Multiculture?

Arting up the 'plexes

This summer, Aussie Mel Gibson has reigned as an American hero at General Cinema's new Fenway 13 complex, where in addition to starring in The Patriot, he's the voice of a born-in-the-USA rooster in the British-set Chicken Run. I recently watched the latter, a DreamWorks superhit, in one of General Cinema's flagship theaters -- great digital THX sound, fabulous stadium seating, an enormous screen -- and, sure, that's just the way Chicken Run should be seen. But then I thought how stupendous art films would look up there with 50-foot characters, like two of my favorites this year, Beau travail and L'humanité, both from France.

Will that ever be possible at the 13-screen Fenway? Or, as big big pictures devour more and more theaters, will something evolve like the dystopian horror in John Waters's Cecil B. Demented, where every screen at a Baltimore multiplex is showing a Star Wars or a Star Trek?

Several telephone conversations with General Cinema executives reassured me that my worst-case scenario will never be. "When the arthouse and indie product is there, we'll bring it," marketing manager Zvi Cole told me. "If there's a demand in the Fenway, we're there to play what people want."

Brian Callaghan, General Cinema's director of communications and film marketing, promised some shift in direction from the first months at the Fenway, which have been, except for a showing of The Virgin Suicides, blatantly blockbuster-driven. "People clamored to see The Klumps and The Perfect Storm, and you need to show them as often as you can. Typically, at our megaplexes, in summer we tend to focus on big Hollywood movies, and also in December. But January-May are `down times,' and also September-November. For those occasions, and with students coming back, we will be bidding on a number of more independent films, which we will have room for."

Those are the movies I like, I told Callaghan.

"Those are films I love as well," he answered. "Indies in the right theater can do as much business as a Hollywood film in its third or fourth week. We have a theater in DC, the Mazza Gallerie, where East/West has played for months.

"With the Kendall, Nickelodeon, and Coolidge nearby, we'll have to compete for special product. How difficult it will be remains to be seen. We haven't gone head-to-head with them yet. It's been easy at our General Cinema in Framingham, because there isn't competition. In the last year there, we've shown Boys Don't Cry, Cookie's Fortune, Being John Malkovich, Election, Dogma, An Ideal Husband."

The Framingham Cinema 16 was also once the site, in 1995-'96, of an attempt to create an arthouse audience in a suburban environment: "Cinema Internationale," one screen devoted exclusively to foreign-language films and independents. It was the idea of a General Cinema vice-president, Jim Tharp, who's now head of distribution for DreamWorks. Tharp assigned the project to Elaine Purdy, then marketing manager for the Northeast.

It was Purdy who came up with the "Cinema Internationale" imprimatur -- "to give it a more European flavor," she told me. She developed an elaborate "Passport Program," in which people who sent in a cutout from the Tab newspapers were issued a passport book with coupons for restaurant discounts and a free cappuccino, and a grid that you got stamped each time you attended the Internationale. Five stamps meant a free movie anywhere at the Framingham Cinema.

"We got 8000 members," Purdy explains, "and feedback was wonderful. We had one huge hit, Big Night, which played for weeks. But did the theater bring in as much revenue as a mainstream one? No. And if 250 seats aren't being filled, that's a substantial `ouch.' It was a group management decision that indies didn't warrant exclusivity on one screen. In my heart, I wanted to continue. But the grosses weren't there. Framingham wasn't West Newton or Cambridge. I don't know if after a few years the Cinema Internationale would have drawn an audience. I'll never know."

Two years ago, Purdy moved to National Amusements, where she is the assistant vice-president for publicity and promotions, in charge of showcase and multiplex theaters. Her newest project: Showcase 20 in Revere, which opened May 23. She's proud of the Movie Walk Café within Revere's Showcase -- "unbelievably good fries, lattes" -- but admits there's no plan for an exclusive indie screen. Still, she can't resist one plunge into arthouse screening: on September 15 Revere will host the American theatrical premiere of the Italian-made, Julie Harris-starring Passage to Paradise, which is being distributed by Allston's Brighton Avenue. This spiritual tale about the friendship of a crusty old lady and a lost-soul private eye, with an original score by Pat Metheny, was a riveting audience hit at the recent Woods Hole Film Festival. "I was overwhelmed by how beautiful this film is," Purdy says. Want to know how to see it? Call (781) 461-1600 extension 321.

Back at General Cinema: Harlan Jacobson's "Talk Cinema," Sunday-morning sneak screenings of art films, moves from the Chestnut Hill to the Fenway 13, beginning September 24. Call (800) 551-9221 for information.

Gerald Peary can be reached at gpeary@world.std.com

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