Lincoln Village 1-6
6341 McCormick Boulevard,
Chicago,
IL
60659
6341 McCormick Boulevard,
Chicago,
IL
60659
7 people
favorited this theater
Showing 76 - 100 of 187 comments
Well, I clicked on the link to Village Theatres and received this “villagetheatres.com expired on 01/24/2008 and is pending renewal or deletion”
Big surprise, huh!
It was a huge mistake not to build the Gateway Plaza.
Sorry to disappoint, but my understanding from Chabad Lubavitch is that they intend to convert the existing structure into a school, not tear down and rebuild. Whether Village stays or not, we’re stuck with the building for a while. Maybe it will look better once windows are carved into it.
Well, I think we are mostly in agreement then.
Moving on, when CO first announced the new buildings, it was planned as an 8-screen, and was to be called the Lincolnwood. CO had a 25-year lease with 4 five-year options to renew. Shortly after it was built, the building itself was sold for 7.5 million dollars by the developers, to free up capital for other projects.
While CO still operated the Plaza, 1-6, and 7-9, the Plaza was generally booked with the more “urban” features.
In 1996, Cineplex was in fact sued for accessibility issues. However, the building was built before the ADA. Also that year, somewhat ironically, the Tribune named it the city’s best theater in terms of parking.
In 1998, CO proposed an 18-screen theater in Lincolnwood that would have replaced the LV 1-9 and Plaza; this was probably killed by the Loews/Cineplex merger. Also, from 1996-1999 CO also planned to build a 14-screen theater at Gateway Plaza, which got as far as foundations before being cancelled.
BWChicago:
I and familiar with and agree with everything you’ve written above about the context, history, intent, criticism and corporate economics of early 20th-century theatre design and present-day big box movie theater design. I just didn’t want to make my comments unnecessarily long, and at the time I was only responding to others thoughts about the architectural merits of the building in absolute terms. One comment had made a comparison between this theatre and an ancient Mesopotamian temple and I was saying that such an intentional ‘hommage’ was probably not the designer’s intent here. It is true that LV’s original designer may have been trying to do a little more here to ‘decorate the box’, and in my comments I did consider the context of the era in which it was designed, which was late-80’s post-modernism. I did not get into all the detail which you have in your response, but I thank you that you did.
With any building project there will always be constraints and I have dealt with them all: flood plains, constricted sites, constricted budgets, unrealistic deadlines, unrealistic clients, urban infill contexts which demand all that all the attention be placed on the facade and not the side or rear walls, etc. The bigger question is how to judge the adequacy of LV’s response to it’s constraints in absolute terms as a piece of built form in the public realm. One might try to argue that ‘theatre’ architecture should somehow be exempt from this judgment, but why should theatres get this special consideration, particularly since they are visited far more often by the general public than other ‘public’ buildings (such as libraries, courthouses, hospitals, etc)? On the contrary, one might say that movie theatres have an even higher aesthetic/architectural responsibility precisely because they are so heavily patronized. In this day and age, people’s perception of what constitutes good design is more often than not based on what they see at the shopping mall. If one wants to influence public artistic perception, this is a prime building type where one can still do it.
I still maintain this building is an architectural eyesore; it is big, it is bulky (despite the stair & box office tower massing), it has no sense of detail or articulation, and it’s attempts at decorative expression are so stripped down so as to render them trite and banal. The sideways orientation of the building to the street is awkward and impedes any visual recognition of the building’s form(s) and the attempts the designers may have made at scaling this theatre down to size. I have lived in the area since before LV was built and I have had this opinion since the first time I saw it. My feelings have nothing to do with my particularly bad experience at this theatre, although that experience has certainly focused my attention on the merits of LV continuing to operate under the adverse conditions it faces. My point is, barring any change of attitude from the MWD there aren’t many compelling arguments (profitability, community patronage, architectural preservationism, civic or neighborhood presence) for this particular building to stay. Indeed, there have been far more worthy examples of architectural excellence in Chicago that have fallen to the wrecking ball. LV (or its operator) needs to go if we are to have any hope for the civic potential of this prominent corner to be realized. Until it does, MWD and LV will remain deadlocked, and this site will remain an unsightly no-man’s land of chainlink, aging asphalt, concrete barricades, shuttered businesses and neglected landscape.
GS, if it is indeed your business to know something about good architectural design, then you should know better than to let a grudge color your judgments. Nobody’s saying the Lincoln Village is an architectural icon of any sort. I said as much with my Lego remark – it is without question crude. But if you indeed are judging it in terms of multiplex architecture in its time period – which is really the only reasonable way to judge it, then yes, it is an innovative solution to the problem of fitting six cinemas on a constrained site. You must consider the alternatives.
Multiplexes have always been cookie-cutter box designs, but there was clearly extra effort put into the design here. If you know of a better approach to the problem of fitting six cinemas on a small footprint next to a parking lot that is presumably a flood plain, I’d like to hear it. The site also offered the architects (Probably David Mesbur, who did about 250 multiplexes for CO in the 80s) the opportunity to take advantage of a site at the focus of McCormick Boulevard, following classical planning principles – something few retailers would bother to do beyond a pylon sign.
If you’re going to talk about the quality of the design, you have to look at it in context of the area and of its era. The area is nothing more than a bunch of anonymous big box stores. It might be best judged in comparison to the earlier Lincoln Village, which may have been a fine theater in its own time, but it was essentially a totally undistinguished big brick box. Worse still was the Plaza, which was literally a big box, and by all accounts a terrible cinema.
A similar attempt to hide stairs – complete with striped brick – was carried out at the 1929 Atlanta Fox, as can be seen here. Perhaps you forget that the secondary and tertiary facades of movie palaces were almost always virtually blank walls with rusting iron escape stairs attached. Anyone who’s studied theater architecture will tell you that movie palace design was almost never meant to be a “faithful” reproduction of any revival style – the point was always to be flashy and out of place, to catch the eye. Theater architecture has almost never cared about context, accuracy, or fitting in with architectural ideals. The degree of elaborateness justified by economic concerns has gone down over the decades, but the same idea persists. It’s not relevant to judge in terms of postmodernism, because theaters have almost always been judged in terms of low architecture. You won’t find too many theaters designed by world-famous architects; they were always working in the vernacular. There were hardly any theaters built in the International style; theater architecture was Googie at best. Eye-catching, but nobody was handing out AIA prizes to the architects. I can tell you for sure that 20, 30 years after the movie palaces were built, a lot of people were deriding them as tacky and obsolete; that’s why so many were modernized and disfigured at that time. Although certainly not the same caliber of architecture and design as 20s movie palaces, LV – certainly more than a contemporary design by the same firm, the hidden-away Rivertree Court – recognizes its precedents and tries to have a distinct identity within the boundaries of corporate design standards. You will not find many multiplexes that have anything resembling a grand stairway, for instance (another design touch hearkening back to a modernized movie palace). It is distinct in that it does offer many touches not found in its contemporaries – two floors, an imaginative exterior, operating curtains, relatively large auditoria, and at least some connection to the street. As large as the building is, its bulk is broken up by the (functionally expressive, something rarely seen in multiplex design) stairways on the outside and by the use of variegated brick colors.
The LV is not an architectural gem by any means, but it is about the best you could possibly hope for from its era, and it does reflect what the ideal of a multiplex was at the time, much the same as the Muvico theaters do now. It is essentially what would pass for a movie palace in 1989 terms.
Perhaps the flag is the last refuge of a scoundrel, but Village isn’t operating out of any of their sites because they think anyone cares about their history, they’re doing so because they allow them to operate cheaply. I don’t think anyone’s choosing to go to any of their theaters because they’re old, they’re going because they’re cheap or because they’re convenient. Don’t wrap your (well-deserved) contempt for Village’s poor business practices in reasons that have nothing to do with the operator.
Catherine:
No worries – we think alike. I’m all for small business. I’d rather patronize an old renovated or well-kept classic theatre than a banal new one. I think alot of people think like you and me; otherwise there would not be a website with such a fan base as this. The problem is – and I realize you see this – Village Theatres LLC is just cashing in on this sentiment. They have no intention of living up to their responsibilities as business operators or curators/caretakers of the public trust. There’s a phrase – I’m misquoting it but it goes something like “the flag is the last refuge of a scoundrel”. Definitely applicable here. If they feel otherwise; if they feel they are being misunderstood, (and Ron Rooding if you are reading this)….then prove otherwise with your actions.
All:
I appreciate your appreciation of ‘architecture’; and I guess LV 1-6 might appear more animated than some other multiplexes in Chicago – but then again holding multiplexes up as the standard-bearers for good architecture/design is perhaps a bit of a reach. It’s my business to know something about good architectural design – and this is not it. The Lincoln Village 1-6 was built at the trailing end of the architectural post-modern era, well after its first practitioners had abandoned the whole post-modern movement as bankrupt. Stylistically, LV may appear to be loosely quoting some form of stripped-down neo-classical motif but I am quite certain that the ‘ziggurat’ forms took no inspiration from Eqypt, Greece, Rome or Central America for that matter. More than likely those forms were someone’s uninspired attempt to disguise the large emergency exit stairs that are required for any ‘assembly’ space where alot of people may have to get out in a hurry. As the enclosed exit stairs from the upper theatres descend down the side of the building, so do the roof forms. Take away the exit stairs and you’re left with the same basic big multiplex box that you’ve got in all the other multiplexes.
I’ll quote a passage from the article cited by Redon above to sum this up:
“Almost by way of apology for the crime against cinema that Cineplex Odious committed, in 1985 they built the LV 1-6 at the other end of the parking lot. It was your typical CO monstrosity complete with a Good ‘n’ Plenty color scheme and abysmal focus.”
The old classic theaters – such as the ones that originally inspired this website – pursued their goals much more seriously and sucessfully. They hired real artisans to produce faithful (if somewhat fanciful) architectural period reproductions. They spared no expense, unlike LV 1-6 whose stripped-down architectural detail leaves everything to the imagination. LV’s time has come and gone – it has said all it had to say about architecture in the first week that it was open. Time for something more inspired to occupy this prominent site – this gateway to Lincolnwood and Rogers Park.
Maybe “ziggurat as rendered in legos” would be a more apt description. I think it brings an interesting monumental quality to a sea of big boxes.
Now THAT is a deep comment! If it was, I like the Ziggurat better. I’ve always thought the interior of this place was well done. But I don’t think the exterior quite works. It is a clumsy collection of shapes towering over the neighborhood.
I think it’s quite good architecturally, and C-O probably considered it a flagship of the Chicago market when it was opened. It’s a much more creative design than the standard multiplex. And I think it’s patterned somewhat after a paragon of premodern architecture, the Ziggurat at Ur
GS,
I know we got off on the wrong foot, somewhat, but I do agree with you on most of your points. The thing is, when Village Entertainment first became a chain, I thought (and was hoping) that they would succeed. I’m all for “the little guy” and locally owned businesses, which is why I like going to Classic Cinemas theatres. Village looked like they might have succeeded because initially they took over still viable properties that just needed proper management. But we all know what happened after that.
You know, in an odd way, I’ve always liked the design of the LV with its many right angles. Had it been better run, it would still be viable. Someone made comments as to why Loews dropped it.
Redon:
You have been too kind in your review.
WIthout advertising, without parking, without a working phone number — how does this place even get enough patrons to pay for film rentals?
Agreed, I would be very interested to see what kinds of deals have allowed them to remain open as long as they have.
My fault for calling the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District “the city”. But that doesn’t really change the situation for Lincoln Village.
Is the possibility of losing of your customer parking normally factored into a business model?
It stays to reason, that less parking means less customers, and less customers means less money. In turn this results in less monies for staff and repairs.
In my opinion: Without that parking lot – this theater doesn’t stand a chance and will close.
Staffing issues are part of Village’s business model, that’s true of all their locations. In fact most of these issues are. And the city does not own the lot, the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District does. So it wouldn’t be the city trying to shut them down.
I performed a unannounced theater check for this theater. I like to research the theater before I check and found that the reviews of the place were a more then a bit unfair. Parking does suck and you will get your car towed if you don’t park in a correct lot. (They have worked out an agreement on parking with the Home Depot) The parking situation is not the theaters fault. The city raised the rent on the parking lot 800K a year.
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The theater can’t pay and the lack of parking has really hurt their business.
Lack of parking causes:
If the city is trying to close them down, they have found a way. They won’t be able to last much longer without a parking lot.
This theater is operating on a dwindling budget, and I think that the lack of revenue has forced the theater to make tough choices. The escalator and the elevator appear to have been broken for a while and I don’t think that they’re going to be fixed any time soon. Theaters 4, 5, and 6 are on the second floor. So if you’re unable to walk up a LARGE flight of stairs, you’ll want to avoid those screens.
Water fountains don’t work. Staffing has been cut so the patrons have to buy their tickets at the concessions stand. Staffing problems have also caused the phones to be unmanned and the website to be out of date. Marquee tends to be out of date.
On the other hand I found the staff to be friendly, the manager to be courteous and available to hear any of the patrons concerns. The bathrooms are clean and well kept, the graffiti is kept to a minimal. Concession’s offers free popcorn on Wednesday’s and always has free refills on regular size popcorn and soda. Matinee prices are $5.50 and $8.25 for evening adult.
You do have to park across the street, and the walk around the building to enter the theater, but I feel that the staff and concessions make up for the parking. At this time you have your choice of seats in the theater, and maybe even a private showing.
This is a neighborhood hang out. A place where kids can watch a movie and play games in the mini arcade. A place where local couple have made dinner and a movie part of a weekly ritual. Unless the parking lot situation is resolved, this theater will be forced to follow the unfortunate fate of many of the local theaters and close.
They also had ads in the Chicago Tribune also.
Robin, they had ads in the Sun-Times yesterday (12-23-07). It’s still open. Village is just too f@(king lazy to update its website.
Village has not updated its website for the Lincoln Village 1-6 and the Bloomingdale Court. The Village North and the Glenwood have been updated.
Is this theatre still open? I’ve tried calling the number listed on Village’s website and all it does is ring ad infinitum!
mp775:
You said it – as absurd as it may sound, parking at the unlit, unsecured and under-sized gravel parking lot at Thillens is now an official part of the Village Theatre’s business operations. They must think their customers are that dedicated (or insane) to walk through the mud and trees, cross busy Devon Ave, cross a canal bridge, and hike around (or over) fencing and barricades to visit their theatre. I guess you’re suggesting that the lot I parked in may have belonged to the shopping center, and that this may have been allowable up to a couple of weeks ago. Truthfully, I could not tell you who this lot actually belongs to – it is a no-man’s land adjoining the back of multiple businesses and was deserted at the time. I can’t believe anyone cares or depends upon it for their business…it probably operates much more effectively as a towing ‘trap’ profit center so that the related businesses can split the take with the towing companies. As I mentioned before I took pictures the next morning and will review them as to what the signs might have said the night I was there.
The Home Depot option is just as exiting for those inclined to risk…you can only park there until 9:30pm (and presumeably vulnerable to towing after that). Like Thillens, you have to leap over or walk a loooonnnngggg way around fencing barricades and cross 6 lanes of busy traffic on McCormick to get to the theatre.
The bottom line is that Village’s seat-of-the-pants business operations puts their customers at risk (can you imagine how fun it was to drag my family 25 miles down to 17th and Western at 11:00 pm in an icestorm?). I understand that Village is having the squeeze put on them by the MWD, but this parking fiasco (and the theatre’s building/accessibility code violations) have gone on for the better part of a year – if not longer. Ridiculous! No one in this City should knowingly operate this way….or be allowed to…
GS,
Just curious, where did you park? You said there was a sidewalk directly to the theater, so I’m guessing you were in the shopping center lot. I’m 99.99% sure the signs on the door, at least a couple of weeks ago, said to park in the Home Depot or the shopping center lot. I’ve never seen anything about parking at Thillens, and that lot is all the way up at Kedzie & Albion, a half mile from the theater!
GS,
No offense taken. Hey, I’d be upset too if I was in your shoes right now! My car was unfairly towed too once, so I know!
You might want to call the City of Chicago on their “311” number. Also check the city’s official website for consumer affairs. I would also file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, etc.
I’ll not doubt that Rooding faces challanges as a small operator of movie theatres. But if the Johnsons, who head up Classic Cinemas can do it, why can’t Rooding? He’s actually got some potentially good sites.