Movie theaters

Movie theaterS

A movie theater, movie theatre, picture theatre or cinema is a venue, usually a building, for viewing motion pictures ("movies" or "films").
Most movie theaters are commercial operations catering to the general public, who attend by purchasing a ticket. The movie is projected with a movie projector onto a large projection screen at the front of the auditorium. Some movie theaters are now equipped for digital cinema projection, removing the need to create and transport a physical film print
History
Before 1900
Noting that the first public exhibition of projected motion pictures in the United States was at Koster & Bials Music Hall on 34th Street in New York City on April 23, 1896, the first storefront "theater" in the US dedicated exclusively to showing motion pictures was Vitascope Hall, established on Canal Street, New Orleans, Louisiana June 26, 1896: it was converted from a vacant store. In the basement of the new Ellicott Square Building, Main Street, Buffalo, New York, Mitchell Mark and his brother Moe Mark added what they called Edison’s Vitascope Theater (entered through Edisonia Hall), which they opened to the general public on Monday, 19 October 1896, in collaboration with Rudolph Wagner, who had moved to Buffalo after spending several years working at the Edison laboratories: this 72 seat, plush theater was designed from scratch solely to show motion pictures. Terry Ramseye, in his book, A Million and One Nights [p. 276], notes that this “was one of the earliest permanently located and exclusively motion-picture exhibitions.” According to the Buffalo News (Wednesday, November 2, 1932), "There were seats for about 90 persons and the admission was three cents. Feeble, flickering films of travel scenes were the usual fare." (The true number of seats was 72.)

modern era
In the next ten years, as movie revenues exploded, independent promoters and movie studios (who owned their own proprietary chains until an antitrust ruling in 1948) raced to build the most lavish, elaborate, attractive theatres. These forms morphed into a unique architectural genre—the movie palace—a unique and extreme architectural genre which boasted a luxurious design, a giant screen, and, beginning in 1953, stereophonic sound. The movie chains were also among the first industries to install air conditioning systems which gave the theatres an additional lure of comfort in the summer period.
Several movie studios achieved vertical integration by acquiring and constructing theatre chains. The so-called "Big Five" theatre chains of the 1920s and 1930s were all owned by studios: Paramount, Warner, Loews (which owned Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer), Fox, and RKO. All were broken up as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in the 1948 United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. anti-trust case.
In the 1970s, porn theatres became ubiquitous in some areas. However, the introduction of the low-cost VHS video system for home televisions has decommissioned many porno cinemas as well as many 'second-run' theatres.
People can pay to watch movies at home, through cable television or streamed from the Internethttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet#Streaming_media: pay-per-view (PPV) and video on demand (VOD). This may have contributed to an industry wide slump in the late 1980s (see disruptive technology), not to mention the decline of the 'Dollar Cinema' (where first-run films are pulled from circulation). The theater industry responded by building larger auditoriums with stadium seating layouts, installing more screens (to allow for more variety and more show times), upgrading sound systems and installing more amenities and higher-quality concessions. The growing popularity of high-definition television sets, along with HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc players has probably also contributed to the decline in cinema attendance. On February 17, 2009; all US television stations will be broadcast in the digital format. This could also affect US movie theaters.

3D
Sometimes a 3-D film is shown. Visitors borrow or keep special glasses to watch it. Depending on the system used, these are e.g. polarized glasses. Three Dimensional films use two images channelled, respectively, to the right and left eyes to simulate depth by using 3-D glasses with red and blue lenses (anaglyph), polarized (linear and circular), and other techniques. 3-D glasses deliver the proper image to the proper eye and make the image appear to "pop-out" at the viewer and even follow the viewer when he/she moves so viewers relatively see the same image. Most 3-D films are used in amusement parks and even "4-D" techniques are used when certain effects such as spraying of water, movement of seats, and other effects are used to simulate actions seen on the screen. There were early 3-D films in the 1920s and several "waves" or 3D in the 1930s, 1950s, 1980s, late 1990s. A current wave involves IMAX 3D.

IMAX
IMAX is a system using film with more than 10 times the frame size of a 35mm film to produce image quality far superior to conventional film. IMAX theaters use an oversized screen as well as special projectors. The first permanent IMAX theater was at Ontario Place in Toronto, Ontario.

Drive-in
A drive-in movie theatre is basically an outdoor parking area with a screen at one end and a projection booth at the other. Moviegoers drive into the parking spaces which are sometimes sloped upwards at the front to give a more direct view of the movie screen. Movies are usually viewed through the car windscreen (windshield) although some people prefer to sit on the hood of the car. Sound is either provided through portable loudspeakers located by each parking space, or is broadcast on an FM radio frequency, to be played through the car's stereo system. Because of their outdoor nature, drive-ins usually only operate seasonally, and after sunset. Drive-in movie theatres are mainly found in the United States, where they were especially popular in the 1950s and 1960s. Once numbering in the thousands, about 400 remain in the U.S. today. In some cases, multiplex or megaplex theatres were built on the sites of former drive-in theatres.

Other venues
Some outdoor movie theatres are just cleared areas where the audience sits upon chairs or blankets and watch the movie on a temporary screen, or even the wall of a convenient building.
Colleges and universities have often sponsored film screenings in lecture halls. The formats of these screenings include 35mm, 16mm, DVD, VHS, and even 70mm in rare cases.
Some alternative methods of showing movies have been popular in the past. In the 1980s the introduction of VHS cassettes made possible video-salons, small rooms where visitors viewed the film on a large TV. These establishments were especially popular in the Soviet Union, where official distribution companies were slow to adapt to changing demand, and so movie theatres could not show popular Hollywood and Asian films.
Movies are also commonly shown on airliners in flight, using large screens in each cabin or smaller screens for each group of rows or each individual seat; the airline company sometimes charges a fee for the headphones needed to hear the movie's sound. Movies are sometimes also shown on trains, such as the Auto Train.
The smallest purpose-built cinema in operation is the Cinema dei Piccoli in Villa Borghese, Rome, Italy. The Cinema dei Piccoli was built by Alfredo Annibali in 1934 in the park of Villa Borghese, and today covers an area of 71.52 m² (769.83 sq ft). Originally called the Topolino Cinema (after Mickey Mouse), the movie theatre used a Path-Baby 9.5 mm movie projector, bed sheets for the screen and played 78's for background music. Restored in 1991, the cinema now has 63 seats, a 5 x 2.5 m (16.4 x 8.2 ft) screen, stereo sound and air conditioning. It is mentioned in the Guinness Book of Records.

Programming
Movie theaters may be classified by the type of movies or when they are shown:
First-run theater: A theater that runs primarily mainstream film fare from the major film companies and distributors, during the initial new release period of each film.
Second-run or discount theater: A theater that runs films that have already shown in the first-run theaters and presented at a lower ticket price. (These are sometimes known as dollar theaters or "Cheap Seats".)
Repertoire/repertory theater or arthouse: A theater that presents more alternative and art films as well as second-run and classic films (often known as an "Independent Cinema" in the UK).
An adult theater or sex theater specializes in showing pornographic movies. Such movies are rarely shown in other theaters.
IMAX theaters can show conventional movies, but the major benefits of the IMAX system are only available when showing movies filmed using it. While a few mainstream feature films have been produced in IMAX, IMAX movies are often documentaries featuring spectacular natural scenery, and may be limited to the 45-minute length of a single reel of IMAX film.

Presentation
Usually an admission is for one feature film. Sometimes two feature films are sold as one admission (double feature), with a break in between. Separate admission for a short subject is rare; it is either an extra before a feature film or part of a series of short subjects sold as one admission (this mainly occurs at film festivals). (See also anthology film).
Historically, many movie theatres presented a number of shorter items in addition to the feature film. This might include a newsreel, live-action comedy short films, documentary short films, musical short films, and/or cartoon shorts (many classic cartoons series such as the Looney Tunes and Mickey Mouse shorts were created for this purpose). Some theatres ran on continuous showings, where the same items would repeat throughout the day, with patrons arriving and departing at any time rather than having distinct entrance and exit cycles. Newsreels gradually became obsolete by the 1960s with the rise of television news, and most material now shown prior to a feature film is of a commercial or promotional nature.
A typical modern theatre presents commercial advertising shorts, then movie trailers, and then the feature film. Advertised start times are usually for the entire program or session, not the feature itself.[6]
Thus people who want to avoid commercials might want to enter later, and those who want to avoid the trailers, again later. This is easiest and causes the least inconvenience when it is not crowded, and/or one is not very choosy about where one wants to sit. If one has a ticket for a specific seat (see below) one is formally assured of that, but it is still inconvenient and disturbing to find and claim it during the commercials and trailers, unless it is near an aisle.
Some movie theaters have some kind of break during the presentation. There may also be a break between the introductory material and the feature. Some countries such as the Netherlands have a tradition of incorporating an intermission in regular feature presentations, though many theaters have now abandoned that tradition [7], while in North America this is very rare, and usually limited to special circumstances involving extremely long movies.
During the closing credits many people leave, some stay till the end. Usually the lights are switched on after the credits, sometimes already during them. Some films show additional scenes while the credits are rolling.
Until the multiplex era, prior to showtime, the screen would typically be covered by the traditional curtain which would be drawn for the feature. Some theaters, lacking a curtain, occupied the screen with slides of some form of abstract art. Currently, in multiplexes, theater chains often feature a continuous PowerPoint-like presentation of slides between showings featuring a loop of movie trivia, promotional material for the theater chains (such as encouraging patrons to purchase gift certificates and group rates, or buy concessions), or advertising for local and national businesses. Advertisements for Fandango and other convienent methods of purchasing tickets is often shown. Also prior to showing the film, reminders, in varying forms would be shown concerning theater etiquette (no smoking, no talking, no littering, removing crying babies, etc) and in recent years, added reminders to silence cellphones.
Some theatres, if projection is well-equipped, have the ability to interlock, which is where one film print runs through two projectors at the same time. Once the film is threaded and loaded in the first projector, the projectionist threads the film on multiple rings that surround the nearest wall that will designate to the projector that is closer, but both projectors must be programmed in similar format to allow both projectors to run the single print at the same time. This practice is most common with blockbuster movies in the summer and sometimes winter. Pacific Theatres and AMC Theatres are two of the theater circuits that does interlocking.

Live broadcasting to movie theaters
Sometimes movie theaters provide digital projection of a live broadcast of a performance or other event. For example, there are regular live broadcasts to movie theaters of Metropolitan Opera performanceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_Opera#Met_broadcasts_to_movie_theaters, with additionally limited repeat showings.