Plaza Cinema Cafe Opens Downtown

Went to the grand opening of the Plaza Cinema Cafe Friday after work. The Plaza Cinema Cafe is the long awaited movie theatre that has opened on Orange Avenue. I walked over after work to see an early showing of Star Trek. Cost was only $4.75 for admission. There was plenty of beautiful signage outside but nothing to tell you how to get to the box office. It's on the second floor up the escalator. I took an educated guess, and headed up.

By the way, parking is $10 (valet) with lots of attendants. There wasn't anything to indicate if the theatre was validating, but there was a number of ATM machines to use for paying parking located right outside the box office so I'll assume your out 10 bucks if you don't live or work in the downtown area.

The lobby is confusing, and small with lots of ropes when you get in, and I was a bit taken back trying to figure out where to present my ticket. You go either left or right depending on what theatre your movie is playing, and you show your tickets before heading down the hallway. I thought the theatre was playing up its bar and enhanced food, but the front is layed out like a typical concession stand with candy and popcorn. There is a menu with things like pizza, salads, subs, shrimp, chicken strips, and nachos. All are reasonably priced, but out of sight from the typical popcorn and candy.

Inside the nicely appointed theatres, there are large leather rocking chairs layed out in typical stadium fashion. Between each seat is a very small cocktail table just big enough for a drink and one other item. There is a good deal of room between you and the row in front, so if some late asshole arrives after the movie starts, you shouldn't have to stand up or end up with food on your lap. The chairs reminded me of 1st class airline seats that rocked. The theatre I attended featured digital projection and a kick ass sound system. They need to adjust the sound levels because they were set one notch below bleeding ear drums. They don't play anything while you wait, no music or advertisements. I'm sure that will change.

The only mishap we encountered, was the movie started and played without the projector on through the first preview, before someone from the theater got up and ran outside to tell them. They stopped the show, and restarted it a minute later and all was good. The theatres have these annoying flourescents side lamps, that don't like to be dimmed, so they occasionally blink on and off during the show.

All in all a great experience, but I can't tell if the movie lineup of classic films from way gone past is just a grand opening thing, or if the theatre will be showing first run movies at all. Advertising and marketing doesn't seem like this chain's expertise. They need to step it up a bit, if they are ever going to survive downtown. Everyone I've told about my trip to the Plaza Cinema Cafe give me that quizzical look, and then tell me they've never heard about it. Of course, they don't live downtown.

Oh, and one more tip. When you go down the long hallway to the movie theatres on each side, if you keep going down to the end, you'll find a cute little wine bar overlooking Orange Avenue. Had I known it was there, I might have arrived early for the film, and enjoyed a nice glass of wine or two before heading inside the the theatre. I was surprised that nobody told us this when they took our ticket. Stupid is what stupid does.