Yet this week, Sony Theatres will try to coax cranky New Yorkers, of all people, into getting a kick out of theaters once again. Sony’s new multilevel, 13-screen behemoth at Lincoln Square attempts to resurrect the movie theater by borrowing from its past and peering into the future. Twelve of the theaters are modeled on great American movie houses, from the pagodalike facade of the Majestic to the marching gold elephants and maroon walls of Loews 72nd Street. Up an 80-foot escalator, theater No. 18 adds a modern but even more tantalizing attraction: 3-D IMAX with an eight-story-high screen. Sony hopes that the 4.200-seat, mini-movie theme park (did we mention the 100-foot-wide Hollywood mural and the stand of black and gold palm trees in the lobby?) will pry people from their VCRs and cable boxes. It may even divert attention from the growing list of Sony box-office duds.
Opening off a massive, muralized lobby, the recreated theaters don’t mimic the insane opulence of the old palaces as much as evoke it. For most, only the entrances-bedecked with faux marble cherubs or gold sphinxes–are dressed like visitors from an earlier, glitzier era. The exception is the 900-seat Loews, which threatens to upstage the movies themselves with its graceful balcony and chandelier, gold piping from stage to ceiling and a light show before every seating. “If people feel that visiting is worth the price of admission even without seeing a show. then we’ve been successful,” says Robert Green, the multiplex’s principal designer.
But it’s IMAX, despite its $9 ticket, that will be the featured attraction. IMAX (from the phrase “maximum image”) pulls the viewer into the action because its enormous screen (100 feet wide in New York) extends beyond the range of peripheral vision. Since its invention in 1970, IMAX has been largely the domain of museums showing nature documentaries. But Sony has combined it with 3-D–one of only 10 such theaters in the world–and some amazing technology. A “Star Trek”-like helmet outfitted with liquid-crystal lenses has replaced the cheesy red lens/green lens glasses of the ’50s. Each helmet also has its own speakers. which not only make the sound seem to follow the action across the screen, but can do it in four languages with the flick of a switch. Sony has two 3-D IMAX movies ready. “Into the Deep” and “The Last Buffalo,” with two more in production for next year, including a dramatic feature starting Vat Kilmer. The company plans to open a similar complex in San Francisco in 1996 and more beyond. “There is going to be a huge appetite for this,” says Sony Theatres chairman Barrie Loeks. “You are immersed in a way you aren’t in a typical movie theater.” And that’s without the chewing gum and soda stuck on the floor.
