Taylor Swift 'Eras' concert film coming to theaters

For those unable to attend Taylor Swift’s record-breaking “Eras" tour, which generated ticket demand so severe it crashed Ticketmaster and led to lawsuits against that company as well as a Senate hearing, a concert film is premiering theatrically on Oct. 13. The film was shot during Swift's recent six-night engagement at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.

AMC Theatres on Thursday announced tickets for “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour” will be priced at $19.89, plus tax, with children’s and senior tickets at $13.13, plus tax, for regular screens, with an additional charge for IMAX and Dolby Cinema formats. AMC, also acting as the film’s distributor, will additionally screen the movie at other theater chains’ locations, including Cinemark in the United States, Cineplex in Canada and Cinépolis in Mexico.

In order to try to avoid a similar ticketing debacle as befell Ticketmaster, AMC said it had upgraded its website and ticketing engines to handle more than five times its previous largest influx of ticket-buying traffic. 

“But AMC is also aware that no ticketing system in history seems to have been able to accommodate the soaring demand from Taylor Swift fans when tickets are first placed on sale,” the company noted in a news release, cautioning that buyers “may experience delays, longer-than-usual ticket-purchase waiting-room times and possible outages. AMC is committed to ensuring any delays or outages are addressed as quickly as possible.” 

Additionally, “To discourage speculation on secondary-ticketing sites, there will be no refunds offered on ticket purchases.”

The company also said no free movie passes will be accepted, and that AMC Stubs A-list members may not use their membership to reserve tickets. The company also will temporarily restrict the usage of AMC Stubs rewards toward online ticket purchases and scale back its website ticketing availability for most other movie titles. 

Every U.S. AMC Theatre location will run at least four show times per day on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.

The tour recently concluded its U.S. leg, which began in March, and commences its international portion this November. 

Swift announced her tour Nov. 1, with registration open that day for Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan program, promising registrants a place in the Nov. 15 presale queue ahead of the Nov. 18 general-public date. Ticketmaster, the only source for obtaining a ticket, quickly encountered problems, with the site freezing, putting registrants on indefinite hold for hours and then cutting them off and other glitches. Compounding matters was a series of responses from Ticketmaster many found inadequate and said avoided accountability.

On Dec. 5, more than two-dozen plaintiffs nationwide sued Ticketmaster parent Live Nation Entertainment, alleging antitrust behavior, breach of contract, fraud and other violations of the California Cartwright Act and the California Unfair Competition Law. The Justice Department by then launched an antitrust investigation, and in January of this year, a U.S. Senate hearing brought bipartisan criticism of the company.