N.Y. Post critic/columnist Lou Lumenick is reporting exclusively that the Tribeca Film Festival “is cutting prices for this year’s edition, running from April 23 to May 4, after complaints about a 50 percent price hike for most tickets in 2007.

“Most evening and weekend tickets will cost $15, down from $18 last year, and the festival is introducing six- and 10-ticket packages that bring the admission price down to $12.50 apiece,” he reports. “The charge for most weekday and midnight screenings is dropping from $14 to $8, with a 10-ticket package for $64. A few gala screenings and special events will continue to carry a $25 ticket price.”
In late March ’07 Lumenick, Indiewire‘s Eugene Hernandez and myself (among others) groaned about the ticket-price hikes.
“It’s clear Tribeca has seriously lost its focus and become the cinematic equivalent of a street bazaar,” Lumenick wrote at the time. “The festival’s decision to boost most ticket prices by a whopping 50 percent from last year — most evening screenings now cost $18, a few as much as $25 — indicates a leadership that is increasingly out of touch with New Yorkers.

On 3.30 I wrote that “the TFF, launched on the spirit of downtown recovery from 9.11.01, now has a new rep — the nation’s most avaricious and money-grubbing film festival.”