Cineplex Cinemas Mississauga
309 Rathburn Road W,
Mississauga,
ON
L5B 4C1
309 Rathburn Road W,
Mississauga,
ON
L5B 4C1
2 people
favorited this theater
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A few updates on this location and corrections from my last post. I was able to see two movies here after my visit at TIFF 2021 and was amazed to be in the grandfather location of the Famous Players “Stadium” era. Overall a solid location but I can tell MANY things have changed over the years and it still has some unique features.
Cinemas 1-4 (not #5) are not flat-sloped but rather at a slight “sightline” seating setup. There are small stairs on both sides which end about 2/3rds of the way down. Many of the seats also have a gentle recline to them, whereas many other Silvercity locations did not (they were bolted and fixed seating).
There were additional concessions upstairs and back in the IMAX area, but those have been completely removed. There is still a dated “Upstairs Concession Open” sign at the top of the escalator that is still there though! Maybe it is still there in case they do some sort of pop-up concession stand in the future? The main concession is right as you pass the podium area, however, so these additional concessions wouldn’t be needed today.
Many of the original decorations are all gone from the older photos I posted. Not a huge loss though as you do see a lot of the height and high ceiling of the lobby now. Except for AVX in #9 and the IMAX auditorium, all of the original Famous Players blue seats are STILL there in 2021 and looks like they will never be upgraded unless a recliner conversion is announced (and would be easy to do in the smaller #1-4 theatres, not so sure about the stadium rooms).
While there is an escalator to get up to the stadium 5-10 section and a down escalator, there’s also a very hidden additional staircase between #9/10 where guests can exit down to the lower floor. I suppose this was added for fire regulations but it seems to be ignored, and it’s still accessible to anyone to go upstairs or down.
The 1998 addition of #11/12 and IMAX is VERY noticeable that it has been added after the fact, with a tacky arrow sign directing guests to those theatres, though the mirrored hallway is a REALLY cool design and also I assume where they would do lineups to any auditorium if needed. The hallway to #11/12 also has #11 at the far end and #12 closest to the hallway. Typically this would be the other way around.
The big, grand Cinema 10, the main reason for my visit, still has a proper Cinemascope screen but the masking is open and the curtains are still there, but of course will never be used again. #10 is pretty much as it was when it opened in 1997.
A contact of mine mentioned that at their opening, when it was just the circular 10-plex, that there were 10,000 guests a DAY visiting that location. The location was busy when I left my second matinee leading into the evening show, so that was great to see. I do like the more minimalist interior and REALLY love the new Cineplex Cinemas design outside. It’s still very well located in the Square One/Mississauga area with tons of parking and will remain for quite some time.
I’m also curious to know if this was the test location for the Sonics Associates S4 speaker system.
Sonics was IMAX’s sound vendor for decades, until they purchased them in 2003.
Sonics was branching out and engineered and marketed a Coaxial loudspeaker system for THX Stadium houses called S4. There was one test location somewhere in Ontario, and being in Mississauga, close to the home of IMAX, this location makes sense.
There are no other known installations of this speaker system.
RE: Digital Sound,
The location I worked at which was a Famous Silvercity location that opened in Nov 1998, all screens had some form of digital sound. The two smaller houses were DTS only with SR backup coming from a scaled-down CP500.
Perhaps that’s what Corus meant above but the chances of hearing SR in those houses were greater if someone didn’t change the discs or reboot the DTS players on Thursday night/Friday afternoon.
I really want to visit this theater now and am hoping that after COVID restrictions that I can make a trip out here during my annual trip to TIFF.
For the earlier Corus comment about two theaters not having digital sound; I’m pretty sure all 10 screens did when they opened with Dolby Digital, but at that point Columbia movies like THE FIFTH ELEMENT only had SDDS tracks on their prints and a Dolby SR backup, so they couldn’t run that with digital sound unless they installed an SDDS system. There’s also the possibility that a Universal title also opened that was only available with DTS and it wasn’t playing in a DTS equipped auditorium. That didn’t last long, however, as later in the summer Columbia’s release of AIR FORCE ONE was released with Dolby, DTS and SDDS tracks and Universal also went to all tracks in that time period.
Also interesting about this location is that it appears Cinemas 1 to 5 still are flat sloped theaters, #10 has its original scope screen AND the original blue seats remain after all these years. You’d think with the success of this location they would have at least done a stadium conversion to the smaller theaters and put in Ultra AVX-style seats in all of their auditoriums by now, like in many other locations.
A while back I added a few photos including theater #10 which is a rare FP Silvercity/Coliseum screen that is SCOPE! A few other Coliseum builds in that era had these in their largest theaters, but later pretty much all screens were flat 1.85 only. Like with a lot of photos I have added to CT, I have went through a LOT of “fan photos” on Google, Yelp and Foursquare and am fascinated by this theater design.
As noted by CorusFTW, this was originally a Famous Players theatre under the Coliseum branding.
Famous Players installed the two additional theatres and the IMAX screen on June 30, 1999.
Here’s a list of the first movies shown at Cineplex Cinemas Mississauga (when it was known as The Coliseum): =Digital sound -Breakdown -Warriors of Virtue -Murder at 1600 -Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion -That Darn Cat -Volcano -The Saint -Father’s Day -Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery -Night Falls on Manhattan -The Fifth Element* Overall, a lot of movies for a (initially) 10 screen multiplex. Only two theatres didn’t have digital sound.
The closures of SilverCity Mississauga and Landmark Square One (former Cineplex Odeon) leaves this theatre, two former AMCs and the newly expanded Queensway VIP the only theatres left in the area.