AMC Metreon 16
101 4th Street,
San Francisco,
CA
94103
101 4th Street,
San Francisco,
CA
94103
9 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 41 comments
SFGate article on a 6am showing at the Metreon Imax of Dune Part 2 on March 4, 2024.
SFGate
This theatre was opened on June 16, 1999, by Sony Theatres. Its opening movies include Star Wars: Episode 1-The Phantom Menace (on two screens), Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (on four screens), Notting Hill (on three screens), Instinct, Election, Birdman of Alcatraz, Vertigo, Bullitt, The Matrix, Everest in IMAX, and Into the Deep in IMAX 3D.
ridethectrain….I wouldn’t go into a movie theater right now whether they were selling refreshments or not and believe me, one of the joys of a recently retired (about 1 year ago) lifestyle was going to at least one film a week at various SF theaters. SF is in the least restrictive category for California’s counties however the mayor seems to have listened to her Dept of Public Health head from the get go last January and imposed even stricter restrictions across the board than the state’s standards. That and recent news reports of almost universal mask wearing (appx 95%) has kept the level of infections and deaths at one of the lowest per capita for a large city in the US. Apparently because of Halloween/parties and people letting their guard down SF’s positive percentage rate has tripled in the last month so would not be surprised if theaters (and other businesses) were ordered to close completely again or be further restricted if this trend continues (very limited indoor restaurant dining was curtailed just this past week). Stay safe.
Won’t attend movie theaters that don’t sell refreshments
Added to above: “RESTRICTED For indoor movie theater complexes with multiple individual theaters, the capacity limit for the entire complex is 25%, and the limit for each individual theater or auditorium is 50 people.”
Posted at SF.gov, the latest requirements for SF indoor movie theaters:
SF Movie Theater Reopenings
The plan was to allow 50% capacity by mid November but due to an increase in covid infections in the city that plan has been rolled back to 25% along with the other requirements.
October 30, according to this article.
Please update, 1727 seats (reduced due to AMC Signature Recliners in all auditoriums except IMAX)
Dolby Vision Cinema®In auditorium Lucky #13 is about to have their nice red lights turned off for good. These red lights are on the side walls and over the Dolby Atmos® ceiling speakers. They are on when you come into the cinema space. Seems AMC is turning them off soon in a few weeks and just have a blue strip light down the side cove section when you come inside Dolby Cinema® #13. Bad move on AMC’s part. At least they could have kept the red LED lights on when you came in, then switched to blue for the trailers and then shut them off for the main feature. What a waste even putting them in when they are about not to use them at all. Complain when you pay over $20 plus a fee $$$ to see Dolby Cinema® here that you miss the red!!! To my shock on a visit to see the scope movie ‘Bigger’ today in a rather small curved screen in space #2 for the first time in many months they had the motor black masking working again. I did not have to see white screen at the top and bottom. Maybe someone at AMC saw my complaints? Thank you AMC for bringing the proper masking back.
This opened on June 16th, 1999. Grand opening ad in the photo section. It was in the Sony Entertainment center, which was to be built worldwide. Only the ones in San Francisco, Berlin and Tokyo were opened.
Probably safe to call this straight up AMC Metreon… all Loews signage has finally been removed inside and outside the building.
Hello,
Are there sources confirming the screen size to be 97 by 76 ft? Because I read that some claim to be 100 by 80 ft.
Hello-
to Joe Vogel thanks for the info about the Northpoint. I guess the story with the Northpoint is similar to the recently closed Ziegfeld in Midtown. no one I know had any complaints about the theater in terms of the projection, sound etc…..but the last few years any big film that played the Ziegfeld also played 10 to 12 other theaters in Manhattan. plus lets be honest even if it were making money what multiplex chain wants to spend the time to operate a large single screen movie theater. its sad the only 1st run single screen movie theater left in Manhattan is the Paris.
A Cineplex Odeon spokesperson said at the time of the Northpoint’s closing that the lease was up and the house had been losing money for some time, so the lease wasn’t renewed. Apparently nobody else wanted it either. SF Gate Story.
Hello-
i haven’t been out to San Francisco for maybe 10? years. to which i was shocked to hear the Northpoint closed. i always liked the theater during my trips out to your city. so why did it close? lack of business or the landlord sold the land? i looked at theater’s page but non one has posted there for well over a year so i thought i’d ask here.
The big AMC remodel job is almost over at the Metreon Theatre in San Francisco. One of the worst changes is the removal of the dark blue cove lights in the long hall. AMC replaced them with bright ugly white LED lights that shine in your face when you walk around to go into your auditoriums. They trashed about 50% of the nice large candy counter display popcorn and drink signs in the lobby. They did make a big change in the Dolby Cinema #13 for the better after my last visit 6 months ago and reduced the red lights on the aisles so they don’t shine on the curved Dolby Vision® screen on the bottom corners. I did enjoy the new Pirates movie in Imax 3-D in their only Imax screen in the building even though they had a 10 minutes delay at the start at a 12:45 mat because of a chiller problem in the Imax projectors. The people that do these remodel jobs for AMC have no showmanship, at least they could have put in multi color LED lights so the manager could change to what ever color he wanted in the lobby halls but now we are stuck with boring no class white bright lights.
I think hdtv might be referring to the Metreon itself. The IMAX web site lists only 17 theaters with laser IMAX in the US and Canada, and 22 more in the rest of the world. I don’t think many of them have screens as big as the Metreon’s, though.
I don’t get it. That link doesn’t refer to any particular city. What city is the real laser IMAX? Why write in code & mystery?
2 years of posts are missing from this page. I’ve noticed that some of my posts for other theaters were deleted also. ???
re terrywade – Cinema 13 was the theater that had a Dolby Atmos sound system installed for Gravity. Dolby Vision Cinema will still use the Atmos sound system, add more comfortable seating and the latest in digital projection.
DolbyVisionCinema
Visited this cinema today and they are busy putting in the new recliners in about half of the cinema’s at one end of the building. Cinema #13 (the largest screen non Imax in the theatre) is being turned into SF’s fist Dolby Vision Cinema. They removed the small candy counter they never used in front of the new Dolby Cinema entrance. Go visit in the next few weeks to see the old worn seats before they are removed in cinemas #7-#12. Be ready for noisy hammering going on during your movie from the next door cinemas they are working on. Many people left and got a refund! They need to put a sign up in the lobby on the remodel noise going on. Once a former Loews/Sony large complex theatre the seating will be way reduced by the larger seats at the SF Metreon. Same old problem in Cinema#7 and most of the spaces, the red aisle lights shine on the bottom right and left part of the curved screen. At least AMC still has masking that moves not like Cinemark/Century that keeps everything open with boring white screen shown. Things hope to ready with the new seats in some auditoriums by Christmas. They have turned up the sound I think to drown out all the hammering. Bring the workers in at night to do the work please.
Exterior and lobby photos from July 2015.
Transformers 4 was shot in digital imax 3d (the first feature length film to use it) and presented that way.The next 70mm film to be shown later this year will be Interstellar which will probably be the last major 70mm imax feature film.
Transformers 4 is shown using their digital projector. While the IMAX scenes are significantly larger than the regular scenes, they are still using much less of the screen than if it had been shown on 15/70 film. Such a shame even though it is probably still the best place in SF to see it.
hdtv267 – Saw 3D Gravity here on Sunday in auditorium 13 which was outfitted with a Dolby Atmos sound system Dolby Atmos link and a medium size curving screen. Very good 3D and sound, the low frequency effects felt like they were going right through you. The film was released with a Dolby Atmos sound track BTW. Why auditorium 13 and not IMAX? My friend, who bought the tickets in advance at the Metreon in person the day before, asked the ticket seller if Gravity was presented in IMAX ($19) using the entire screen. He was told no – that the Metreon would no longer show true IMAX as the projectors had all been switched out to digital. So he opted for the Atmos presentation ($15) which I have to say was quite impressive. Most of the films (Apocalypse Now Redux, Spiderman, Avatar) I’ve seen at the Metereon IMAX theater over the years have not been projected on the whole screen but looked like blowups using maybe 60 – 70% of the screen.
A 2012 photo can be seen here.