As the community is well aware of, Malibu’s only theater—Malibu Cinemas—closed its doors on Sunday, Sept. 10. The Malibu Times first reported on the theater’s closing in January.
Malibu Cinemas, located in the Malibu Village shopping center, had a 25-year run before its lease ended at the end of 2016. Since then, the two-screen theater had been on a month-to-month lease until its closing early this month.
Jamestown Property Management, the management company behind Malibu Village, put out feelers to get another theater chain in Regal’s place to no avail. With such a small space, today’s popular multiplex and megaplex theaters would not be able to take root.
Jamestown had offered Regal a 75 percent reduction in rent this year, as reported in “Malibu Cinemas will close for good Sunday,” originally published in the newspaper on Sept. 7.
After posting the article on social media, The Malibu Times received an outpour of comments ranging from despair at the closing to nostalgia at past memories.
To give some context, the Facebook post with the Sept. 7 article received 81 comments and 61 shares; it was able to reach over 12,000 people. Meanwhile, the Twitter post received over 1,000 impressions.
Some, like Facebook user Mark Olsen, blamed the management.
“It’s all a mess and horrible management. Down at Trancas [Country Market] all we have left is Kristy’s [Village Café], which is horrible! The theater was a similar problem,” Olsen commented. “You have a movie theater which should be a great place for kids/teens on Friday and Saturday night. This weekend, for example, you should be playing ‘It’ and ‘Logan Lucky’ but instead you’re playing ‘Ingrid goes West’ and ‘Wind River.’ Both R rated films that can’t bring in the teen crowds. Instead they will go hang around in front of Ralph’s or Pavilions because there is no better alternative.”
Bruce Resnikoff commented on the excessive prices for the movie and refreshments, citing it as one of the reasons for less turnout. On a similar note, Barbara Geisler said the theater should have let patrons bring their Starbucks drinks (the chain coffee store is located near the closed theater) inside or partnered with local restaurants for a dinner and movie deal to attract Malibuites.
Geisler also brought up the wealthier citizens of Malibu; Velvet Novak said, “All the movie stars and money in Malibu and no one can help keep it open?!”
Owen O’Herlihy predicted that “Malibu is just going to end up with no real community. Just empty McMansions on the beach…”
“[It’s] impossible to comprehend that Malibu could be without a movie theater…Up to Agoura Hills and Westlake Village…they have plenty!” Facebook user Jude Lyons commented.
Others brought up movies’ inevitable future, given the rise of Netflix and other streaming giants.
“No surprise given going to the movies is inconvenient, expensive and limited. But sad nonetheless,” Alex Quilici commented. Olsen responded with this:
“Unfortunate, but I’ll agree it isn’t so much greed as a dying venue. That said I’ll admit that we rarely go to the theater any longer, and when we do it is generally a larger theater as the selection here in town is usually just two drama genre films. We love dramas but we go to the theater more for the visuals and audio that is beyond our home system capabilities.”
A sense of nostalgia for the community feeling that the theater brought with it permeated the comment section.
Lisajo McGee started a chain of messages regarding the first movie people had seen at Malibu Cinemas; for McGee, it was Tom Lauglin’s “Billy Jack.” Brian K. Lee tagged friend Paul Evangelista—their first Malibu Cinemas film was “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle.” Will Wood commented on the thread with “Star Wars,” a theater, he said, was packed with kids at the time.
McGee and others recall a Malibu tradition of pizza for dinner followed by a trip to the movies.
Francine Ostrow remembers her candy being confiscated—an intergenerational fear—by movie theater staff. Another commenter remembers watching whatever their uncle had picked for them.
All in all, Malibuites lamented the loss of their “quaint” movie theater by tagging friends they used to attend screenings with, commenting with memories or simple “no!”’s and a serious amount of crying emojis.
Steve Donna Blinn commented: “Malibu seems to be losing what made it a family town. All our mom and pop stores have disappeared.”
