E Street Cinema

Here is a photo of the E Street Cinema.

This is a 2007 photo of the E Street Cinema.

One of the travel books in the bookstores states auditorium seating sizes ranges from 96 to 260 seats.

From prior listings, I believe have at least two auditoriums equipped for digital projection. Whether or not they are of the new Sony 4K variety is not known. I've had the privilege of attending many free screenings here as a part of their E Movie Club. The screens, seats and auditorium sizes are decent enough and expectations aren't really that high given the type of programming they have here. You aren't going to see Lawrence of Arabia or 2001 here in 70mm. My only complaint with the place is the fact that the restrooms are far away from the auditoriums to where you enter the downstairs entrance.

For the Animated shorts showcase in February - Peter and the Wolf (the Best Animated short winner) looked utterly amazing - the digital projection image looked 3D, to the point where I literally wanted to reach in and touch the characters.

For the record, their digital system is on Screen 1.

Giles, do you know if their DP system in 1 is the often rumored Sony 4K system? Judging by your comments, I imagine so.

I think it is, I've never asked, but I assume it is, since Landmark and Sony did work out a deal to install Sony 4K systems to select Landmark theatres. 'Bubble' looked great in DP when it played awhile back. I don't know if you know this, but one Sony 4K system is at the National Geographic auditorium - I've seen film there but not a DP feature - I missed it, but I assume Sony/Columbia might have given the Geo a harddisc drive of 'Night at the Museum' for the DC sneak peak.

For this year's Oscar Nominated (Live Action/Animation) Showcase, they moved it from auditorium #1 to #3. For once it's properly framed, since the DP system was off to the side and created a slight off centre image on auditorium #1 (oddly this wasn't a problem when they presented 'Bubble'). While the screen is not as large as #1, the image is still great. I know that movies tend to rotate alot from screen to screen at E Street, but it would be great to see an actual full length movie in digital projection (for awhile E. Street was getting some pretty shoddy looking 35mm prints. 'There Will Be Blood' was a disaster, in that one of the reel changes was flipped upside down AND going backwards) 'Che' would have been ideal to see since it was actually shot with 4K cameras.

and for the record the stadium seating auditoriums are not 7 and 8, but 1 and 4

My friend and I caught a midnight screening of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. As it turned out, the movie shown was actually an extended edition print where a similar version aired on the ABC network way back in 1981. This print was not bad for its age, which I'm presuming dates back to 1981 given when the extended cut was actually made. The only difference is that an alternate take of McCoy counselling Kirk about his fitness at command and Kirk being fitted with a EV suit were NOT in this presentation.

The film sound levels could have been increased a great deal to compensate for some of the surround drop outs. The extended version, with its 'new' cuts were noticeably lacking in at least the original cuts surrounds and ambient sounds, which made the sound flat.

It was interesting to note the audience attendance as that I thought there would be more 'mature' or seasoned viewers in attendance. It looked more like a geekdom private showing with the prevalence of the 25, or so in the audience, twentysomethings. And they were quite well behaved in that there were no snickers or cat calls during some scenes that I've noticed in past viewings. I'd also say there were a few viewers who were seeing this movie for the first time given their reaction to some of the scenes.

Overall, the experience was quite good given the age of this movie, almost 30 years, and the fact that the last time I've seen it in the DC area was way back in 1991. I hope Paramount strikes a new print of this movie, if not the Director's Edition.

I forgot to mention the auditorium we saw it in was #6, which seems like one of the smallest of the auditoriums but with still fairly large screen. I'm guessing at least 30ft.

In regard to Giles comment above, Landmark's web page for this cinema states (as I included in the Intro):
Eight auditoriums, seven of which feature stadium seating and wall-to-wall screens