My wife and I went to see Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End this weekend. We bought our tickets on-line because we wanted a guaranteed show time and we didn’t want to wait in line on a holiday weekend – usually a very busy time for movie theaters.
The tickets were $10 each, plus an additional ‘convenience’ charge of $1 per ticket. We could have also reserved our specific seats for an additional $2.50 per ticket, but we declined. If we had stood in line to buy tickets we would have been able to get a military discount of $2.50 per ticket, but the military discount is not available on-line (no means of verification).
We spent $22 for the for the tickets on-line, but we would have only spent $15 if we had waited in line. The $7 difference is a savings of about 1/3, but that would have meant either driving out of our way in the afternoon to guarantee we get the evening show time we wanted, or getting there early and waiting in a long line and hoping to get what we wanted.
In the end convenience and a guaranteed show time was worth $7. We rarely go out to movies so we didn’t mind spending the few extra dollars. If it wasn’t a holiday weekend or the opening weekend for such a big blockbuster, I doubt we would have bought them on-line at all.
How was the movie? Exactly what I expected: Long, loud, full of special effects and not too much of a plot. But it was fun. 
