Revenge of the Essefficist Update: Metreon Tix Now on Sale
Greetings loyal readers. Welcome to Tuesday. You know those annoying people you see at Giants games with the laptops, busily availing themselves of the free wi-fi network? The Essefficist is them. Even as we type, JT Snow has just smoked a double off the centerfield wall. Now Fonzie's up. We got our Jason Schmidt posters; did you? Anyways, today's question is a perfect example of why the Essefficist was put on this Earth. Look and learn, young Padawans.
Dear Darth Essefficist, Dork Lord of the SFith-
Where should I go to watch a the midnight opening of Episode III now that the Coronet is closed? Where will all the guys dressed up as Stormtroopers and Jedi go to flaunt their knowledge of the ways of the force, their light saber skills, and their sewing ability? Ideally, It should be a big single-screen theater, but the only one I can think of in San Francisco is the Castro and I'm not getting a real strong indication from the force that they'd show a Star Wars movie. What's a fanboy to do?
And, oh, I almost forgot, what is thy bidding, my master?
Bowing to you,
TK421, Cell Block 1138
Oh, no need to bow, TK421. Why aren't you at your post? Get up. Rise, and giveth us instead $7.50, with which to buy some buffalo chicken tenders. Or a movie ticket. We here at SFist, always game to obsess over Star Wars, have publicly lamented the loss of the Coronet and wondered about just this question.
We checked in with a friend at ILM who poked around and told us that the movie will be playing at the Metreon, the AMC theaters, the Century 20, and the Metro, not to mention about 40,000 other screens near you. We asked them about the Cinema, in Corte Madera (where we watched the Star Wars movies as a kid), which isn't too far from ILM itself, and yeah, it'll be playing there. (And they're doing the company screening there.) But she didn't have any of the juicy bits we were looking for about the midnight screening action.
So we went to the mother-lode: the message boards at theforce.net. Specifically, the San Francisco Fanforce message boards. Even more specifically, a thread entitled REVENGE OF THE SITH - SF PREMIERE. Not surprisingly, we found out pretty much everything we needed to know.
Looks like the place to be in San Francisco at 12:01 AM on May 19th, like it or not, is the Metreon. The Metro is the only single-screen theater in town doing the midnight thing, which is tempting. (But c'mon, Union Street?) And the AMC 1000 is a more palatable multiplex than the Metreon. But if mass quantities of Stormtroopers and Jedi is what you're looking for--and it seems like that's got to be the deciding factor--the Metreon is the place to be. (Unless you're in the East Bay, in which case you might also consider going to Jack London Square, where the ubergeeks will also be out in force.)
We sent emails to some of the members of the SFFF (or of Rogue Squadron) and we heard back from quite a few of them.
Matt told us, "I'm currently planning the line up for Metreon, where the charity premiere will be on May 12. The line-up may be only one day, though due to SF laws and/or previous experiences with big crowds at Metreon, most recently the PSP launch at the Playstation store."
Ming said, "Right now we're shooting for the Metreon. I know other groups are doing the Jack London theater and another group of hardcore folks are going to do the Metro. However there may even be a shot that the Coronet would some how miracly reopen due to certain efforts put forth by certain people I know but that's a long long shot. Now that the Coronet is no longer a real current option, your guess would be as good as mine as where the best fan atmosphere would be."
Robert told us, "the best place for the midnight premier in San Francisco would be the Metreon theater. We will be there as a club so there will be many people there in costumes, and we are working on several sponsors for prizes and drawings and contests right now."
Erick said, "I would recommend seeing Star Wars at the Metreon, while its not quite the same as the coronet and other single screen theaters, i can guarantee, it will have the best atmosphere, I, along with most other members from fan force, will most definitely be dressed up and in full Jedi gear, as well as the 501st (Ed note: Ian Hiebert, Commanding Officer of the Golden Gate Garrison 501st Legion contacted us to state that the 510st will not be in attendance, so don't expect them there. Sorry about that, Ian!). Im not so sure how the line up is going to work just yet, it is probably going to be set up similar to the line for the PSP release, its a bit early to tell. If you are in the east bay, I believe the Golden Gate Garrison is planning a midnight event at the Jack London theater in oakland, there will definitely be a great atmosphere there as well."
If all of that doesn't make you want to be at the opening midnight showing at the Metreon, we don't know what would.
To be thorough, we contacted the Metreon and spoke to Michael Spring, the Marketing Director there, who told us that they aren't selling tickets yet and they're not sure when that'll happen, although they expect to have a midnight showing and they expect to have as many as eighty costumed Star Wars fans around for many of the opening weekend screenings.
Update: Metreon Tickets on Sale as of Wednesday. We got a call from Michael Spring today (4/27) and he told us that tickets would be on sale for the Metreon screenings as of today. We were in the neighborhood and stopped by and, sure enough, they were available and we bought some. (How could we not?) They're selling tickets for the digital projection screen at midnight now and will add more screens as necessary. He also said that they'll be showing a 35mm print on the IMax screen, but to our minds, that sounds like watching a Quicktime movie on a big screen TV. What's the point? You can go to the Metreon box office for tickets or get 'em online.
If you're dying buy your tickets already, you can get them for a lot of theaters at Fandango or here for the AMC theaters.
And by the way, we love Lyrics Born, but that was the worst "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" ever. Ever.
In closing, as per usual, please remember that you can e-mail all your questions about San Francisco or your own exciting life to the Essefficist, thereby obtaining, if you're lucky, even more info on the everyday things going on around you all the time (or just post 'em in the comments). And remember, March still equals Irish Month around here, even though it's April now and officially Baseball Month. May'll be Star Wars month. Maybe. We'll see how The Movie is.