Pros
I worked my way up from a film crew position. Job scheduling is great if you're going to school or have two jobs or just any other commitment needing your time. The way they schedule employees work well since you can either work in the morning or at night. For the most part unless it's a holiday period or some crazy busy weekend, requesting time off is done fair and they're pretty good about getting you time off if needed. Obviously the free movies are a plus. Every now and then they'll have pre-screenings for movies just for employees. Depending on the manager on duty at the time, they'll let you bring a friend. So you get to watch a movie before it comes out and before the general public gets to see it. You can also get free movie posters and request standees if you're into that type of stuff. Advancement is fairly easy if you're a hard worker as a film crew. It starts to cap off at the management level because of the politics that goes on. There's more of it at the management level vs. film crew level. But if you have a good GM, your hard work won't go unnoticed.
Cons
First CON is the pay. It is horrible for every position, film crew, bartender, supervisor, manager, facility manager, senior manager and general manager. Every position is underpaid and raises are a joke. Corporate gives theatres an "average wage" budget where you're essentially expected to either be at or below the budget. Average wage goes hand in hand with the amount of hours employees are scheduled and that's essentially how they "manage" payroll. Cutting hours and/or paying people less to keep the overall cost of payroll down. It's referred to as "payroll variance" which is the difference between what's budgeted for the theatre and what the theatre actually schedules. Theatres are always expected to come up with a negative payroll variance which tells you that they "saved" money. If it's a positive variance, the theatre "spent" more than they should have. This is all BS because at the end of the year if the bottle line is good, guess what? You're still making money! AMC refers to the bottle line as OCF (operating cash flow). Second CON is the politics involved with AMC. I'm sure all companies have some sort of politics but with AMC, if you're not with the "in-crowd" you're screwed no matter what. This occurs at all levels, whether it's film crew, hourly manager or corporate. If you're not part of the "in-crowd" you will get passed on promotion opportunities and you'll be reviewed more harshly compared to your peers. Third CON is that you have to work weekends and holidays. AMC is opened 365 days a year and you're expected to work on days where your family and friends might be off work but you won't. Last CON is that AMC is a hypocrite. They tell theatres to save money, don't spend, cut costs and sell more but yet every year corporate, or what they like to refer to themselves as Theatre "Support" Center (TSC) holds an annual GM meeting that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. I wouldn't be surprised if it was in the seven figures actually. This annual meeting is worthless. You get nothing out of it other than some AMC branded items. "Training" at the event is a joke. This annual meeting is really just a way for other GM's to kiss the corporate people's behind to further my point of having to be in with the "in-crowd." Of course no GM's complains about it because it's like a little vacation for them. I complained to my DO (Director of Operations) and asked if I could just use that time to stay home and spend time with my family but of course this meeting is "mandatory." BS!