ivelostr2

A few years ago, my wife and I went to Chicago and saw Playtime at the Music Box and occasonally when visiting my sister in DC, I have gone to the Uptown. I know there have to be really cool, historic theaters in New York City, but I can;t find a link, and searches keep taking me to current show times.
Some friends and I are going to New York City to see a Hockey game in MSG in january, and I want to check out a few, and maybe catch a movie...Does anyone have a link to a site that would have the theaters and what is playing?

I remember back in the day reading in a magazine about a theater built specifially for Star Wars in NYC and I think a few years ago, they played the Indiana Jones movies one after another during Spring break, but I had to stay at school for my internship, so I wasnt able to go. Anyone know which theater that was?

Ash Ketchum

Not many "historic" theaters left in Manhattan. The Star Wars one was the Loew's Astor Plaza on 44 St., off B'way, in Times Square, but it wasn't built for SW, it was just a lucky accident that SW was an early hit for it. (I saw it there when it opened, in fact.) That theater shows live shows now, not movies.

The Ziegfeld, on 54 St. between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, is the last big single-screen theater left in NYC. But it opened in the 1970s so I wouldn't call it necessarily "historic." But it's worth a trip, depending what's playing. (QUANTUM OF SOLACE is the most recent movie I saw there.)

The Paris is a single-screen arthouse theater on 58 St. and 5th Ave. that's been there forever. It famously showed only French films once upon a time and it's still open. (Currently playing: CHERI, starring Michelle Pfeiffer.)

All the great 42nd Street and Times Square theaters are gone, gone, gone.

All the great revival theaters on the upper West Side are gone, gone, gone.

I can't think of any others that I would recommend to you. It's very depressing. I can't stand stadium seating and I don't like theaters where you have to take a series of escalators to get to the theater your ticket is for. I like the Ziegfeld because the seat backs don't move. Much more comfortable for me that way.

FantasticVSDoom

Yeah, theatres are pretty much just regular old theatres you would get anywhere here...

Mabuse

Go to LA instead. F NY

arminius

True, and you should go during the mardi gras.

ivelostr2

we plan to go sooner or later, but the Penguins don't play the Rangers in LA that weekend...and Pen's games and otehr sporting events are usually how I motivate my wife and friends to take these sort of trips...when we went to the Music Box, part of the allure of Chicago for my wife was sitting in the Bleachers at Wriggley...(very uncomfortable by-the-way)...

ivelostr2

thank you, I wills ee what I can find playing there...it may not be worth it to go, but i have heard of the Ziegfeld and I think that was the one I was trying to think of...

lamphorn

Loved seeing a mention for the Music Box in Chicago. When I resided in Chicago, I practically lived at the Music Box. My second home was the Gene Siskel Film Center.

DeFan

Well if the OP really wants to see the Indiana Jones movies one after another LA isn't a bad idea.

The Egyptian Theatre: Saturday, August 22
6:00 PM RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK & INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM & INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE

And it's the BIG screen.

ivelostr2

SO I'm resurrecting a 7 year old thread...we never went that year to NY, but I'm going this week for work and I looked for a cool theater to check out and I see the Film Forum is playing the 4k restoration of Ran this week. I will have free nights Wed and Thurs and I might go check it out. Is anyone familiar with that theater? Is it worth spending 3 hours there to see Ran?

Thanks in advance!

Ash Ketchum

The Film Forum is one of the most uncomfortable theaters I've ever sat in. It's dark, cramped, the sightlines are not the best. The whole place is just a warehouse reconfigured to fit three box-like theaters in its space. And that renovation happened in the '90s. There are three screens in it. The biggest one (Theater 1) is the least uncomfortable. I'm not sure which one they're showing RAN in. I go there regularly simply because it's the only place to see certain rare films. The last one I went to see there was HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT.

The Ziegfeld is now closed.

As of now, the only "historic" theaters still showing movies in Manhattan are the Paris and the Museum of Modern Art's main auditorium.

TomOpus

How can you have a movie theater with bad sightlines? One would think that was pretty important.

story

You'd better tell ogsoley / excom101 on Voxer and let him know, R2!

bluetoast

Damn - no historic theaters in NYC remain? Fuck that. Hell I'd also like to go to one of those cheapo 70's theaters on Times Square, but even those are gone.

Ash Ketchum

Ahhh, you never went to the Thalia, in which the floor sloped upwards! But they showed so much great stuff, I went all the time. Probably the greatest revival theater in New York history, in terms of its programming. But a difficult place in many ways. Closed a long time ago and then reopened in the '90s and then renovated in the 21st century. It's now completely different and is called the Leonard Nimoy Theater, used only for festivals.

Ash Ketchum

You mean like these? (Pic taken 30 years ago)



Yup, long gone.

bluetoast

Yeah those. Though I bet they were probably gone by the mid 90's or so, right?

Ash Ketchum

The last one, the Harris, closed in 1994. I passed it on one of its last nights when it ran THE CROW and CROOKLYN. I'd already seen both films, so I didn't go in, but if I'd known that was going to be the last double bill, I would have gone in and stayed till closing, just for history's sake.

Alan Smithee

How was the presentation at those theaters? Looks like it was probably awful. There were a few like that in San Francisco too, I remember checking their listings in the paper just to see what they were playing as they often showed stuff that was out on video, and not even popular or classics. Wondered who would actually go to them, though I heard it was mostly homeless people who could stay all day for a buck or so.