Palace 17 and Odyssey Theater
330 New Park Avenue,
Hartford,
CT
06106
330 New Park Avenue,
Hartford,
CT
06106
4 people
favorited this theater
The giant screen in the Odyssey Theater is over five stories tall with a six-track digital sound system powered by 18,000 watts.
All the screens have stadium seating and Dolby Digital sound. The theater is open 365 days a year.
Contributed by
Dave Bonan, Ken Roe
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Recent comments (view all 27 comments)
Well this movie theater had yet another robbery attempt. This time it was almost humorous. The robber asked for money, the cashier gave it to him. When the robber went to pick up the money, he put his gun down; well the cashier picked it up and the robber went fleeing. This time it ends happily. I’m glad nobody got hurt but, this is how it could have gone.
The robber put his gun down to pick up the money. The cashier reaches for the gun; the robber sees his error and reaches for the gun. A struggle ensues and then the gun is fired. An innocent child is shot.
Recently a bank teller in Seattle was fired for stopping a robbery. He put his life and the lives of others at risk for some money that was insured. I hope this Bowtie cinema explains to this casher how stupid he was. Nobody needs a dead hero.
Now if only Bowtie cinema would just put some security on the premises. If only they would employ a Hartford policeman or two, maybe the people of West Hartford wouldn’t be afraid to come here, especially after dark.
tom
With the nearby Cinema City Closes on July 22. The Palace will set aside 5 of its theaters to make The New Cinema City @ the Palace the next day. This will be great, it will have a separate enterance and upscale consession . This will offer the public an better selection . Insted of showing a hollywood blockbuster in 3-4 theaters you will get counter program with fine arthouse and independant features.
Cinema City is covered here by the Courant – so far it sounds like they’re doing the right things – I hope it remains and develops into a place for the Hartford film community and they get more involved. Parkville certainly isn’t a bad place to be with Real Art Ways down the street and the annual Hartford International Film Festival (if Bow Tie and the city lent some additional support that festival could grow and increase attendance – which in return would boast Bow Tie’s bottom line in developing a special wing for film goers with taste). Here’s the article on the new theater:
View link
Why didn’t they just make it cinema city at blue black square?-
tom
I visited this evening and for now I’ll tell you the Cinema City section consists of part of the left wing – theaters 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15. They have their own concession stand, a few bits of remodeling and more poster cases were added, as were a pictures of the original Cinema City which I think is a nice touch in addition to the Cinema City branding that appears. Cinema City also has a dedicated box office – the box office (although I was there slightly earlier than prime time) seems to be running more efficiently than it was under Crown who would schedule every movie to start between 7 and 8 – a mess on weekends. I do have a legit complaint that I’ve voiced to corporate first – I wouldn’t want to be accused of pulling a Tomas Kent or anything.
John, did you ever get a response? BTW I like reading your comments, always very incisive.
tom
I got a very quick response from Joe (next day) – and passes in the mail. What happened (a projection issue) could have happened at any theatre, before digital alleviating many common projection problems I counted National Amusements and Dipson Theatres (Western NY) as the best in the country for 35MM projection and even they had the occasional problem screening. There is one theatre I regularly comment on because for the past 10 years they’ve been providing poor projection at first run prices. The Palace is one that I don’t know that well, and secondly I doubt it’s the norm – I had been here twice before under Bow Tie and didn’t have any issues.
Despite the higher ticket prices and no student rate which I think is a shame with the colleges in the area including UHa which has an excellent Cinema Studies program, things look to have improved especially with the addition of Cinema City at the Palace, an additional screen for art/indie film makes me happy to see. (Film culture in Hartford is alive and well with the announced addition of a new Cinema Grill and with the growth in attendance at Hartford International Film Festival, which I was in town to screen my film at)
I think and hope this bowtie company is finally learning, which is a good thing. They took over from a bigger, more experienced chain and I think they were out of their depth. They stumbled around badly for a few years, but now maybe they are better. let’s hope so. Although I still won’t go to this theater at night. Where is the security that was promised at the last day at Cinema City? In that neighborhood, I expect to see security all the time.
When cinema city closed in Hartford, Bowtie cinemas saved this cinema by giving FIVE count em five screens at the palace 17 to cinema city for “art” & “foreign” films. I am no expert in what constitutes an “art” film but it appears bowtie considers both Morning Glory and Love & other drugs in that category. We knew it would happen sooner than later, well it’s sooner. Now do you suppose that Harry potter takes place in England, makes it a foreign film? This is yet another exsample of them sayng one thing and doing another. Just like telling us there would never ever be advertising at bowtie cinemas or that Blue black square would be a place to foreign films, etc etc etc.
The Palace was designed for Crown Cinema Corporation by Port Washington, New York, architect James Thomas Martino. The City of Hartford requested the rather traditional movie palace facade, a departure from the more adventurous designs Martino usually did for Crown. The theater had a total of 3,611 seats.