract more customers and save on costs if they offered two movies for the price of one. The tactic worked; audiences considered the cost of a theater ticket good value for several hours of escapist and varied entertainment and the practice became a standard pattern of programming.
In the typical 1930s double bill, the screening began with a variety program consisting of
trailers
, a
newsreel
, a cartoon and/or a short film preceding a low-budget second feature (the
B movie
), followed by a short interlude. Lastly, the high-budget main feature (the A movie) ran.
A
neighborhood theatre
running a double feature won out over a higher-priced first-run theatre with only one feature film. The major studios took note of this, and began making their own B features using the technicians and sets of the studio and featuring stars on their way up or on their way down. The major studios also made
film series
featuring recurring characters.
[
citation needed
]
Although the double feature put many short comedy producers out of business, it was the primary source of revenue for smaller Hollywood studios, such as
Republic
and
Monogram
, that specialized in B movie production.
[
citation needed
]
In 1910, double features were banned in France. The ban was lifted in 1953 but with one of the features having to be more than 10 years old.
[2]
Decline
[
edit
]
The
Astor Theatre
in
Melbourne
, Australia has shown double features since its opening in 1936
The double feature arose partly because of a studio practice known as "
block booking
," a form of
tying
, in which major Hollywood studios required theaters to buy
B-movies
along with the more desirable A-movies. In 1948, the
U.S. Supreme Court
decided that the practice was illegal in
United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.
, contributing to the end of the
studio system
.
Without block booking, the studios no longer had an incentive to make their own B-features. But audiences at first-run
movie palaces
,
neighborhood theatres
, and
drive-in theatres
, still expected a program of two features. In 1948, nearly two-thirds of the movie houses in the United States were advertising double features.
[3]
Following the Supreme Court ruling of 1948, known as the Paramount Consent Decree, the source for the second feature changed.
[4]
The second feature could be:
- a major studio re-release of an older feature,
- an older feature re-released from firms that specialised in acquiring and re-releasing older films such as
Realart
and
Astor Pictures
,
- a low-budget feature contracted from a smaller studio.
James H. Nicholson
and
Samuel Z. Arkoff
formed
American International Pictures
in the mid-1950s to produce and distribute low-budget features. They discovered exhibitors were only interested in buying their pictures as supporting features (a
B-movie
) at a flat rate. Once Nicholson and Arkoff combined two features into a program, sold as a double bill, with each picture given equal billing in the advertising and backed up with an explosive advertising campaign, theaters were willing to exhibit them on a percentage basis.
[5]
The exhibitors may have kept a larger share of the box office than the major distributors demanded,
[6]
but AIP's share of the box office was enough to keep it from going out of business.
The double bill was sold on a percentage basis and each feature was given equal billing in newspaper advertisements and promotional materials. Since the trailers and advertising promoted the two titles, exhibitors were discouraged from separating the features in the package. To distributors and exhibitors, it was a substantially different policy than the standard double feature in that it was not a top-billed A feature combined with a minor-billed support feature sold at a flat rate (a
B movie
).
By the mid-1960s, double features had been mostly abandoned in non?drive-ins in favor of the modern single-feature screening, in which only one feature film is exhibited. However, double bills of popular series that had previously been run as a single feature, such as the
James Bond
and
Matt Helm
series in the
superspy
genre, and the
Man with No Name
and
The Stranger
spaghetti Westerns
were re-released together by the main studios.
The end of the first-run double feature also saw the end of continuous screenings, an exhibition policy where a theater opened at 10:30 or 11:00 AM and ran the program without breaks until 12:00 midnight. Customers bought tickets and entered the theater at any time during the program.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
, and its 1973 stage predecessor
The Rocky Horror Show
, reference the practice in their opening song "Science Fiction/Double Feature" and are largely inspired by B movies presented in these showings. The movie itself was and still is often shown as a double feature with
Shock Treatment
, a loose follow-up by the same directors.
While most cinemas have long discontinued the practice of showing the double feature, it has nostalgic appeal. The
Astor Theatre
in
St. Kilda
,
Melbourne
,
Australia
, established in 1936, continues the tradition of the double feature to this day. Many
repertory
houses continue to show two films, usually related in some way, back to back.
Short films still occasionally precede the feature presentation (
Pixar
films generally feature a short, for example), but the double feature is now effectively extinct in first-run movie theaters in the U.S.
Following the success of
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
, three
Roger Rabbit
cartoon shorts were created to be shown as preludes to other Disney films, in an effort to revive the viewing of cartoon shorts before major films. Only three were made and the scheme failed.
[7]
During the 1990s, many
VHS
cassettes that contained two films on the same tape (with the second often a sequel to the first) were described as "double features," a practice that was later extended to
DVDs
.
In the 21st century
[
edit
]
The Aquarius
duplex
theater in Palo Alto, California, presented simultaneous viewings of
Oppenheimer
and
Barbie
on its two screens
In 2007, filmmakers
Quentin Tarantino
and
Robert Rodriguez
released their individual films
Planet Terror
and
Death Proof
as a double feature under the title
Grindhouse
, edited together with fake
exploitation film
trailers and 1970s-era
snipes
in order to replicate the experience of viewing a double feature in a
grindhouse
theater. Although
Grindhouse
received critical acclaim, it was a complete financial flop in the United States. The films were screened individually in international markets and on DVD.
Another recent double feature was the Duel Project, when Japanese directors
Ryuhei Kitamura
and
Yukihiko Tsutsumi
created competing films to be shown and voted on by the premier audience.
One of the
Marvel Animated Features
, a direct-to-video series features
Hulk vs.
which is a double feature, has
Hulk vs. Wolverine
and
Hulk vs. Thor
.
More recently, double features of re-released popular films hit the big screen. The first was of the re-release of
Toy Story
and
Toy Story 2
that started on October 2, 2009, before the release of
Toy Story 3
the following year. Both films were distributed in
Disney Digital 3D
in select theaters.
[8]
The next double feature was a re-release of
Twilight
and
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
on June 29, 2010, shortly before the midnight screening of
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse
in select theaters.
[9]
In February 2011, it was announced that the 14th
Pokemon
movie
Victini and the Black Hero: Zekrom and Victini and the White Hero: Reshiram
, due in July, would be released as a double feature, though both films are actually "versions" of each other, with differences related to plot points and character designs varying between the version being watched.
In 2022, Russian cinema launched double features with American and Russian movies. The first film is a Hollywood blockbuster, it designated as "free pre-feature service". The second film, designated as main feature, is Russian patriotic propaganda movie or
short film
(tickets are sold for it).
[10]
[11]
In 2023, many theaters began offering double features for
Barbie
and
Oppenheimer
as part of the "
Barbenheimer
" phenomenon. The two films – which were noted for their tonal and genre contrast – were released on July 21 in the United States and several other countries.
[12]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
Phillips-Matz, Mary Jane
(2006).
Washington National Opera 1956?2006
. Washington, D.C.: Washington National Opera. p. 196.
ISBN
0-9777037-0-3
.
- ^
"French Decree Allows Dualers After 43 Years"
.
Variety
. August 26, 1953. p. 15
. Retrieved
March 15,
2024
– via
Internet Archive
.
- ^
"In Praise of the Double Feature" New York Times
[1]
Hoberman, J.
- ^
p.78 Schatz, Thomas
History of the American Cinema: American Cinema in the 1940s. Boom and Bust Volume 6
University of California Press
- ^
Arkoff, Sam (1992).
"Flying Through Hollywood by the Seat of My Pants"
. Birch Lane Press. pp. 46?47.
- ^
p. 124 Doherty, Thomas
Teenagers and Teenpics
Unwin-Hyman 1988
- ^
Double Feature
The Dark Crystal + Who Framed Roger Rabbit
, September 10, 2009
- ^
Hartford Informer
'Toy Story' Re-Release Provides Trip Down Memory Lane
[
permanent dead link
]
, October 22, 2009
- ^
"Twilight/New Moon Combo (one-night-only)"
. Box Office Mojo
. Retrieved
2011-11-22
.
- ^
"Кинотеатры начали показ голливудских новинок под видом ≪бесплатного предсеансового обслуживания≫"
[Movie theatres started screening new Hollywood features under the pretense of "free pre-feature service"].
Fontanka.ru
(in Russian). August 1, 2022
. Retrieved
July 22,
2023
.
- ^
"Российские кинотеатры показывают фильмы без прокатного удостоверения. Что происходит?"
[Russian movie theatres screen films with no distribution certificates. What is happening?].
journal.tinkoff.ru
(in Russian). August 2, 2022
. Retrieved
July 22,
2023
.
- ^
Rubin, Rebecca (17 July 2023).
"
'Barbenheimer' Fever: Meet the Film Lovers Turning 'Barbie'-'Oppenheimer' Double Features Into the Movie Event of the Year"
.
Variety
. Retrieved
18 July
2023
.