Friends, countrymen, lend me your ears. We have a travesty on our hands and it goes by the name Cinemark.

Let it be known to each and every person that Century was recently acquired by Cinemark, to become a part of the worst commercialized chain in movie theatres.

Personally, I thought Regal was pretty bad however this takes the cake.

I went to a Cinemark for the first time a few weeks ago in Corvallis, and it was a horrible experience. Not only had I been treated rudely by the staff in concessions, stating I had to wait for them to finish their break before they could help me, but I also had to deal with over 15 minutes of commercials after the showtime.

If you state a movie will start at 7:45 either show one commercial and stick to it or just show the damn movie.

Well, low and behold I arrived in Eastport's Century to see a movie and feel like I was home again. All I have to put up with is Fandango, and they usually have cute commercials, or decent ones at least.

When purchasing tickets, I noticed some of their garb had changed and I inquired as to their reasoning. "We're part of Cinemark now," I was told by the girl I usually buy tickets from.

I asked if anything was different and was told movies come with a 15 minute commercial session before the movie.

I shouted "WHERE'S THE MANAGER???" and was promptly directed to the man sitting next to her. I asked for a refund and he said they weren't able to do refunds on purchased tickets.

So I sat through Borat, much to my dismay and the 15 minute snooze fest which made me protest even more when I left.

Never again Century, never again.

Too many theatres in Portland for me to be messing with your money centric asses.

Please, please, please, don't go see a movie at Century unless you absolutely have to. I suggest supporting the Family Theatres chain, as even though they don't have the nicest theaters, they do only charge 7.00 for a first run feature with no commercials.

http://www.familycinemas.com/

Small cinema outlets like these need your support so they can stifle the chains that are Cinemark and Regal. I will be driving from Gresham to any outlet now aside from a Regal or Cinemark outlet. Thank you for the lesson money grubbers.

Steve

Cornelius Stadium Theater (formerly Cornelius 9 Cinema) and the Forest Grove Theater advertise that they run no commercials and a maximum of 10 minutes of movie trailers.

So sad about Cinemark - I knew they had acquired Century, my preferred multiplex chain for sure in Portland over Regal, but I haven't been there in a while. The commercial thing really, really sucks - that was one thing Century had over Regal.

But Century was superior to Regal in other ways, too. ALL of their auditoriums have been THX and the sound/video presentation was consistently good, whereas at Regal both of these depended on the theatre and the auditorium. Some rooms (the big ones where the new blockbusters show) are good but in the small rooms, you might pay full price to see a film on a tiny screen with lousy audio. I never experienced that at Century.

If I ever want to see a multiplex movie again, I'll still give the Cinemark theatres my preference (since Regal does the same thing), but I will be much more wary. Unfortunately, if you want to see a new movie on a big screen, there's not much other choice than Regal or Cinemark in this town. If you wait for the movie to come to McMenamins, you're going to have to put up with crappy sound, etc. even if you pay only $3.

But you're right, there are lot of small theatres in Portland to support. Let me plug the Cinema 21, http://www.cinema21.com , the first-run art house in NW Portland whose website I happen to run. There are also many others: the Cinemagic on SE Hawthorne, the Roseway on NE Sandy, the Hollywood Theatre (a non-profit theatre) that shows art house stuff on NE Sandy, the Moreland in Sellwood, and many others. Here's a good list:

http://www.portlandmercury.com/portland/Content?category=22203

Andrew

I haven't seen the inside of a movie theatre in well over 12 years.... and (from what I'm hearing here) there aren't many reasons to break that streak.

Mike,

There are reasons to go. Some theatres are small businesses and are worth supporting.

I agree with you Andrew about the theatres, they are nice and always the reason I chose Century over Regal. Regal has made strides with their first look program offering commercials early on instead of when the showtime starts. But the sound, and the amenities are something I will never see again.

Hollywood Theatres, apparently located on Taylor is the 5th biggest movie house in the country, yet are not located anywhere in Washington and Oregon. Gresham has been soliciting bids for a movie house in the new downtown core, and I hope to see these guys move in.

I do like going to Cinetopia in Vancouver when I want something upscale. There is nothing like it and again, no commercials.

Movie chains have to make money in advertising and I fully agree with that. Most of us who get there early expect that, but when the showtime starts, the showtime starts.

I had heard about the purchase as well a while ago, but I figured that they would keep the chain completely separate and not start to change a winning combination. I notice there are always more people at that theater than the one I live by on Division and 168th. People drove to this theatre for its amenities and to me that is slowly dying.

The Cinema 21 doesn't even show on-screen ads (stills) before a movie. All you see before a movie are a few previews. Plus they show some way-cool movies. (And they are applying for a liquor license, so soon you may be able to buy beer/wine as well.)

Anyone dying to meet screen legend Margaret O'Brien, the little girl in "Meet Me in St. Louis": she's coming Dec 9 to attend a screening of the film at C21. (I've never seen it but will probably attend - love seeing old Hollywood films on the big screen).

Portland already has a great old movie house called the Hollywood Theatre at NE 42nd and Sandy - we don't need another one! I guess Gresham could use just about anything semi-hip to upgrade its image.

Andrew

Our image is only tainted by Rockwood. That was a mistake we never should have taken from Portland.

I bet if we sampled 10 people from Hillboro/Beaverton and 10 people from Gresham who live in apartments, we would find the same classes. It is just that we get all of those stinky mexi gangs.

Drchaps~

If you want it easy as far as movie choices go come to the Coove--you have only three choices: Regal, Cinetopia (if you don't mind paying $15 for a ticket.......never again.........) and the Liberty in Camas if you don't mind the drive down Hiway 14.

Battle Ground and Hazel Dell reportedly have new Indieplexes as well, but as I have never been to those I can't comment on them myself. However, I have heard/read favourable reports about both.........


My personal opinions:
Regal's fun (they have arcade paintball & Dance Dance Revolution in the lobby at 164th!) but a bit on the expensive side for my taste. Also the TV and 20 minutes of trailers before a film are a bit irritating. Liberty's cheap but classic, and sometimes (especially in the right-side balcony) a bit *too* comfortable at times...

Cinetopia's expensive and rather uncomfortable for my taste. If I want to watch a movie on a big screen/HD seated on a couch, I can easily do it for free in my neighbour/mutual friend's basement on a giant Akai HDTV unit and DVD box, with really the only cost being the purchase of the DVD itself and the charge to my phone bill to ask if s/he wants to see the particular film (often not even that as I ride my bike to that area quite often...)

That and I never have been too fond of "gourmet" food outside of maybe popcorn with *real* butter. (I'm a meat and potatoes, pancakes and eggs guy.)

But as far as I go Liberty seems to top the list for me-$6.00 regular shows ($4.50 matinees!), decent selection of drinks/candy and comfortable seating. Also they do have trailer reels before films but they usually only have one or two trailers (rarely runs over five minutes), sometimes none at all.

Also Liberty doesn't show TV or an ad filmstrip before shows.....usually just the curtains and some instrumental/light electronica music for most movies or heavy metal and rock & roll for action, scifi & sports films.

Probably my one beef with Liberty is the driving distance--it's about 20 minutes from my pad about 1/4 mile away from Evergreen High school.

I would have mentioned the Kiggins here but I don't think that one's even open any more (haven't been downtown in several months tho.......... )

I realize that it is probally to far for most of you all to drive but Salem has a really great alternative to the art house theatres and Regal.

Check out www.northernlightstheatrepub.com

I know the days of dinner and a movie are long gone but here you can still do just that and at a very affordable price. You cannot beat the $3.00 ticket price for what are essentially second run movies. I would rather support the little guy than the corporate monster anyday of the week.

How can you beat dinner, a movie, and beer or wine all in one location and at bargain prices with quality to boot?

Portland has plenty of theatre pubs (beer/wine + food like pizza, beer, etc.) that show 2nd-run movies for $3, by the way...

Andrew

I'm not saying this just because our show has a relationship with McMenamin's, but the Kennedy School and the Bagdad Theater are GREAT movie houses. The sound may not be the best (I believe they're mostly straight up 2 channel stereo, like we used to endure in the 80's) but brewpub theaters have their advantages, and they care about the image they throw onscreen there, as opposed to most of the big chains, who stopped caring about how the image looks a LONG time ago.

I'm sad that Cinemark bought out Century. Act III theaters (a local theater chain) used to have very nice quality before Regal bought them out back in the 90's. After Regal closed down the Eastgate (WHY, REGAL, WHY) and it turned into a Russian Orthodox Church with U-Haul depot next to it, the Century 16 was my theater of choice. One of my best theatrical experiences was seeing the Matrix opening weekend, and part of the reason it grabbed me so hard was because the presentation at Century 16 was SOO GOOD. Hopefully it doesn't slide downhill as fast as Regal's acquisition of Act III did.

As far as Salem goes, I've heard the new Santiam multiplex at the Lancaster Mall is a VERY good cinematic experience. And I hope it would be--it's replacing the old Lancaster Mall theater, and their main screening room was a CAVERN that had a monstrous screen and great sound. When I was a projectionist at the Keizer Cinemas back in 97 (it's a car dealership now) I used to love taking films over to Lancaster and hanging out in their projector booth, checking out how cool their equipment was compared to ours (we upgraded to Dolby STEREO in 97 from Mono sound read off the film itself)

The Laurelhurst also makes dough hand over fist for a good reason, too. I've heard the Academy on Stark is also pretty nice. Cinema 21 is an institution, as is the Hollywood.