The Gold Class Cinemas

Sorry for the lengthy posting delay. Jazz Fest, as usual, took a lot out of me, and its been a whirlwind since coming back of nonstop scrapbooking, birdwatching, ballroom dance classes and visiting county fairs. Doesn’t leave a lot of time for hilarious observational blog posts like usual. Hopefully I can kick out a few posts in the next month or so. Besides, you should all be spending your time seeing the summer blockbusters. Like Prince of Persia. Or Sex in the City 2.

Good Lord.

Living as I do out there on the cutting edge, I took yet another step into the future recently by seeing a movie at the new Gold Class Cinemas at the Domain. Also known as the next step in the movie industry’s desperate attempt to lure people back to movie theatres. The Domain, of course, is Austin’s rapidly expanding North Dallas materialism enclave (or as I like to call it, “Shallow Island”), so it makes perfect sense that some obnoxious corporation would locate a huge, rapacious, ostentatious theatre here. I'm not sure where else I could enjoy a $9 movie for $30 and eat snacks going anywhere from $9 to $19. A wine list is available, including Cristal, along with a custom “girl drink” menu (a "ginger collins"?) and list of beers. There’s no Milk Duds here, buddy.

Let’s start with the basics. The Gold Class Cinemas is a small chain (about six franchises in hip locations like Redmond, WA and Pasadena, CA) of ultra-luxury movie theatres. A seat costs $30. There’s roughly 30-40 seats, but in a standard size theatre (actually, it has a pretty large screen). You first present yourself at the huge doors, which somewhat resemble the gates to the Emerald City, and check in at the reception area that substitutes for the normal box office window (which hides the teenage ticket seller behind bullet-proof glass in normal theatres). Prospective models wearing black cocktail dresses, seemingly straight out of a museum fundraiser, greet you and help you check in. Gold Class dispenses with the anonymous vulgarity of standing in line for tickets, with tickets normally being sold on line. From there, you’re escorted to some sort of holding pen/departure lounge with spare furniture, Jetson-esque fixtures, dark lighting, and Sprockets music give off that Delta Airlines Cincinnati Airport First Class Lounge vibe. There, a personal attendant clad as some sort of Viet Cong guerilla/Bond villain henchman in black pajamas takes your drink and dinner order. You while away the time before the movie eating $18 lobster rolls and drinking crisp Napa chardonnay.

Roughly 10 minutes before the movie begins, you’re directed to enter the theatre. And what a place it is. The old Alabama Theatre has nothing on this place. Its roughly along the lines of a normal theatre, but without mysterious sticky residue on the seats or floors. As you enter the theatre, you’re offered a blanket and pillow. That’s really nice, and far more luxurious than riding in coach, though its not immediately clear what sort of cleaning regime the place uses. Comfy pumpkin-orange fabric covered La-Z-Boy type seats are arranged two by two, not unlike God’s creatures on the Ark. The front row is reasonably distant from the screen, so no going cross-eyed if you have to sit in the front row. Each seat fully reclines, and has an outside armrest that opens to a storage container, where you can no doubt stow your bags, jackets, deer carcasses, whatever. In between seats lies a very wide armrest that doesn’t move, thereby inhibiting movie theatre making out. So I would guess. On the other hand, that arm rest isn’t nearly wide enough to allow you to go the movie with another guy (at least not and recline in your seats). In front of this middle armrest sits a smallish table for placing your food and drink, the size of which probably dictates the fact that the food is served in tall, narrow cylinder-type bowls, thereby appealing to those who enjoy digging their calamari out of a tube. The table has a lit button, not unlike the flight attendant call button, which when pushed will bring your Bond henchman scrambling to your seat to take your order or otherwise see to your needs. There’s about the usual number of trailers, but none of the witty, clever “movie ads” that really bring me out. You know, like the Coca-Cola trivia slides: “Which of these actresses played Scarlett O’Hara in ‘Gone With the Wind’?-A. Lucille Ball, B. Hattie McDaniel, C. Judy Garland, or D. Vivien Leigh?” Is it “A”? I'm not sure. That one was pretty hard. Hey, the USA Today crossword puzzle thinks the Coke trivia game is embarrassingly easy. The sound system is pretty incredible. We saw Iron Man 2, and when Robert Downey, Jr. flew across the screen (from the suit, not from a cocaine high), the seats vibrated from the fake jet turbo sound.

So is all this worth the price of admission? A regular theatre charges almost $10 in Austin for a movie. Is the extra $20, and the more expensive snacks, worth it? Well, maybe. But not very often. There’s a lot to recommend it. You’re never squashed up next to a sweaty, 300 pound, computer game-playing slacker dude spilling popcorn all over himself. The seats are pretty comfortable, avoiding that bench-like squalor in conventional places. There’s no cell phones ringing away or people having conversations throughout the movie. People don’t even bother to limit their conversations to the movie anymore. Its like watching TV…in someone else’s house while they talk to their sister-in-law. There’s no waiting at the concession stand for toxic snacks at post-hurricane disaster area price gouging levels. It really is analogous to paying to fly first class. Maybe every now and then, like when the flight or movie is really long, or when it’s a really CGI intense movie (imagine The Empire Strikes Back in a place like this), it might be worthwhile. Or if you’re on a first date. But otherwise, that’s a lot of money to pay.

This all begs the question why such places are cropping up in the first place. Like the newspaper, it pains me to say the traditional movie theatre borders on obsolescence. I’ve always loved going to the movies. It’s always been a great getaway. As a kid, it was a chance to see really cool action not duplicated on television. Even now, its fun to go to the movies just to get out. It can be a great date, and for comedies its fun to watch it and laugh along with others. But even as much as I love going to the movies, I kept wanting to hit “pause” so I could go to the restroom, or “rewind” to listen to dialogue I missed. The advent of home theatres with digital screens playing blue-ray or “on demand” movies, with superior sound, and similarly comfy chairs rivals the movie theatre experience. You can stop the movie any time you want, replay it, turn it up or down, adjust the brightness, eat or drink anything you want (feast away on your tostitoes and queso instead of paying $8 for a Nestle’s Crunch), and enjoy it with your friends (whom you can comfortably tell to shut the hell up so you can hear the movie). The quality is nearly as good as at the movie theatre, but you don’t wind up missing some of it while you go to the restroom. No need to hire a babysitter, fight traffic, stand in line, or deal with the annoyances of other human beings either. The theatres are forced to compete with that, and the shrinking gap between theatrical and video release for movies, coupled with the declining cost of video releases, is cutting into theatre profits. The Gold Class clearly is an effort to differentiate from home cinemas. Restaurants aren’t falling out of vogue, nor bars and clubs. You can virtually hear the investors’ pitch to the underwriters, “instead of going to dinner and then the show, why not combine them in one elegant evening out, without driving from place to place?” Its trying to find a niche way to offer something people cannot get on their own. Unfortunately, they’re stuck with the same generally wretched movies one can see at any theatre. It would make more sense if they showed a mix of the mainline, Hollywood movies and art/foreign films, to further differentiate itself from other theatres. As presently constituted, the Gold Class Cinemas is sort of like the deluxe Toyota Corolla with all the options. It may have a lot of bells and whistles, but its still a Toyota.

Next-the Government can't save you. Hoard canned goods, ammo, gatorade and compressors.