Mercer Mall Cinema

Closed sometime in October 2000, last listings I can find are around October 10th-15th or so.

Good posting above and GCC’s other problem was that they were stuck in leases for theaters that became obsolete when other chains like National Amusements started multiplexing…

markp, I don’t know what union-vs.-non-union booth has to do with print wear. The alignment and tension on the take-up reel would be factors in sprocket hole damage. We had issues with this since the theater opened thanks to initial poor setup by a lousy RCA service man. I eventually learned how to address most of the problems in the booth myself. And perhaps I am misremembering after all these years but it seems to me that Universal’s prints (i.e. Jurassic) were made on a better film stock than Paramount’s (Saturday Night Fever). I never had to replace a Universal print. We were also running SNF five shows a day with midnight shows on the weekends. We ran SNF close to 1000 times during its run.

One, or perhaps both, of the expansions of the Mercer Mall Cinemas was designed for General Cinema Theatres by Port Washington, New York, architect James Thomas Martino.

Mercer Mall Cinemas did indeed open Xmas 1975. I was the first head projectionist (from 1975-1979). The theater was very successful, with months-long (!) runs of “Saturday Night Fever” and “Animal House.” I had to get a replacement print for “Fever” due to extreme sprocket hole wear!

Dave, I was there about the same time you were (spring 1976). I was there to see ‘Peter Pan,’ but I distinctly remember ‘The Bad News Bears’ was playing simultaneously, because while waiting in line, I heard a father say to his son, “We’re not going to see ‘The Bad News Bears,’ we’re going to see ‘Peter Pan’.” (Wish I had seen BNB on the big screen. I had to settle for the bowdlerized TV version until home video came along.)

I too have great memories of the place. Saw ‘Animal House’ there back in ‘78, 'Airplane!’ in ‘80, 'Star Trek II’ in ‘82, etc., etc. Just went back yesterday to buy shoes for the kids, and made sure to let them know how it used to be.

On an unrelated note, anyone remember the old Game Barn arcade? It was right in the corner of the mall where TJ Maxx presently is. It opened in late ‘75, but I don’t think it survived the decade.

Mercer Mall Cinema I II III, opened in late 1975. Originally seating C 1- 543, C 2- 386, C 3- 336. It received a long overdue expansion and upgrade in 1988. At that time four new theatres were built on the north side ranging in size from 144 to 270 seats. The original theatres had new seats and screens with movable masking installed during this build, along with new speakers and Dolby CP 55 processors. During the next few years the larger theatres were equipped so they could play films with DTS, SRD, SDDS digital soundtracks. In the mid to late nineties Mercer Mall received its second and last expansion. Three new theatres were built on the south side of the building, ranging in size from 120 to 218 with large screens. All theatres were capable of all three digital sound formats by this time… Dolby CP 45 processors in 8 of 10 theatres. Projectors were Cinemacanica V-5 w/consoles and Christie AW3 platters in all theatres. Mercer Mall Cinema 10 closed in the fall of 2000 due in large part to the fact that it was a “flat” theatre… Stadium seating was all the rage, and with a brand new 24 screen with stadium seating within a few miles, and another new 12 screen with stadium seating a couple of miles past that… Mercer became a ghost town in short order. General Cinema itself was soon out of business… bought out by AMC.

The information on this theater is incorrect. It was not built in the mid 80’s. I moved to Princeton in September 1980 and it was already there. It was converted from a three-plex to a 7-plex around 1988. I have a memory of “The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad” being one of the first movies to play when it re-opened. It converted because a year earlier the Movies at Marketfair! 9-plex opened just a short distance away. Infact, the Movies at Marketfair! and Garden Theater are the only theaters in the Princeton area from the 80’s that are still running.

A DSW Shoe Warehouse now occupies the site of the former Mercer Mall Cinema.

I was kind of surprised when it closed because it was a nice theater. One of the last films I recall seeing there was “Gladiator” around Memorial Day 2000. The theater closed sometime later that fall.