[SXSW 2024] MOVIEPASS, MOVIECRASH -- How Many Movies Did You See?

Review by Jonathan Berk

2018 feels like it was only yesterday and a hundred years ago, as we live in a world where time is a construct that is our reality. For moviegoers, that was our golden era. We paid a measly $10 a month to a company, and in turn, we could see one movie a day, every day. MoviePass gave us access that seemed too good to be true, and eventually, it was. MoviePass, MovieCrash is a new documentary by director Muta'Ali Muhammad that goes deep into the company's formation, rise to power, and ultimate demise. It's always a little surreal to watch a documentary about a topic you were intimately involved in, but the film finds ways to provide new information for any viewer, regardless of their familiarity with the service.
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The film ultimately finds its protagonist(s) with Stacy Spikes and Hamet Watt, who started the company with the best intentions. It shows how they developed the idea and built a brand for around ten years. Then, it shows the true antagonists, Mitch Lowe and Ted Farnsworth, who wrestled away control and both brought MoviePass to new heights only to have flown far too close to the sun. Some of this story was played out to the public via news outlets, but the documentary gets great interviews and has access to many of the people involved. It paints a fuller picture than what many would know about the ins and outs of the company.

The two most significant weaknesses of this film are common issues with documentaries. Sometimes, docs will reuse or repeat topics in a way that seems simply to pad the runtime. That happens a few times in this documentary, where we return to topics that felt resolved earlier in the documentary. It reiterates or comes back — but not to offer new insights or to provide a throughline. A problem with many documentaries that are filmed as a retrospective of things that happened is that there is a limited amount of footage of these past things taking place. This is felt in this film, as much of the B-roll feels very generic, or the same images are reused multiple times. These two issues feel connected and work to make it feel like this perhaps should have been an hour-long documentary instead. 

Despite that, in a world where it feels like the rich are systematically making the rest of us poor, this film truly resonates. Watching two Black men develop a tool that would benefit almost everyone involved, including the customers, have their company taken from them and destroyed by rich white guys feels poignant. Times are bad, and this film reminds us why we should eat the rich; they'd eat you first if they happened to notice your existence. However, they may be too busy partying on a yacht and sending their slightly less rich friends to Coachella. 

MoviePass, MovieCrash isn't a documentary that'll change the world. However, it points out a systemic problem in this extremely specific story. Many of us rode the MoviePass excitement, and it didn't take a business expert to know they were spending more money than they were making. We enjoyed it while it lasted. The documentary is a good time capsule of that moment and provides the context to understand why it all happened. 

MoviePass, MovieCrash is screening at the 2024 SXSW Film Festival, which runs March 8-16 in Austin, TX.

Rating: 3.5/5