Film Forum

Peter K.: I also saw “Fantasia” at Radio City Music Hall in May 1978. I remember the huge audience applauding at the end of each musical segment – what a wonderful sound that was.

I think the drive-in speaker survived intact, but the car window sure didn’t! Another memory of that movie: Joan Crawford got star billing, but I think she was in it for about 10 minutes total.

Talking about the Biograph and the Hollywood reminds me of the Elgin Cinema, which was down around 19th St. It wasn’t the cleanest theater and it always had a funny smell, but they sure showed some great classic movies. The first time I saw “The Birds” in a theater was there – same with “Nights of Cabiria”.

Peter,
I liked the Biograph very much but again the scope screen wasn’t large enough in relation to the theater.
The excellent programmer there Frank Crowley was the one who also made the Regency such a success.
By the way don’t waste any portion of your life watching Hennesy or Petrovka. I just saw them because they were playing at the Music Hall. At that point the Hall should have just played classic films because what they were showing was so bad they should have been ashamed.

Vincent, I am glad you were not trying to insult me. It reads like we have a disagreement we can live with, between what constitutes a screening room and a theater. I understand what you mean about how what you consider a theater enhances the presentation of a film. What did you think of the Biograph revival cinema on West 57th St. in NYC ? That’s where I first saw “Psycho” on a movie screen Sunday July 10 1988. It was one of many blastedly hot days in that blastedly hot summer, so I stayed for a second screening of “Psycho” after the end of the second feature, titled (oddly enough), “Seconds”. I mention the Biograph, becaue it came closest to your hope of a full-sized revival movie house, complete with interior splendor, of any theater I know or have been in.

What suburb did you grow up in ? The last film I saw at Radio City was “Fantasia” in late May 1978. No, I have never seen Henessy or the Girl from Petrovka, but now that you have mentioned them, I will check them out on the Internet Movie Data Base.

Bill Huelbig, what I liked about Gimmick-O-Rama, besides the Castle films themselves, was the faithful and at times painstaking reproduction of the original Castle gimmicks. “The Tingler” went one better by having a staff member run around the darkened cinema with a
two-foot long rubber Tingler !

Speaking of William Castle, I saw his “I Saw What You Did” in its original run at the RKO Madison in Ridgewood, Queens, NY NY, summer 1965. I also read about it about that time in “Famous Monsters Of Filmland” magazine, edited by Forrest J. Ackerman.

I saw McCabe and Mrs. Miller there as well so we were in the same audience probably same nght too.

Bill the wide screen in 1 is not so bad because of the placement of the screen but to tell you the truth they might be the same size. But unfortunately the only widescreen revivals there that I know have been Contempt and Rochefort. They should do all scope in that theater. But the Watt screen in 2 was much larger. Bye Bye Birdie in that old theater was sensational. Haven’t seen it that good since and it is one of my favorites. To have seen it at the Music Hall…

Peter I honestly was not trying to insult you, however my swipes at Film Forum are genuine.
I consider a real theater to be one that is architecurally mean’t to be more than a modest sized screening room. One that is meant to enhance the presentation of a film. A theater that gives a film size and scope and at the same time is a pleasure to sit in as one waits for the lights to dim and for the curtains to part. A real theater lends the occasion excitement.
For documentaries and contemporary art films the Forum is fine as these films would be as well presented on a DVD. However for many of the films Bruce likes to show(not all but most) the size of the auditoriums and the screens often diminish a film.
Screen two of the old Watts St had a really good head-on scope screen that I miss. Now the scope screen puts the letter into letterboxing.
In a way I’m glad you were insulted as you revealed to me some of your youthful movie experiences.We are about the same age and being that I grew up in the suburbs I can only say that I envy you your
trips to the Music Hall during the 60’s. I started going to the Music Hall in ‘70 and by that time the films were pretty much dreck. (Has anybody else alive seen Henessy or the Girl from Petrovka?)
With Cablevision in charge the Music Hall is a lost cause. The rock concerts in no way utilize the potential of the place and now they’re using the greatest theater in the world for basketball games!!
I wouldn’t call the Forum a bunker but I would say they are shoeboxes with a screen attached at the end. And I would still say Bruce G and Steve Stern deserve better. Long may they be part of New York’s cultural life!

Vincent, do not insult me by condescension, lazy or careless assumption, or pedantry. There is no need to GUESS at my age. I am 48 years of age, and saw my first films at age 5 in 1960 or 1961 in what you would call the “real” Ridgewood and RKO Madison Theaters (q.v. on this site) in Ridgewood, Queens, NY, NY, which had separate ticket prices for orchestra, loge and balcony. Among my first few films in those “real” theaters were “Morgan The Pirate” starring Steeve Reeves and “Swiss Family Robinson” in the summer of 1961 when I was 5 going on 6. Two or three years later I saw shows at Radio City Music Hall of “The Singing Nun”, “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” and “The Chalk Garden”. I saw “True Grit” and “Winning” at Radio City in the summer of 1969. I KNOW what a real movie palace is as opposed to what Jay Leno has referred to as “a concrete bunker at the end of the shopping mall”.

My hobby of urban archaelology is, in part, about finding and collecting images of these old, now mostly gone, movie palaces, in part, by “cross-pollinating” and cross-referencing this site with nycsubway.org, which is often the only place I can find images of these older theaters, such as Loew’s Valencia, RKO Bushwick, Loew’s Gates, the Colonial, the Dekalb / New Casino, the Decatur, the Empire, the Monroe, to name a few in Queens and Brooklyn.

I asked you what you meant by a “real” theater" so as to know EXACTLY and UNAMBIGUOUSLY what you meant, as I cannot read your mind.

I found Film Forum at 57 Watts Street to be adequate to the material I saw presented there. I consider 209 W Houston to be adequate also, even though I preferred the larger screens of 57 Watts. I did not experience, and therefore know nothing about, the screen sizes at the earlier 80 Wooster Street location. I was a frequent patron of Thalia Soho in the late ‘80’s and early 1990 and therefore remember the screen size at 15 Vandam (tiny !)

Have you expressed your wish to the management at Radio City ? If not, its probability of being fulfilled will most certainly remain ZERO. If you do, it will have some chance of being fulfilled, however small. Your results, as you know, will most probably be in proportion to your efforts. I wish you success, but, in the meantime, will take what I can get.

Reads good, Vincent. How is Film Forum at 209 W Houston not a “real” movie theater ? How close is Bruce Goldstein to fulfilling your wish ?

CoolGuyCarl, I couldn’t agree with you more. I will merely add that, in 1988, the William Castle material was a “Gimmickorama” in the fall, after, and separate from, the summer sci fi / horror festival that year. I attended that festival in 1987, 88 and 89, to be a kid again, and to enjoy, and be in awe of, all that great ‘50’s sci-fi and horror I grew up with, know by heart, and love so much.

Seeing Allen Ginsberg and Herbert Hunke at the February 1988 Beat Festival was great also.

I don’t think there was a sci fi / horror festival in the summer of 1990. When I returned to Film Forum in late August 1991 for the Hammer “Curse of Frankenstein” and “Horror Of Dracula” it was at its new location at 209 W. Houston and wasn’t the same anymore. Perhaps because I had changed, and was now about to be married. Ditto mid-September 1992 when I returned for “The Blob” and “World Without End” and had been married a year. The ambience wasn’t the same as it had been at 57 Watts Street, no more excited and talkative lines of fans waiting outside one show in advance, up against original color lobby cards mounted on the wall.

My last time to Film Forum was November 1 or 2 1998 to see “Lenny Bruce : Swear To Tell The Truth”. Some of the old ambience seemed to have returned then.

My only beef with Film Forum was a cut in 1987 from Forbidden Planet : when the monkey steals fruit from the Morbius table and Robby gently zaps him away.

When they screened the Donavan Affair they had a full cast reading of the script with sound effects. I was there and it was really something. They just had a 3D festival and it was great to see films in that format.

This theatre has some of the best programming in American, much of it under the tutelage of Bruce Goldstein. I should add some accolades to the ones above by mentioning the enormously popular and virtually complete Fellini festival they put on, the retrospective of the films of Frank Capra…which included an exceedinly rare 1929 film called THE DONOVAN AFFAIR, for which the soundtrack was lost. It was shown here anyway. I believe that the dialogue was read aloud from a script! The Film Forum is not a trend follower but rather a trend setter.

I think an at least ten story office building. I would have to go take a look to be sure. It’s not hard for me, as it’s close to my place of work. Perhaps Film Forum itself can give you more information.