Island Cinemas
1708 Montauk Highway,
Mastic,
NY
11950
1708 Montauk Highway,
Mastic,
NY
11950
2 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 26 comments
Remains of movies past still on the pylon.
At one time the owners were a group of lawyers. They added a couple of illegal screens. Go figure.
10 screens on October 31st, 1997 the cheap stake owners bought no grand opening ad in Newsday.
Probably just phased out because of Covid as is the case with other theatres.
It would of been nice they would of said something on their website.
Theater is now closed and a For Lease sign on the door as well as on the pylon.
It most definitely was an A&P Supermarket. I remember going there as a kid.
It was definitely a supermarket (as was the current Hampton Bays). I believe both had been A & Ps.
I think its fadcade when it was a Movieworld look like the A & P supermarket.
What kind of store was the building before it became Island Cinemas?
The photo is quite a few years old. The owners illegally added three screens to the venue (interestingly they were lawyers). They were then forced back to the original 7. I got the figure of 9 from a current advertisement appearing in the newspaper. Have no idea when the new two were added.
The marquee in the above photo says 10 screens.
Island Cinemas is back to 9 screens (hopefully legal this time). They also now serve lunch and dinner from noon to 10 PM each day via the newly opened Castaway Cafe. Very upscale sounding operation in a questionable area.
Good to hear, Victor. I’ve avoided the place because the shopping center is so sleezy. The only time I ventured onto the premises was to get the seating capacities of the seven auditoriums.
The new owners have really come through with this place. As far as I can tell, they are continuing to upgrade. I heard that they were going to all digital soon, and that they were considering doing special features soon (sports, genre nights, midnight showings). I just love it because I hardly have to wait to get in, it’s clean, and safe now. OH! (my wife says) they keep the bathrooms clean, too.
The seating capacity of the 7 auditoriums is as follows:
1 105
2&4 91
3 111
5 107
6&7 110
AWF, do you remember the name of that original movie theatre?
I wonder if this is the church group that used to rent one of the theaters in the old Patchogue Multiplex. They also had a “CHurch at the Movies” group that rented one of the auditoriums on Sundays for church service.
It’s a good way to take in some extra money when they really don’t need the auditorium for movies anyway on Sunday mornings.
They’ve got something new – “Church at the Movies”. They even have a van to transport people. I went past last Sunday and they really had a crowd. I wonder if films do as well.
I think the screen count has to change to 7 above. It’s more than the 5 listed.
The newowners had to completely rebuild the place. The previous owners illegally subdivided a couple of the auditoriums resulting in 10 houses, not the seven they had permits for. The town closed them down. Then the former owners removed EVERYTHING from the space. The new owners had to reequip the place. I think the total
auditorium count is 7 not 8.
My thought was that the Movieland name had nothing to do with the one used by BS Moss in Douglaston. I thought it might be associated with Movieland in Coram. But knowing that at least one lawyer was one of a group which owns the Coram house I would hope not.
As far as naming a theatre is concerned I think they could have chosen something better than Island Cinemas when the 16 plex in Holtsville was already well established.
This movie theater was closed at the end of 2007. New owners completely rebuilt the place and opened it up in March 2008 as Island Cinemas. Everything is brand new and clean. It is a nice place to take the family for a movie. You can visit website http://www.island-cinemas.com for showtimes and even buy tickets online.
Does anyone remember the original movie theater in Mastic? It was in the same shopping center that Movieland Cinema of Mastic currently occupies. It opened in the early seventies (‘71?) and sat in the middle of the shopping center to the right of the A&P (which is now Movieland). It was flanked to the left by a chinese restaurant (still there) and to the right by a staionary store (long gone). I think you can still see the outline of the original marquee.
Among the many films I saw there, I most vividly remember catching a glimpse of my 1st “R” rated movie – Hitchcock’s “Frenzy” (‘72) – when I was 9 years old. Much like the nearby Shirley Twin Theatre, they would frequently run day-long weekend marathons of multiple movies, cartoons, shorts, you name it.
I believe it was independently run (my sister knew the couple who managed the place) and lasted for several years until closing in the mid-seventies.
This theater was originally an Supermarket, an A&P.
I saw a movie in this theater for the first time the other day, and actually, it was better than I thought it would be. The lobby and hall was clean, as was the auditorium. The screen was small, but not any smaller than other theaters I have seen. The auditoriums are bare utilitarian – cement block walls painted black.
Now that I am used to the newer multiplexes, I found the seats extremely small in this theater – probably the smallest seats I have ever been in in a theater.