My credit card issued a full refund on every dollar from Sinemia, above and beyond what I requested!
I think they actually Googled the company and saw Sinemia's shenanigans. That was my main defense. Not elaborate documentation or persuasive argument. I told my credit card company: "Just Google Sinemia." Looks like that worked.
So I've joined the satisfied masses of folks who requested a refund from those scammers--denied--but then requested a chargeback from their credit card company--thumbs-upped.
This is why you pay with your credit card and not direct from your bank account, kids.
Now Sinemia has two billing cycles to appeal this decision. And they will. They usually do, apparently, and spew their usual fraudulent nonsense doublespeak. But I can appeal their appeal and I have a nuclear weapon of a crowdsourced letter to send if that happens.
I guarantee the refund will stand.
*
And guess what I'm spending that refund on?
You guessed it: MoviePass Uncapped!
The refund amount will cover eight months of the service, so basically everything I see with it will be free for the next 240 days. (Because my original Sinemia annual subscription was given to me as a gift.)
And my new MoviePass card arrived a couple days ago! Six business days after starting the account!
I activated it, same process as the old one, and took it right to the theater to see a movie in the evening (Shazam!, also fun on a second viewing). All movies and showtimes were available and the card worked. No ticket verification. You just buy the ticket and go to the movie.
Ah, bliss...
Something else worth noting: MoviePass repeatedly stated that you'd only be able to buy tickets for showtimes three hours in advance. But the app shows all showtimes for the day first thing in the morning. Pleasant surprise!
I wanted to be a good gonzo journalist and max out my usage to see at what point I get "capped" by the "Uncapped" plan, as they promise to do if you watch too many movies.
But alas: there aren't enough movies out I want to see. You couldn't pay me to see the new Dumbo. Already saw the new Hellboy (I was the one who liked it, in a nation of 300 million who hated it). And that new horror movie coming out this weekend looks like mega-trash. I'd just rather be home watching Black Summer or the new episode of The Orville.
But luckily, there are power users on reddit who have reported seeing anywhere from six to nine movies in a two week span on the new plan. This appears to be the limit before they cap you.
And honestly? Anyone watching that many movies deserves to be capped. I assure you: if the pickings weren't so slim, I'd be gallivanting about, engaging in cap-worthy cinematic behavior.
In fairness, there was a movie playing at the Alamo last night I was sort of interested in, but Netflix won out. I was back in that mental spot of "It's free, but do I want to drive 22 minutes round-trip to see this?" and the answer was "No."
That's a nice place to be. Knowing you can use MoviePass, but don't have to. This was how life was from October 2017 to August 2018.
Oh, and they made it clear they're gonna jack the price from $14.95 to $19.95 per month soon. That's fine. I'll pay that, as long as it works.
And heck, the service might implode any minute. That's also fine. As with the original MoviePass unlimited plan, this is one of those things you just have to enjoy in the moment. One day at a time. Verily, like the fanciful trees and flowers that doth bloom outside in the brisk spring air, this too shall eventually decay and die.
But the beauty stands, for now.
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And real quick, someone did a legal analysis of the patent in dispute in the MoviePass lawsuit against Sinemia.
I understood some of that article.
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And the New York Times did a reasonably objective comparison between Sinemia, MoviePass, and AMC's plan.
Nothing really new there. Just passing it on. Plus, the New York Times is a pretty big paper.
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I also keep meaning to talk about how Amazon is killing independent cinema by randomly deleting movies from their video library. Because that's huge cinematic news. But the time never seems to be right. And the time may never be right.
So there it is. I talked about it.
And I have some skin in the game, since a friend of mine is a director and about half of his 16 films on Amazon were deleted, including one I co-directed with him, Craptastic Number Two.
Ironically, he says some of his worst films are still there while some of his better ones got the axe. The criteria for deletion: totally arbitrary.
It's Amazon being Amazon. Ours is not to reason why.
-B.P. Kasik/Phony McFakename
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