Art Cinema

201 E. Avenue D,
Killeen, TX 76541

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The Art Cinema was a small single screen theater which opened sometime in the autumn of 1969 in downtown Killeen, Texas. In keeping with its name, the theater offered a more adult/foreign genre of film to the audience of predominantly soldiers stationed at nearby Fort Hood.

Contributed by Ron Dupree

Recent comments (view all 5 comments)

Mike Rogers
Mike Rogers on August 4, 2010 at 3:47 pm

We had the same theatre in Augusta,THE ART THEATRE that before it changed its name to Cinema 1 in the late seventies,it played Adult and foreign films,but i never thought the soldiers station at Fort Gordon,Ga. Ever cared about that fare.But I guess you guys did. Art theatre is on CT.

Ret. AKC (NAC) CCC Bob Jensen, Manteno, Illinois
Ret. AKC (NAC) CCC Bob Jensen, Manteno, Illinois on August 4, 2010 at 9:01 pm

Mike, folks in the Armed Forces are just regular men and women who happen to be in the military. If they are on the “outside” they might go to “adult/foreign genre” why not still do that when in the military? They are still the same people. I even went the opposite and this sailor went and saw a kids flick. In ‘64, I went to Radio City Music Hall and saw MARY POPPINS, along with a stage show and that Mighty WurliTzer Theater Pipe Organ, ya just never know!

Open 1980?

Owned by Texas Cinema Corporation?

Anyone have more info or photos?

Chief Jensen

RonnieD
RonnieD on August 5, 2010 at 8:28 am

I was a soldier stationed at Ft. Hood in 1968 and 1969. I remember the Art Cinema was adjacent to a bookstore on Avenue D and diagonally across the street from the Blue Bonnet Café in downtown Killeen.
I remember seeing two films on different occasions in the Art Cinema, Luis Bunuel’s “Belle de Jour” and Russ Meyer’s film “Vixen!”

Mike Rogers
Mike Rogers on August 6, 2010 at 4:47 pm

I never pictured you guys watching “A MAN and A Woman” or “THE FOX” in those days,but “THE GREEN BERETS”.but i was never in the miltary.Thanks for your service.

RonnieD
RonnieD on August 9, 2010 at 12:40 pm

You’re very welcome Mike; serving was entirely my pleasure and honor.

As Bob has mentioned above, people who are in the military are just regular guys with the same interests and disinterests as civilian folk.

Back in the late 60s, TVs were something of a rarity in army barracks so for soldiers, feature films were one of the main sources for entertainment. There were three theaters on Fort Hood each screening a feature film nightly as well matinees on weekends. The films used to play usually two or three days at one of the three theaters and then often move to one of the other theaters for a few days screening. So any night of the week there was often a choice of three different feature films you could attend without leaving the Base, if you desired.
To fill the bills took a fair selection of movies and the army screened a wide range of film genres. “The Green Berets” did indeed play on Base in 1968 and I remember first seeing it at Theater 2 on Fort Hood. But for every “macho” themed film like “The Green Berets” or “Where Eagles Dare” or “The Battle of Britain” the army also screened movies like ‘The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie”, Zeffirelli’s “Romeo & Juliette”, “Sweet Charity”, “Oliver!”, “The Subject Was Roses”, “Isadora”, “Ring Of Bright Water” just to name a few of the wonderful films I saw in Base theaters at Fort Hood.

I also remember seeing “The Fox” in the summer of 1968, but at a theater in nearby Temple.

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