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Author Topic: AMC Buys Carmike Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 11-16-2016 05:59 PM                        quote: Martin McCaffery I'm sure they still have plenty of those 30+ year old crappy theatres doing business in small towns without competition. Or else they do like they've been doing in Billings, which is use a building until its lease runs out, then abandon it and build a newer building and start the process again. Currently in Billings there are 16 screens worth of abandoned Carmike theater buildings. One of them (a 7-plex) has been revived once as a discount house, but failed. Another (a twin) has been sitting there doing nothing since the late '90s, despite being right next to the city's largest mall. I assume these buildings have continued to gather dust because they have concrete sloped floors and can't really be used for anything else...or else the owners have pie-in-the-sky price ambitions, what with Billings being a growing city and all. I'm sure Bobby is right about an L.A. writer thinking of a town like Billings as rural. It's the biggest city in Montana, but even in the dead-center of town you can drive maybe 20 minutes and you'll be in the middle of the relatively uncivilized countryside.  |  IP: Logged Martin McCaffery Film God Posts: 2481 From: Montgomery, AL Registered: Jun 99 posted 11-16-2016 06:25 PM                        quote: Mike Blakesley Or else they do like they've been doing in Billings, which is use a building until its lease runs out, then abandon it and build a newer building and start the process again. Yup, they did that here, too. There are two abandoned theaters, a 10 and an 8 and an 8 that just got reopened by the Evans chain as a 3. There were many other abandoned theaters, but they've been torn down or converted. They run them down and toss them out. One of my ex-projectionist was doing some pickup work at a Carmike building up shows. He got fired because he cleaned one of the machines.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 11-16-2016 10:27 PM                     Here in Lawton Carmike kept the old 8-plex around that they opened in 1994. It's now a bargain theater with the new 13-plex nearby. The old Video Triple they operated until the late 1990's was converted into a hardware supply store. The Showcase Twin where I first watched The Empire Strikes Back was converted into a Blockbuster Video store. Then it was demolished when Blockbuster folded. Now there's a different small strip shopping center in that space. It's generally easier to convert a small theater into another type of retail space. A big multiplex building can't really be converted into anything else. It just has to be demolished. And even then the property may not get re-used. Our old Cache 8 multiplex was torn down years ago. Those open acres of property, the crumbling parking lot and even the old sign are just sitting there. It's kind of a lousy location. There's a freeway style "Y" intersection there, so traffic can only access that site going Eastbound. Maybe the city can turn that land into a park or something.  |  IP: Logged Michael Riley Film Handler Posts: 52 From: New Jersey Registered: Apr 2010 posted 11-17-2016 08:13 PM                  So what happens to all the theaters that the Justice Department doesn't let them buy for anti-trust reasons? Regal more likely than not won't want them, especially if they're older theaters in smaller markets. Maybe some of them will get picked up by regional chains or independent buyers, but most will probably close. I know of one theater here that has had at least 3 or 4 different owners in as many years since Showcase Cinemas exited the market.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 11-17-2016 09:01 PM                     As far as I can tell every one of the screens Carmike currently has in operation will go to AMC. With no questions asked. Maybe the DOJ would pay a slight amount of lip service to anti-trust concerns if some movie-going markets in major cities were getting monopolized through this deal. Since the monopolizing is mainly happening in smaller city markets like mine the DOJ probably shrugs and says, "who cares?"  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 11-18-2016 05:20 PM                        Uh....what the duck, may I ask, is the "Guest Experience?" A guest is someone who DOESN'T PAY. You have a guest over, you don't charge them for their room and especially for way over-priced junk FOOD. You don't offer them a hotdog (what Bobby rightfully calls a turd) and charge them $10 for it and think they should be happy that you're giving them free mustard! "Guest Experience" my hairy ass. Just another example of twisting words to sound like something other than what they really mean. Marketing BS, or in honest language, you know....LYING. The LIEMAX Experience....the AMC Guest Experience....same bullshit.  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 11-18-2016 05:26 PM                     quote: Martin McCaffery Let's see if they infect AMC. Not sure that's a viable comparison Martin. They are both already infected really bad, so its more like which is gonna infect the other so the infection evens itself out. Also, Dumb buys Dumber comes to mind. Both are just downright awful. Mark  |  IP: Logged Frank Cox Film God Posts: 2234 From: Melville Saskatchewan Canada Registered: Apr 2011 posted 11-18-2016 07:38 PM                        Hotels and restaurants have been calling their customers Guests forever.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 11-19-2016 02:44 AM                        Yah...and it's just as idiotic when they do it.  |  IP: Logged Manny Montes Master Film Handler Posts: 270 From: United States Registered: Feb 2010 posted 11-30-2016 01:17 AM                     Not necessarily, a guest is defined as "a person who patronizes a hotel, restaurant, etc., for the lodging, food, or entertainment it provides" Anyone in the hospitality industry knows that hotels always call them "guests" and not customers, heck pretty much everyone except retail calls them "guests" now. It has nothing to do with if they're a paying customer or a comp, but rather the level of service you are expected to provide to them.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 11-30-2016 03:14 PM                        Yeah, "guest" is one of those words that has multiple meanings. If you look it up it'll have like 5 definitions. It's just word evolution -- like, "movie" hasn't necessarily meant a roll of film for several decades now.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 11-30-2016 06:31 PM                     "Movie" is an acceptable term. "Film" is not acceptable at all. Not unless it is shot on fim, post-produced on film and projected on film. Those who don't like my stand on this can please be happy I'm not calling the content played in theaters now "videos" or "TV shows."  |  IP: Logged Eric Hooper Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 532 From: Fort Worth, TX, USA Registered: May 2003 posted 12-01-2016 10:32 AM                     It always cracks me up on NFL football games how they still say they'll "review the film" or "review the tape"...  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-01-2016 12:29 PM                        What would be a good alternative though? Saying "let's check the digital video" doesn't roll off the tongue as well as "let's check the film." And saying "let's check the video" makes it sound too amateurish....I mean, "EVERYBODY" has video cameras now, right?  |  IP: Logged Mitchell Dvoskin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1869 From: West Milford, NJ, USA Registered: Jan 2001 posted 12-01-2016 02:20 PM                     I'm still looking for the "dial" on my cell phone so I can make calls...  |  IP: Logged

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