The Cecchi Gori Fine Arts Theatre, last leased by Marc Cuban’s Landmark Theatres chain, closed it’s doors for the last time on May 18th. It went out with a bang – it played a four-month engagement of Downfall, a truly great film from Germany about the last weeks of Hitler’s life. Read that again – a FOUR MOUNTH engagement in a single-screen theatre in 2005. This is truly an anomaly these days, when a film travels through a 14-screen multiplex, all the way down to the smallest auditorium at the end of the hallway, in a matter of a couple of weeks.

The Fine Arts was a very good auditorium. The two Downfall shows I attended there were bright and perfectly in focus, which, in today’s exhibition business model, is not something to be taken for granted.

There have been quite a number of closings the past couple of years on the Westside – the Mann Westwood 4-plex on Gayley is now a Whole Foods, the Mann Plaza on Glendon was just recently demolished to make room for a new apartment/retail monstrosity on the opposite side of Westwood Village, and the United Artists Coronet 4-plex was converted into a much-needed Sav-On Drug store at the southern side (one block below Wilshire) a couple of years back. It is safe to say that I will not step foot in the Sav-On, ever.

Before Landmark, AMC ran the Fine Arts, and Laemmle before them (if my memory serves). The theatre played mostly foreign and upscale fare, something one may think would do very well in the middle of Beverly Hills. But the city’s incredibly restrictive street parking, in addition to the non-existent parking lot (they used to validate for the Flynt Publications building on the corner of La Cienega) did them in, I believe, no matter that the theatre was so much better then the nearby but tiny Landmark’s Westside Pavilion 4-plex or Laemmle’s Sunset 5, which all play roughly the same fare. The lot and building are for sale at $3.1M. I would hope that a film person would come through and keep it in operation, just as Robert Bucksbaum kept the Crest in Westwood alive after Pacific Theatres dumped it a couple of years back (although I do not think the Crest story is considered a success from a financial perspective, at least for Mr. Bucksbaum).

More info on the theatre can be found at Cinematreasures.org, a truly fascinating site I stumbled upon doing research on the theatre. The Fine Arts’ listing disappeared from the Landmark website, and only after calling the Cecchi Gori’s Landmark recording line did I hear the dreaded “After 68 years in operation…” message. The theater was (is, damn it) ornate on the outside and the inside.

For nostalgia’s sake, take a peek at Cinemetreasures.com – without a doubt, you will find the movie houses you visited weekly in the city of your childhood, and find out what became of them. A friend who grew up in England said most of her childhood theatres were demolished. Search by name, city, zip, etc.