SURREY — The renovation work is done at Landmark Cinemas’ Guildford Town Centre property.
The new-look movie theatre boasts completely redesigned lobby and concession areas, as well as power-recliner seats in all auditoriums.
Renovation work was done in stages over the past several months.
“The introduction of powered recliner seating provides a significant increase in personal space and a more relaxing, disruption free movie-going experience,” the Calgary-based Landmark company stated in a release on Monday (July 17).
“Free reserved seating is also part of the theatres’ premium offering and, best of all, there has been no change to the ticket price.”
The reno job includes a lobby with eating area (tables and chairs), new Coca-Cola Freestyle “beverage experience” and additional rooms for birthday parties.
On Monday, the company also announced completion of renovation work at its New Westminster movie house.
Tonight, (July 19th), an invite-only, premiere screening of Luc Besson’s new Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets will celebrate the end of construction work at Guildford. The sci-fi/adventure film, which stars Cara Delevingne, Dane DeHaan, Clive Owen, Rihanna and Ethan Hawke, opens on Friday (July 21st).
Extra-wide recliners were also recently installed at Cineplex Cinemas Strawberry Hill.
At Landmark’s Guildford theatre, the bill for reno work is approximately $5 million, Bill Walker, the company’s chief operating officer, told the Now-Leader in February.
With larger seats comes reduced capacity in each of the theatre auditoriums. Overall, the theatre has lost 55 per cent of its seats, with the total number reduced from approximately 3,000 to 1,300.
“The theatre was underutilized from a capacity perspective,” Walker revealed in February. “Typically, we saw 15 per cent capacity during a given movie screening, on average.”
The movie theatre at Strawberry Hill opened in December of 1998, not long before Famous Players built and opened its theatre in Guildford, which Landmark purchased in 2013.
Landmark recently launched an ATOM app that allows users to order tickets, reserve a specific seat and, if they choose, tell friends exactly where they’re sitting for a movie, so they can book a nearby seat.