Regal Majestic 20
900 Ellsworth Drive,
Silver Spring,
MD
20910
900 Ellsworth Drive,
Silver Spring,
MD
20910
1 person
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 44 comments
Since I missed the last showing of 2001 at the AFI Silver, I walked here to see what was playing and decided to see Ant Man in IMAX. I think its the first time I’ve been back to a Regal theater since the Into Darkness film blogged above. 5 years! And after tonight’s visit, it may be another 5 before I go back. :)
The remodel of the IMAX auditorium is nice. The soft faux leather seats are car seat comfortable and firm. They don’t recline! Seating capacity states 303.
I can’t believe I plunked down $20 for this movie. I used the kiosk to buy as the single cashier was busy. Still having my Regal card, I saw I had 500 points. The movie point system with them has changed in what I believe is just psychological. Instead of singular points for your dollar spending, it is now in the HUNDREDS.
The main concession stand is undergoing a major remodel and was completely closed. The secondary refreshment counter was opened and the counter guy explained you need 7000 points for a measly popcorn. I bought a pan pizza for about $7, not too bad. I asked for ice water and received nothing at the other end. Customer service is poor.
The pre show show plays on the entire screen, which is very nice. On the other hand, the sound plays only on the left side. Why this is, is baffling. You’d expect more for that $20 ticket price.
The IMAX trailer is the same. The circular countdown touting the big screen and immersive sound. They need to update it. Of all the trailers shown, the bio pic of Queen’s Freddie Mercury in the upcoming ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ looks quite good. :)
Presentation of the movie was as expected. This is IMAX-lite. Some decent stereo rear effects but nothing worth mentioning. Paul Rudd looks better with age. The CGI de-aging of Michael Douglas and Michele Pfeiffer’s characters are almost flawless. The darkness of the short scene definitely hides some of the imperfections of the effect but the shots are short that you’ll have to freeze frame the eventual home digital copy to notice it better.
does anyone know what the dimensions of the IMAX-D screen IS?
so I finally caught a movie on the IMAX-D screen: ‘Stalingrad’ in 3D. Still miffed that for the first screening of the day, there is no matinee pricing for the IMAX screenings: $19 … “ouch!” Sound was colossal , and the image was great … but. The screen is no where as tall as either the IMAX-D or ETX screen over at Tysons. Even the ‘Xtreme’ screens over at Cinemark Fairfax Corner have a considerable height advantage.
as part of Regal’s nationwide upgrading it’s projector’s to High Frame Rate films (i.e, specifically ‘The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug’) auditorium 15 can playback features as such.
My friend and I saw ‘Star Trek: Into Darkness’ here at a fan ‘sneak’ in IMAX-lite 3D. Surprisingly, the line was loooong, the longest I’ve experienced at an opening film day IMAX-lite showing. There were a few dressed in Starfleet uniforms, which got the attention of some special folk, not sure if they were from Paramount or a news organization, who took pictures. They gave out posters to a few hundred of us, which was a nice bonus.
No friendly greeting from the ticket taker.
The movie is quite good. I want to see it a few more times in the different formats. I have some quibbles with the ‘Wrath of Khan’ references and scene homages. I hate the pixie dust warp drive trail. Bad idea. Presentation was very good but sound booms weren’t as they should have been such as during some explosions and warp jump snaps. Not sure if it may have been the soundtrack, as the trailer for the upcoming Superman reboot ‘Man of Steel’ had some good sound booms from just the music, itself.
I saw ‘Skyfall,’ the latest James Bond flick last night. Presentation was very good, though the IMAX intro started with audio only. Previews of ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘Oz’ look very good, especially ‘Oz.’ Adele’s voice can be heard center screen. I prefer vocals to be surround especially with top notch visuals that usually open the Bond movies. I want to see the movie in a THX cert house to compare sound track subtleties. While IMAX is loud, its not necessarily crisp, with distinction.
The movie is a good Bond flick, with the usual intrigue, femme fatale, but with less gadgetry, even though there are new alphabet characters introduced. I wished there was more story/scenes with Javier Bardem and ’M.‘ There were some audience sobbing at the end when a certain character passes.
On the refreshment side, this Regal has upgraded concessions to include burgers, fries and onion rings albeit at the inflated movie chain price. If you forgo the drinks, the $5-$7 prices for a burger and fries is a little more palatable…$1 more for onion rings. They did mix up my order giving me fries instead of onion rings. The fries were okay, crisp, hot and plentiful. The boneless wings were ok, if plain.
I saw Mission Impossible 4 in IMAX over the holidays. No complaints, everything was as it should be. The large screen canvas properly showcased some of the more harrowing scenes like Tom Cruise’s hop around the skyscraper hotel. Didn’t see the preview for The Hobbit though.
Like many of the multiplexes built by the Consolidated Theatres chain, the Majestic 20 was designed by the Charlotte, NC, architectural firm ADW Architects.
I revisited #1 after 7 years seeing the very entertaining movie Super 8. The movie was most likely shown in 4K DP. The movie was decently bright and in scope as I noticed the riser going down after the movie. Surprisingly, the movie had very good use of the surrounds this time and was not muddled from my memories of seeing the Day After Tomorrow, or whatever it was called, back in ‘04. If only the bass was deeper for the film’s tense moments involving the usual fx laden crashes and alien activity. I would have preferred to see it in IMAX-lite but my dumb friend decided to wait for ME to pay. Its ok…next week, he’s going to pay for Green Lantern in IMAX-lite 3D at the $18.00 per ticket price!!
BTW, I missed seeing Pirates in ETX at Tysons. That weekend they booked, of all films, Hangover 2 in the ETX auditorium. Who cares to hear that movie in a theater with 40K watts of sound?
well at Tysons, the IMAX auditorium and ETX auditorium are separated by a walk way, so the excess bass from either screen can’t be heard, however the screens that are left of the IMAX screen/right of the ETX screen might be another story altogether. The bass though during ‘Battle Los Angeles’ and ‘Fast Five’ on the ETX screen never drowned out the dialogue. But you have to remember the ETX screen can feature the discrete 7.1 soundmix of ‘Pirates 4’, the IMAX screen is standard 5.1
LOL. I want to and plan on it maybe this weekend. Pirates is playing there in 3D on the ETX screen and IMAX-lite. It seems the two are one and the same yielding a similar ‘experience’ other then the ETX’s 40K watt system. I enjoy louder presentations on the event films but not so loud that it diminishes the dialogue. If you happen to catch Thor here, you’ll see what I mean during preview time.
I consider $18 buck highway robbery and for Regal not to have reduced matinee pricing for the IMAX screen simply unexcusable. I have yet to see or give my impressions of the system here at the Majestic, but have you been over to AMC’s ETX screen over at Tysons, oh…my…god, the bass there is frightening, it literally shakes the floor, your feet, your legs – it’s “rumblerama”!
My friend and I saw and enjoyed ‘Thor’ in IMAX-lite 3D. I had bought tickets to see Tron in IMAX-lite when it opened here earlier, but missed it due to a family emergency. Hopefully, I can swap my ticket for a replacement show…I like the sightlines and the screen placement in this theater compared to the AMC installs. It appears to go deeper but I doubt it is much larger, if at all, then the AMC IMAX-lite installs in the area. The sound seemed to be played louder as the bass appeared to be deeper. The IMAX preview ad touts the 12K watts of power, which baffles me why I did not ‘feel’ the same deep bass at the AMCs. Maybe they just play the movies louder here? Further showings will have to be seen to be certain. Unfortunately, the deep bass interfered with some of the dialog..not good. Its nice they have a good cleaning crew thoroughly clean the place before the next shows. My 3D glasses were not clean. Even the replacement pair was dirty. I suspect they do not clean the glasses between shows. Where’s the
time? For the $18 price, that is inexcusable. I’m going to log a complaint and see what response I get.
Looking at the showtimes, even the matinees are not discounted. Not good. AMC does.
Hmm. Even if they installed DCinema here, look back at Steve’s post about how AMC replaced the sound system with an inferior one. Dumb, dumb, dumb AMC.
well… in regards to the Uptown… a little birdie told me… oh I won’t jinx it. nevermind…
They should put DP at the Uptown. If it works for Seattle’s Cinerama, and from what I gather their screen is also 70', it should work here, too.
On an aside note, I’m wondering if you can sneak into the IMAX-lite auditorium or is it far and away from the others and always attendant staffed? Hmmmm.
The Air & Space’s Chantilly IMAX would be a good alternate and REAL IMAX theater to see Potter. I’m not a real Potter fan, but am looking more forward to the Narnia and Tron sequels.
looks like Regal is offering NO matinee reduced prices for it’s IMAX screen – that’s just flat out robbery. Guess they think we’re Manhattan NYC
what’s interesting is that if you were to make an online purchase for a ticket for the IMAX (film) presentation at Udvar Hazy – it’s actually a dollar more. At AMC Tysons it’s $16.50/pre-noon: $11.00
but I’m going old school and see it on the Uptown screen for $6 (pre-noon price)
I agree – $17.50 for a NON-3D IMAX presentation that’s outrageous.
$17.50 a ticket?? $17.50??? Its ticket gouging deja vu. Didn’t the exhibitors learn from the mistake they made this past summer about out pricing themselves? I know many midnight shows are sold out all over, but the IMAX-lite prices are ridiculous. King of Prussia’s real IMAX venue has the same price. I’d rather see it there, spend the night and go shop at the mall. :) The thing is my previous experiences there have met with a projector breakdown of some sort ever since Polar Express in ‘04.
actually it’s auditorium #20 that is getting the IMAX-Digital conversion that opens this week with ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part 1’
question: which screen is getting the IMAX-Digital makeover? – as I noted before screen #1 might do the trick.
IMAX-Digital – really?!? oh come on, it makes more sense for a RPX screen – that’s discouraging news, since more films (other than the IMAX) get the deluxe theatrical experience – added to the fact that the RPX sound systems are configured to 7.1 sound – damn you Regal, that’s the reason I go over to the Egyptian [insert mad face]
I believe that and what used to occur and might start to be relaxed is that an exhibitor was given essentially a franchise over a certain territory by IMAX. Therefore AMC has Manhattan and Regal had to go RPX. I believe IMAX and Cineplex couldn’t come to an agreement on renewing their contract so AMC was able to build IMAX locations in Canada. Now AMC is getting greedy and putting in IMAX and ETX theaters in the same complex – are customers confused? One such location that was confused was AMC Garden State where the usher couldn’t figure out if I should get Real D glasses or IMAX 3-D glasses for Hubble 3-D.
As for IMAX’s “standards” – I don’t know what they are. I know Cinemark was shut out of many markets, saw how pathetic Digital IMAX is and said ‘we can do that’ – and so they did with XD. AMC did it when they at first couldn’t built an IMAX in the same territory as a Cineplex in Toronto, Regal facing the same thing in Times Square developed RPX. Cineplex in Canada has Ultra AVX (the IMAX screens they own were all from Famous Players). And now….Carmike has Big D and Rave is getting Rave Revue Big Screen. To be fair others had in house big screen formats showing “35MM Enhanced Prints” – such as Crown Theaters of CT (one of which – The Palace is still open) and Marcus Theaters UltraScreen.
Regal does have its own proprietary wide-screen format which they call RPX (Regal Premium Experience), but they also install these IMAX digital screens, as does AMC, which also has its ETX (Enhanced Theater Experience) screens. I don’t know why some theaters get the IMAX-branded screens, while others get the respective company’s own version. It may have to do with the fact that all or mostly all of these recently-installed large format screens are conversions of existing auditoria and that there are some that cannot accommodate the IMAX digital screens for some reason.