Movieville | News
- Regular Updates
- Final week for "Phantom Menace" at Chinese, Village
- New theaters, reviews
- 1999 Last Remaining Seats
- Silent Movie to reopen
Regular Updates
- Most Fridays I list my "picks of the week" on the directory page.
- Max takes care of When Reviews Attack! on his own, so sometimes he's got reviews newer than my listed update date. Drop by his site and check!
Final week for "Phantom Menace" at Chinese, Village
- Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace will be leaving the two best theaters it's in on the planet after Thursday: the Chinese in Hollywood and the Village in Westwood.
What happened to a promised eight or twelve week run? Well, the folks at Mann's Theaters refused to agree to that, and Fox and/or Lucasfilm wouldn't bend. In the end, the only thing that kept the film in these two theaters were the people camped out for weeks - realizing just how bad a publicity move it would be to NOT open the film at these two theaters, Fox and/or Lucasfilm decided to rent the theaters for four weeks and run the films essentially themselves. (This is called a "four-wall" - it's not a regular booking.) Those four weeks are coming to an end Thursday, so if you haven't see it yet at either theater, by all means go. ("We must do something quickly." Sorry, sorry.)
New theaters, reviews
- After a long updating drought here at Movieville (other than minor news items and the picks of the week) I'm getting back into the swing of things. New this week is an updating of the Los Angeles theaters list, with the addition of multiplexes in Long Beach, Lakewood (reopen) and Valencia. The Eagle Plaza 4 has reopened with new management, and a few theaters have closed, including the Esquire in Pasadena. Also corrected are a few new area codes up north (most 805s becoming 661) and other minor fixes.
I've also restarted my capsule reviews page, with intentions of keeping it up to date now, and done some behind the scenes file reorganization (hopefully without breaking any links or bookmarks). Next week, probably during the week, the Orange County theaters will be updated, as will a number of other pages.
1999 Last Remaining Seats
- The Los Angeles Conservancy's Last Remaining Seats schedule is out for this year; six Wednesdays of classics in the downtown movie palaces, starting this Wednesday. Tickets are going quick, so hurry over to their web page for details on how to get tickets.
Silent Movie to reopen
- Silent Movie has been purchased by an individual from Santa Monica, and published reports indicate he plans to reopen the theater in July. While the new owner was probably not able to get the film libary Austin owned (it was auctioned last Sunday) many silent prints are available for rent, and the new owner plans to also have more vaudeville and other entertainment true to the silent era.
I'll see if I can track this guy down and do Movieville's first news interview.
Click for older news.