I hope someone can help prevent this wonderful theater from closing...

But, I'm lucky. I still go there occasionally with my ten year old Son who watches with the same kind of intense passion I still have.

So, I do feel sorry for all those who are losing their own history. It must feel like a part of you is being erased.

sad but true, y'all -- as "home entertainment" and other "personal" electronic devices bring the noise right at ya and on demand, the incomparable communal experience of watching the same screen in the same room at the same time and hundreds of people becomes remote and almost quaint, like opera or federal guidlines against torture. bravo aicn for giving a platform to something more important than sneak peeks at early marketing campaigns for superhero films, mourning our collective cinematic experience as it morphs into a blue ray or twelve...

I remember when they demolished the Beltline on 28th street to pave it over to expand the Studio 28s parking lot. i think the Alpine may still be a third run matinee theater, all the rest are gone, some long gone, and now the Studio 28 joins them.

It's not really "60s architecture" worth preserving, the original 2 screen version is long gone when the enormous 20 screen structure now stands.

It's weird how some memories stick with you, like where you saw certain movies. Good bye Rocketeer, Goodbye Roger Rabbit. Goodbye, Bonnie and Clyde, Lion In Winter. Goodbye, Cool Hand Luke.

Either Rocketeer or The Net was the last film I saw in a theatre. I think most of the theaters in Grand Rapids now are places I've never been to or only went to once or twice. With no nostalgia and no memories connected to them, what's the draw?

(And here's the cranky old man channeling my dad speaking, but with what used to cost $1.75 for admission and under a buck for candy, pop or popcorn now running close to ten bucks, who can afford to go any more? Plus there's that whole ratio of hip width to seat size thing...)