This blog isn't just about movies. It's about the places that show them. Everyone has fond memories of going to the movies. My mom talks about going to double features for a quarter. I remember going to Radio City Music Hall when I was 12. Every teenager today remembers where they saw their first Harry Potter film.
For anyone who went to the movies in the '80s, we saw the economies of scale change the theatre going experience. Single theater screen houses were divided up into bazaar multi-plex configurations. And theatre companies like United Artists built small "shoe-box" sized multi-plexes instead of single screen houses.
Common sense dawned in the 90's with the age of the new multi-plex, and companies like AMC, Sony-Lowes, National Amusements, Cinemark and Cineplex-Odeon built modern theaters with some of the best projectors and sound equipment available. Showing movies became big bucks again.
Amongst all this change some of the classic movie houses survived and one of them is right here in Oakland. Owned and operated by the brilliant entreprenuer Allen Michaan, this wonderful house has been restored to its classic beauty. When I first moved to the Bay area in 2004, I would see this beautiful structure, glowing in it's neon glory, from the 580 Interstate. It's allure was unmistakeable. I wanted to pull over, buy a ticket and lose myself in whatever films were being screened.
Over the years I did catch a few movies there and it is definetely worth the trip. It is a great movie palace that has been wonderfully maintained. And inside is a state of the art projection system, and according to some folks at Pixar, one of the best 3-D projection systems in the area. Coming this weekend the theater will have special 3-D screenings of Up, Avatar and Coraline, three of the best 3-D movies of 2009, to showcase its 3-D technology.
Under the marquee at the Grand Lake Theatre
The curtain at the Grand lake Theatre
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