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Laurelhurst Theater

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Laurelhurst Theater is a movie theater located in the Kerns neighborhood in northeast Portland , Oregon . Known for showing first and second-run films and for serving food and beer , the theater was constructed in 1923 with an Art Deco design.

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52-670: The theater was built by Walter Tebbetts in 1923. Tebbetts later built the Hollywood Theatre (1926) and the Oriental Theatre (1927). In 1924, The Sunday Oregonian described the $ 30,000 theater as "one of the most up-to-date motion-picture houses in Portland's suburbs." Charles W. Ertz was the building's architect, and G.O. Garrison was the original owner of the theater, which had a $ 15,000 pipe organ and seated an audience of 700 people. The immediate neighborhood at

104-415: A Cinerama theater in 1961, utilizing the ultra-widescreen process until 1963. It was still labelled a "Cinerama theater" until 1969, running exclusively 70-millimeter films . On June 13, 1968, Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey opened, and ran for over 10 months. In 1975, the theater was divided into three auditoriums, and ran second run films throughout the 1980s and 1990s. The theater became

156-589: A "spread") or simply left blank. If a 70 mm film was shown in a Cinerama theatre, the Cinerama sound system was used. From 1976 onwards, many 70 mm prints used Dolby noise reduction on the magnetic tracks but Dolby disapproved of the "spread" and instead re-allocated the 6 available tracks to provide for left, center and right screen channels, left and right surround channels plus a "low-frequency enhancement" channel to give more body to low-frequency bass. This layout came to be known as " 5.1 " (the "point one"

208-444: A 70 mm print, a 1.25× anamorphic projection lens was used to decompress the image to an aspect ratio of 2.76:1, one of the widest ever used in commercial cinema. Due to the high cost of 70 mm film and the expensive projection system and screen required to use the stock, distribution for films using the stock was limited, although this did not always hurt profits. Most 70 mm films were also released on 35 mm film for

260-439: A 70 mm projector added polarization and merged the two images on the screen. The 1971 re-release of Warner Bros. ' House of Wax used the side-by-side StereoVision format and was distributed in both anamorphically squeezed 35 mm and deluxe non-anamorphic 70 mm form. The system was developed by Allan Silliphant and Chris Condon of StereoVision International Inc., which handled all technical and marketing aspects on

312-523: A copycat process known as Dimension 150) were shown in some Cinerama cinemas, which allowed for deeply curved screens. Todd-AO adopted a similar multi-channel magnetic sound system to the one developed for Cinemascope two years earlier, recorded on "stripes" of magnetic oxide deposited on the film. However Todd-AO has six channels instead of the four of Cinemascope and due to the wider stripes and faster film speed provides superior audio quality. Five of these six channels are fed to five speakers spaced behind

364-458: A far lower cost. Coupled with the rise of the multiplex cinema, which meant that audiences were increasingly seeing films on relatively small screens rather than the giant screens of the old "Picture Palaces", this meant that the expensive 70 mm format went out of favour again. The DTS digital sound-on-disc system was adapted for use with 70 mm film, thus saving the significant costs of magnetic striping, but this has not been enough to stop

416-475: A fire that destroyed a nearby plywood sales plant. Burglars caused more than $ 1,300 in damage to the Laurelhurst in 1967, when they tried and failed to gain access to the main contents of the theatre's safe by using explosives. Hollywood Theatre (Portland, Oregon) The Hollywood Theatre is a historic movie theater in northeast Portland, Oregon built in 1926. It is a central historical landmark of

468-433: A five-year special-royalty basis with Warner Bros. The big screen 3D image was both bright and clear, with all the former sync and brightness problems of traditional dual 35 mm 3D eliminated. Still, it took many years more before IMAX began to test the water for big-screen 3D, and sold the concept to Hollywood executives. Hollywood has released films shot on 35 mm as IMAX blow-up versions. Many 3D films were shown in

520-405: A handful of films (such as Spider-Man 2 ) have used 65mm for this purpose, but the usage of digital intermediate for compositing has largely negated these issues. Digital intermediate offers other benefits such as lower cost and a greater range of available lenses and accessories to ensure a consistent look to the footage. A horizontal variant of 70 mm, with an even bigger picture area,

572-425: A non-profit organization in 1997. Starting in 2011, major renovations were done, including new seats, screens, sound systems and an updated paint job. In 2013, a Kickstarter campaign raised the funds necessary to erect a new marquee, and in 2015, 70-millimeter capability was re-installed, making it the sole remaining theater in the state to have it. The Hollywood Theatre currently screens first run films; along with

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624-589: A system of his own which, he hoped, would be as impressive as Cinerama, yet be simpler and cheaper and avoid the problems associated with three-strip projection; in his own words, he wanted "Cinerama out of one hole". In collaboration with the American Optical Company , Todd developed a system which was to be called " Todd-AO ". This uses a single 70 mm wide film and was introduced with the film Oklahoma! in October 1955. The 70 mm film

676-563: A wide range of both well known and obscure classic cinema, offbeat exploitation, educational, independent and experimental films; with a focus of screening repertory films on 35-millimeter and 70-millimeter. The theater also has hosted many special guests since 2015, including Quentin Tarantino , Pam Grier , Michael Ironside , Piper Laurie and Joe Dante . The main auditorium has a 50-foot screen and 384 seats, while two smaller auditoriums are located upstairs, each seating 111. The theater

728-431: A wider distribution after the initial debut of the film. South Pacific (1958), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), My Fair Lady (1964), and The Sound of Music (1965) are well-known films widely shown in 70 mm format with a general release in 35 mm format. 70 mm film received a brief resurgence in the 1980s when it became popular to make "blow-up" prints of 35 mm titles. It had another resurgence in

780-463: Is perforated at the same pitch (0.187 inch, 4.75 mm) as standard 35 mm film. With a five-perforation pull-down, the Todd-AO system provides a frame dimension of 1.912 inch (48.56 mm) by 0.87 inch (22.09 mm) giving an aspect ratio of 2.2:1. The original version of Todd-AO used a frame rate of 30 per second, 25% faster than the 24 frames per second that was (and is) the standard; this

832-600: Is self-owned and operated by a non-profit organization of the same name. Its mission is to preserve and maintain the historic theater and use it to present a diverse program of films. In December 2015, Hollywood Theatre announced plans to open an annex theater in Portland International Airport . The theater will seat 18 with standing room for 10 to 20 people and also have space for live performances. The theatre will show short films no longer than 20 minutes and be free of charge. In mid-February 2017, it

884-542: Is the low-frequency enhancement channel) and was subsequently adopted for digital sound systems used with 35 mm. In the 1980s the use of these "blow-ups" increased with large numbers of 70 mm prints being made of some blockbusters of the period such as the 125 70 mm prints made of The Empire Strikes Back (1980). However the early 1990s saw the advent of digital sound systems ( Dolby Digital , DTS and SDDS ) for 35 mm prints which meant that 35 mm could finally match 70 mm for sound quality but at

936-459: Is used for the high-performance IMAX format which uses a frame that is 15 perforations wide on 70 mm film. The Dynavision and Astrovision systems each use slightly less film per frame and vertical pulldown to save print costs while being able to project onto an IMAX screen. Both were rare, with Astrovision largely used in Japanese planetariums . IMAX introduced a digital projection system in

988-604: The Hollywood District , which is named after the theatre itself. The theatre is located at 4122 NE Sandy Blvd , and is operated by a non-profit organization. The Hollywood Theatre was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983 and is considered to be a gem of Northeast Portland's historic culture and tradition. It is the only theater in Oregon showing movies in 70mm film . Commissioned by

1040-464: The MGM Camera 65 system they helped develop for MGM that was used to film Raintree County and Ben-Hur . Both Ultra Panavision 70 and MGM Camera 65 employed an anamorphic lens with a 1.25x squeeze on a 65 mm negative (as opposed to 35 mm CinemaScope which used a 2× compression, or 8-perf, horizontally filmed 35 mm Technirama which used a 1.5× compression). When projected on

1092-900: The Museum of the Moving Image in New York City, the TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto, the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts, and others. For home theater, VHS and DVD did not offer enough resolution to carry the full image quality captured by 70 mm film, and VHS and DVD video transfers were usually prepared from 35 mm reduction elements. The high-definition Blu-ray format, in contrast, can potentially reveal

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1144-524: The 1959 film Ben-Hur and the 2015 film The Hateful Eight , both of which were filmed with the Ultra Panavision 70/MGM Camera 65 process at an aspect ratio of 2.76:1. It required the use of a 1.25x anamorphic lens to horizontally compress the image, and a corresponding lens on the projector to uncompress it. Limited use of 65 mm film was revived in the late 1970s for some of the visual effects sequences in films like Close Encounters of

1196-915: The 70 mm IMAX format. The Polar Express in IMAX 3D 70 mm earned 14 times as much, per screen, as the simultaneous 2D 35 mm release of that film in the fall of 2004. Same as Standard 65 mm except Same as Standard 65 mm except Same as IMAX except same as standard 65/70 except: Omnivision started in Sarasota, Florida . Theatres were designed to compete with Omnimax but with much lower startup and operating costs. Most theatres were built in fabric domed structures designed by Seaman Corporation. The last known OmniVision theatres to exist in USA are The Alaska Experience Theatre in Anchorage, Alaska , built in 1981 (closed in 2007, reopened in 2008), and

1248-474: The Buckman–;Albina district in the annual Junior Portland Rose Festival . In November 1942, the theater sponsored a "victory party" for marathon swimmers from northeast Portland. In 1947, an armed robber entered the Laurelhurst lobby during a late-evening show and forced the theater manager and another employee to give him $ 150. Ten minutes later and a few blocks from the Laurelhurst, police wounded

1300-585: The Christopher Nolan films The Dark Knight (featured 28 minutes of IMAX footage), Inception , The Dark Knight Rises (over an hour in IMAX) and Interstellar . Since the 2010s, most movie theaters have converted to digital projection systems, resulting in the removal of both 35 mm (the previous industry standard) projectors and 70 mm projectors. However some venues and organizations remain committed to screening 70 mm film, seeing

1352-465: The Third Kind , mainly because the larger negative did a better job than 35 mm negative of minimizing visible film grain during optical compositing . 65 mm was the primary film format used at VFX pioneer Douglas Trumbull 's facility EEG (Entertainment Effects Group), which later became Boss Film Studios , run by former Industrial Light & Magic alum Richard Edlund . Since the 1990s,

1404-459: The decline, and 70 mm prints were rarely made. Among some of the more recent 70 mm blow-up titles are Paul Thomas Anderson 's Inherent Vice (2014) and Phantom Thread (2017), Patty Jenkins 's Wonder Woman (2017), and Steven Spielberg 's Ready Player One (2018). In the late 20th century, the usage of 65 mm negative film drastically reduced, in part due to the high cost of 65 mm raw stock and processing. Some of

1456-709: The entirely distinct " Cinerama " format), started in 1900 by Raoul Grimoin-Sanson . In 1914 the Italian Filoteo Alberini invented a panoramic film system utilising a 70 mm wide film called Panoramica. In 1928, William Fox of the Fox Film Corporation , in personal partnership with Theodore Case as the Fox-Case Corporation, began working on a wide film format using 70 mm film which they named Grandeur . Cameras were ordered by Fox-Case from Mitchell Camera Corp, with

1508-402: The few films since 1990 shot entirely on 65 mm stock are Kenneth Branagh 's Hamlet (1996), Ron Fricke 's Baraka (1992) and its sequel, Samsara (2011), Paul Thomas Anderson 's The Master (2012), Quentin Tarantino 's The Hateful Eight (2015), Christopher Nolan 's Dunkirk (2017) (almost 80 minutes, about 75% of the film was shot on 65 mm IMAX film, while the rest

1560-721: The first 70 mm production cameras, designated as the Mitchell Model FC camera, delivered to Fox-Case in May 1929. This was one of a number of wide-film processes developed by some of the major film studios at about that time. However, due to the financial strains of the Great Depression, along with strong resistance from movie theater owners, who were in the process of equipping their theaters for sound, none of these systems became commercially successful. Fox dropped Grandeur in 1930. Producer Mike Todd had been one of

1612-468: The first cattle drive and the fearless girl who showed the way." The original theater had a single screen. Periodic renovations included one advertised in 1938 that promised "ultramodern appointments and surroundings ... sparkling and completely new". In 1949, the Laurelhurst closed briefly for another remodeling, and in 1953 management replaced the theater screen with an "ultra-wide curved screen." Eventual expansion to four viewing rooms with separate screens

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1664-399: The following categories: "Best Place to See a Film" (2004), "Best Movie Theater (Local)" (2006), "Best Locally Owned Movie Theater" (2007), and "Best Cheap Date" (2009). In its early years, the theater was sometimes the scene of social events other than film-viewing. In May 1938, for example, ceremonies at the Laurelhurst honored two children selected to be "prince" and "princess" representing

1716-420: The founders of Cinerama , a wide-screen movie process that was launched in 1952. Cinerama employed three 35 mm film projectors running in synchronism to project a wide (2.6:1) image onto a deeply curved screen. Although the results were impressive, the system was expensive, cumbersome and had some serious shortcomings due to the need to match up three separate projected images. Todd left the company to develop

1768-407: The height of its popularity most major markets and cities had a theater that could screen it. Some venues continue to screen 70 mm to this day or have even had 70 mm projectors permanently or temporarily installed for more recent 70 mm releases. Films formatted with a width of 70 mm have existed since the early days of the motion picture industry. The first 70 mm format film

1820-406: The history of filmmaking; surpassed only by Polyvision , which was only used for 1927's Napoléon . With regard to exhibition, 70 mm film was always considered a specialty format reserved for epics and spectacle films shot on 65 mm and blockbuster films that were released both in 35 mm and as 70 mm blow-ups. While few venues were equipped to screen this special format, at

1872-473: The late 2000s and most IMAX venues have migrated to a digital setup. The first commercial introduction of 70 mm single projector 3D was the 1967 release of Con la muerte a la espalda , a Spanish/French/Italian co-production which used a process called Hi-Fi Stereo 70, itself based on a simplified, earlier developed soviet process called Stereo-70. This process captured two anamorphic images, one for each eye, side by side on 65 mm film. A special lens on

1924-623: The mid-2010s with the release of The Master (2012), The Hateful Eight (2015) and Dunkirk (2017), with a small number of venues getting temporary or permanent 70 mm film projectors in order to be able to screen these titles. Quentin Tarantino , in particular, led a successful campaign to have the equipment required to show The Hateful Eight in Ultra Panavision installed in 100 cinemas worldwide. The 35 mm to 70 mm "blow-up" process produces 70 mm release prints from 35 mm negatives, so that films shot on

1976-480: The mid-70s (before the advent of Dolby A ) were screening 35 mm prints with single channel monaural sound. However these "blow-ups" rarely used the full six channels of the Todd-AO system and instead used the four-track mixes made for 35 mm prints, the additional half-left and half-right speakers of the Todd-AO layout being fed with a simple mix of the signals intended for the adjacent speakers (known as

2028-440: The quality advantage of 70 mm productions. Although telecine machines for 70 mm scanning are uncommon, high-resolution transfers from high-quality full-gauge elements can reveal impressive technical quality. An anamorphic squeeze combined with 65 mm film allowed for extremely wide aspect ratios to be used while still preserving quality. This was used in the 1957 film Raintree County and to incredible success in

2080-423: The robber during an armed confrontation. Found guilty by a jury later that year, the robber was sentenced to 15 years in the state penitentiary. Six years later, a robber snatched a money sack with $ 100 from Walter E. Tebbetts as he walked from the theater to a bank. Two witnesses chased and caught the robber, who later confessed to the crime. In 1958, the theater suffered unspecified damage from smoke and water during

2132-418: The screen, and the sixth is fed to surround speakers around the walls of the auditorium. Panavision developed their own 65/70 mm system that was technically compatible and virtually identical to Todd-AO. Monikered as Super Panavision 70 , it used spherical lenses and the same 2.2:1 aspect ratio at 24 frames per second. Panavision also had another 65 mm system, Ultra Panavision 70 , which sprang from

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2184-459: The smaller format could benefit from 70 mm image and sound quality. This process began in the 1960s with titles like The Cardinal (1963) and continues up until the present day, with the height of its popularity being in the 1980s. These enlargements often provided richer colors, and a brighter, steadier and sharper (though often grainier) image, but the main benefit was the ability to provide 6-channel stereophonic sound as most theaters before

2236-674: The special format as something that can set them apart and be an audience draw in an industry where most movies are screened digitally. 70 mm film festivals continue to take place regularly at venues such as The Somerville Theatre in Somerville, Massachusetts, The Music Box Theatre in Chicago, the Hollywood Theatre in Portland, Oregon, the American Cinematheque 's Aero and Egyptian Theaters in Los Angeles,

2288-455: The standard 35 mm motion picture film format . As used in cameras, the film is 65 mm (2.6 in) wide. For projection, the original 65 mm film is printed on 70 mm (2.8 in) film. The additional 5 mm contains the four magnetic stripes , holding six tracks of stereophonic sound. Although later 70 mm prints use digital sound encoding (specifically the DTS format),

2340-635: The theatre chain Jensen and Herberg as a companion to the Liberty Theater in Astoria, Oregon , architects Bennes and Herzog designed the building in multiple styles including Spanish Colonial Revival (exterior) and after the Baths of Caracalla and Bernini (interior). The theater opened on Saturday, July 17, 1926, with 1,491 seats, as a venue for vaudeville and silent movies. The venue became

2392-562: The time included the central eastside trolley car barns of the Portland Railway, Light and Power Company and Kerns Public School, and the restricted residential neighborhood of Laurelhurst was nearby. The Sunday Oregonian published brief plot summaries for films scheduled to appear at the Laurelhurst. On March 15, 1925, the summaries for the week described Manhandled , starring Gloria Swanson ; Monsieur Beaucaire , starring Rudolph Valentino , and North of 36 , "the story of

2444-422: The vast majority of existing and surviving 70 mm prints pre-date this technology. Each frame is five perforations tall (i.e., 23.8125 mm or 15/16 inches tall), with an image aspect ratio of 2.2:1. The use of anamorphic Ultra Panavision 70 lenses squeezes an ultra-wide 2.76:1 aspect ratio horizontally into that 2.2:1 imaging area. To this day, Ultra Panavision 70 produces the widest picture size in

2496-575: Was changed after the second film – Around the World in 80 Days - because of the need to produce (24 frame/sec) 35 mm reduction prints from the Todd-AO 65 mm negative. The Todd-AO format was originally intended to use a deeply curved Cinerama-type screen but this failed to survive beyond the first few films. However, in the 1960s and 70s, such films as The Sound of Music (which had been filmed in Todd-AO) and Patton (which had been filmed in

2548-611: Was most likely footage of the Henley Regatta , which was projected in 1896 and 1897, but may have been filmed as early as 1894. It required a specially built projector built by Herman Casler in Canastota, New York and had a ratio similar to full frame, with an aperture of 2.75 inches (70 mm) by 2 inches (51 mm). There were also several film formats of various sizes from 50 to 68 mm which were developed from 1884 onwards, including Cinéorama (not to be confused with

2600-550: Was not enough to compete successfully with the new multiplex theaters built elsewhere in Portland in the 1980s. Childhood friends Woody Wheeler and Prescott Allen purchased and renovated the theater again in 2000. In the early 21st century, Laurelhurst Theater screens second-run films. It has a theme each month and a new feature film every week. Unlike typical first-run theaters, Laurelhurst serves food such as pizza, wraps, and salads, and local microbrewed beer. Willamette Week readers ranked Laurelhurst Theater first place in

2652-487: Was reported that the airport "microcinema" would open on February 23 and have seating for 17 people. In 2017, the Hollywood Theatre purchased the iconic Portland video store Movie Madness, and its collection of over 90,000 movies. 70 mm film 70 mm film (or 65 mm film ) is a wide high-resolution film gauge for motion picture photography, with a negative area nearly 3.5 times as large as

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2704-577: Was shot on regular 65mm film), Kenneth Branagh 's Murder on the Orient Express (2017), Tenet (2020), Oppenheimer (2023), and The Brutalist (2024). Other films used 65 mm cameras sparingly, for selected scenes or special effects. Films with limited 65 mm footage include Terrence Malick 's The New World (2005), the Patty Jenkins film Wonder Woman 1984 (2020), Cary Joji Fukunaga 's No Time to Die (2021) and

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