At first I thought I would title this, "ArcLight Santa Monica, Why Haven't You Crushed All The Other Theaters Around You?," but, then I thought, because they must be slightly cheaper. You see the Third Street Promenade has four theaters to choose from, all owned by different operators. That's a lot of choice. The newest and must up-to-date is ArcLight Santa Monica, so I wonder why it hasn't done something to make the competition fall apart nearby.Then you have Laemmle's Monica Film Center, whose been there for more than 44 years, which from the outside doesn't even look like a theater. The actual comment I overheard while walking up to it to see a movie this weekend was, "Oh, this is a theater, this is the Laemmle's here, I've driven past it so many times and didn't know it was here."
Yeah, for some strange reason Laemmle's Monica Film Center in almost unidentifiable as a theater from the outside. It says Laemmle's on it, but the letters are almost hidden inside the structure. Posters for movies are barely seen unless you walk up close to the windows.
It seems ridiculous that Laemmle's would to take so little effort to say it's a movie theater with three competing theaters nearby and when it's one block off from that competition.
The outright design of it makes it seem boring. And there is no attempt to draw anyone in. It's just downright fascinating that it either thinks enough people know about it or just doesn't care. And if just doesn't care, why should we?
