Update: Woot again - the Web site is up now, and all of the movies link to Apple's trailer site, even. Schweet.

Woot!

EL RENO -- Executives for the new Reno 8 Cinema hope to foster goodwill with area communities by donating most of grand opening proceeds to education.

The $2.5 million theater opens to the public Friday as Canadian County's first theater to feature stadium seating and digital sound.

[…] The Reno 8 Cinema concept was conceived in early 2004. Landowner Ruth Mittlestaedt was granted a zoning change by the city council in March. That allowed the theater development to proceed on a 20-acre wheat field about a half-mile south of Interstate 40 on Country Club Road. Mittlestaedt said the theater will anchor other planned retail development in the area. She declined to offer details.

Combined capacity of the eight-screen theater is 1,100. The theater will employ about 25 people in mostly part-time positions. Operators anticipate the theater will generate $90,000 in annual sales tax receipts for the city and another $1,500 in annual utility revenue.

Other B&B theaters are located in Claremore, Ponca City and Sapulpa, and throughout Kansas and Missouri.

There was a movie theater in downtown El Reno, where I saw many films as a kid, but it "closed" a few years ago and changed to a county-western music venue, probably because it had a stage in front of the screen. In 1998, the owner (later a city councilman) asked people to pay $5 each to help upgrade the Cinema to digital sound, with one person having a chance at winning lifetime free admission. Enough of us cooperated that he raised enough money to do it, and Mom and I went to the premiere movie with the new sound system, the new and laughable Godzilla.

(I should note at this point that if I go to see a movie, I want the movie experience - a big screen with a sharp picture and big, clear, surround sound. I do not want to pay $8, or even $2, to see a movie with a fuzzy picture, obstructed view, or sound no better than my TV provides. I actually had to watch The Two Towers rather carefully on DVD because the sound in the theater was malfunctioning so badly that neither I nor my aunt (my guest that day) heard half the dialog.)

So in addition to Godzilla being bad, the experience was still bad. The sound was surrounding and loud, but it was so loud it was distorted at times. But worse, though, was that the rest of the Cinema had not been upgraded. The screen still had soda stains on it from the late 1970s, the non-stadium-seat chairs were 20-30 years old and felt like it, and the floor was almost stereotypically sticky.

I think Lewis did a great job with what he had, but what he needed was to gut the place and rebuild it, and he couldn't afford that. When I want to see a movie, I drive to Oklahoma City. That makes a movie at least a 4-hour commitment - 45 mins to one of the good theaters by the time you count both driving and getting through huge parking lots, 2 hours for the movie, an hour to eat (I might as well, as long as I'm in the city), and another 45 mins back home, not counting any other errands or shopping I might do since I'm already in the city.

Combine this with me being not fond of fighting crowds, and having a weird schedule that favors either mid-afternoon or very late movies, and I just don't see many films. This year I've seen HHGG and Revenge of the Sith, and I believe that's it. I saw Ocean's Twelve last holiday season, and before that Return of the King, and before that Spider-Man 2.

I really don't remember seeing any other movies in theaters in the past two years -- oh, yeah, The Incredibles in November. Had to go see that, work and all that, you know. I would have liked to have seen many more, but when it's 5 hours vs. 2 hours, I just can't do it when I have a couple of free hours.

According to Google Maps, this new theater is 1.3 miles away from me, "about 2 mins." I can go to a movie five minutes before showtime and make it if it's not a crowded prime-time premiere. I can go if I have a couple of hours free at 3:30 PM on a weekday afternoon. I can go on Sunday afternoons or Saturday afternoons if the schedule works out - and have stadium seating and digital sound.

I can actually see first-run movies in less than 5 hours.. This makes me a happy panda.