I'm going to New York in December and I would like to pick the brains of any NY resident's that frequent this forum. I was wondering:

A) If there are any remnants of 42nd Streets more sleazy days that can be visited.

B Where there are some cool places to pick up DVD's in Manhattan, I'll also be staying in New Jersey so any suggestions for there would also be appreciated.

Thanks

Hi Scott. I'm afraid you'll find the 42nd Street we all knew (or wish we did) and loved is GONE. The last bits that were still hanging on, between 6th and 7th Avenues, have been razed to make way for yet another shiny new skyscraper. Ah, progress.

Around the corner and up 8th Avenue for a couple of blocks you'll see small bits of the old sleaze left, but I do mean "small" and "bits." This is where the porno houses were, but most of even those buildings are unrecognizable now. One is a Burger King! Special sauce, indeed.

I'm afraid that what you'll in that area find are tourist shops, chain restaurants, new office towers, and noisy commuter bars. If not for the still-filthy Port Authority bus terminal, the strip's old "charm" would now be completely obliterated.

For DVDs, J&R is by far the best choice. It's on Park Place near City Hall. They have an extensive selection, better everyday prices than anyone else in town, and good sales.

Let us know how your trip goes!

-Dean

That's actually Park Row near City hall, and I agree, J&R is the best around - just avoid it at lunch time during the week, and especially during the holiday season! I think most Mobians would also agree when I recommend Kim's Video on St. Mark's Place - lots to choose from there. And yes, alas, the Deuce is dead - a recent issue of the Village Voice even compared the Times Square of TAXI DRIVER to today's PG-rated version - not too much left to add, shall we say, character to the area.

I would also recommend Entertainment Outlet (2 branches at 14th St. & 6th Ave. and 40th & 5th) for some bagain dvd's. New Releases are sometimes cheaper than J&R, and there's a rack near the entrance with "Best Buy" discounted dvd's.

I recently picked up the Pioneer THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT 2-disc Special Edition for $9.99.

Thanks guys

Re: 42nd Street: Up until sometime earlier this year, one of the old 42nd Street theaters (the Times Square) was still intact and its interior still visible from the street, but then they boarded it up with blue boards.

I must say, however, that you should still walk up (down) 42nd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues because, in some strange way, the old honkytonk spirit of the street (a spirit going back almost 100 years) lives on. People are using the street in a way that brings back, for me, the liveliness of the street. Granted, the attractions on the street are not terribly notable. Other than a couple of legit theaters there's virtually nothing there you couldn't find almost anywhere else. And there's no sleaze left anymore. But the vibe of the crowd, especially on a Friday or Saturday night, when neighborhood kids mix with tourists, is enthralling. And this from someone who felt and continues to feel a deep sense of loss over the (inevitable) clean-up of Times Square/42nd Street.

As for the rest of Times Square (Broadway intersecting with Seventh Avenue from 42nd Street stretching north to about 50th Street, give or take a block), it's something very new and different from what used to be there. There's definitely a BLADE RUNNER atmosphere, with all the media companies and giant screens and giant versions of chain stores. The worst thing about it is all the tourists--thousands of them packed into the area every night! The painful thing about Times Square is the closing of every movie theater that existed in its original configuration. The only theater left operating north of 42nd Street before you get to the Ziegfeld on 54th Street is the Loew's State multiplex situated two stories below ground under the Virgin Megastore (on the site of the old Loew's State movie palace). So there's no marquee advertising it because it's below the store. You have to enter the store and go down two levels to get to the theater entrance. And woe is you if there's a personal appearance in progress and the way to the theater is blocked. When I went to see KILL BILL VOL. 2 at that theater last spring, I had to wait about ten minutes while Ashlee Simpson and her entourage passed through to make a personal appearance before hundreds of screaming teenybopper girls in the area around the theater entrance.

As for DVD stores, I'll just second another poster's recommendation of Kim's Video on St. Mark's Place (just off 3rd Avenue, near Astor Place), second floor. Also, if you're into Asian films at all, go to the Chinatown shops on the Bowery: Lai Ying (89 Bowery), Lai Lai (85 Bowery) and New York Music (? something like that) on the corner of Bowery and Canal, all three on the same block.

When I was on 42nd Street a while back (we're talking high school, so like 4 or 5 years), I passed by a store which had a huge hand-written sign in the window: All Kung Fu Tapes $5! Big Blow-Out! Of course my heart sped up and I raced to go in, but the group I was with was way too high-class and uptight to be seen in a 42nd Street video store, no matter how cleaned up the street was now. I'd kill to go back to New York City, with safe company...

Maybe someone here would have info on other grindhouse style movie theaters anywhere in the US?

There are a few in Philly and Baltimore that I know of, but a lot of them are pretty sleazy, and although I might go despite my fear of sleaze just to see what a grindhouse theater is like, I'd prefer to go see one that just has regular, non-pornographic movies.

Also, related to 42nd St: as a person who has vague memories of feeling frightened of Times Square's "XXX" nature as a kid, it really does make me feel sad to walk around that area now. Whenever I see a movie from the 80s about New York, like BASKET CASE, TAXI DRIVER, LIQUID SKY or MANIAC, I feel kind of depressed to know I'll never be able to experience it that way, and that all the dumpy kung-fu theaters and bright neon lights have been replaced with Lion King musicals and obnoxiously large advertisements. The only bright side I see is that the urban tides ebb and flow, and that if it weren't so expensive to live in the city, maybe all the interesting stuff would come back.

This New Jerseyan had a fling with grindhouse cinema in the early 80s, in Chicago. Once the Chicago Theater returned to its legit roots, in 1986, it was all over for the Loop scene (though I'm not sure it was ever as decrepit as the NY one).

As a theater buff who continuously marvels at how relatively spic-and-span the Great White Way is these days (corporate influences and disappointing productions aside) I can't see I really miss the Times Square grindhouse grunge and grime. [And the restoration work done on the salvageable hellpits is nothing short of a miracle.] Things change, in this case for the better; and the prejudices and phobias that kept you out of the grindhouses back in the day would probably still keep you away from them today (they would me; I have no great desire to watch, today, a Charles Bronson film while broken bottles whizzed near my head, as happened at a gang-filled Loop theater visit 20 years ago). Memories of the scene can be safely, sanely refreshed by reading incredible books like THE GHASTLY ONE and TALES OF TIMES SQUARE, or revisiting the movies you describe. [THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS has a marvelous scene in a rep house that seems to be near Times Square, as I recall.]

And, like everything else, the grindhouse scene and its "interesting stuff" never really vanished; it's just morphed into a newer form. I'd much rather watch a Subway Cinema series at the Anthology or one of Two Boots' esoteric Euro programs, with an audience of fellow buffs rather than work-release felons, than walk into a fading theater wondering if I would leave with all my basic faculties intact.

If you want to recreate the grindhouse atmosphere, just spread Karo syrup on your living room floor, put a cheesy movie into the DVD player, sit in your cat's litter box, then piss on a hot plate and enjoy the aroma.

:lol:

Seriously, today's grindhouse is our living room. The only reason we had to frequent cinema dives in the old days is because the films we loved weren't on video and they didn't play conventional movie theaters. But since an UNBELIEVABLE array of film is now available in great quality on DVD, there really isn't a need for the grindhouse anymore.

And I don't miss them. I feel much safer sitting in my own home watching my front projector than sitting in a darkened theatrical dungeon listening to ominous grunts coming from the guy two rows behind me. Besides, it's really cold sitting in a movie theater wearing only a raincoat. :unsure:

Well, I think part of my wish to experience the old movies theaters comes from the fact that nothing really replaces seeing a movie on the big screen with other rowdy people around. Near Philly a group called Exhumed Films occasionally puts on cult/exploitation film shows in a creepy NJ theater, and I love going simply to cheer or boo along with everyone else, see the movie on a gigantic screen with the scent of popcorn in the air, and hear other horror enthusiasts discussing the movies afterward. The presence of a crowd tends to make people more riled up when they're seeing a film. Plus the atmosphere isn't so sterile as it is in the huge multiplexes, and they actually show movies I like!

I imagine the grindhouse environment to be kind of similar, only more wild, like when I think of riots during screenings of THE WARRIORS, etc. Of course, I'm probably romanticizing it to a certain degree, but seeing something on video is not a full replacement for seeing it in a theater...and today no theaters seem to show low budget movies, since you basically have to be in with the big studios to get anything widely distributed.

Speaking of Chicago - The Music Box Theater on Southport still plays midnight movies and some from the golden age of sleaze, including 3D XXX and horror flicks like SUSPIRIA...I think the Music Box was, at one time, a dumping ground for skin flicks...

I remember Loop theaters running tons of chopsocky and blaxploitation. I saw THE COWBOYS, OLIVER, 2001 and HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS in enormous Loop theaters before they slid into the gutter...

During the 70s, the closest we suburban kids got to anything like the Loop theater scene (Chicago's 42nd St) was packing up for the drive-in - in particular the Skylark Drive-in Theater in Aurora, Illinois. I witnessed THEY CALL HER ONE EYE, HARD SOAP, SEX WITH A SMILE, THE DEVIL TIMES FIVE, EATEN ALIVE, RABID, GOD TOLD ME TO, among others, out in the middle of a west suburban cornfield. Now those were the days...

In LA, there's a theater in the mall across from USC that had a lot of the "character" you guys have mentioned. I forget it's name, but it mainly played regular mainstream films, but it was filthy, cheap, rat-filled, and the Crips from down the street came to the more violent films that played there.

They had a great midnight movie program(with lousy prints) on the weekends during the USC school year. It's where I first saw John Carpenter's The Thing and Argento's Suspiria(with free gummy worms!). It's hard to match the feeling you get watching The Thing with three other people(all in seperate rows) the week before Christmas and walking home at 2am over deserted South Central streets.

Been a few years since I was there(damn time flies), things might've changed.

Similarly filthy, if quite a bit safer, is the New Beverly Theater on Beverly and a block west of La Brea. It's in a Hasidic neighborhood, and is probably the safest place in LA to park your car on the street(and when I lived in LA you could, which is rare for most residential areas in the city). The film selection is great, the prints vary from ok to pretty good, and it's cheap. Double features for $5-6.

It looks like there may be an actual honest-to-goodness grindhouse still operating in Queens: the Fair Theater in Jackson Heights.

there was a porn theatre on the west side of cleveland a few years back, which had no name, besides the black THEATRE letters on the front, but it showed horror/exploitation movies on friday or saturday nights from time to time. the place was a complete dump, which is a good choice of words because the bathrooms looked like people forgot how to use the toilet properly. also, there were always an army of hookers out front before and after the shows. and they sold popcorn with ants in it. but still, there were some fun times to be had there with fans when they played a movie that a lot of people were into. this place was definately in a shady part of town and it was eventually shut down because of the other activities that went on there, but it goes with what you were saying.
and the person who mentioned exhumed, they put on a good show from time to time and it is definately more fun watching this stuff on a big screen with lots of fans.
out.

I have returned from my trip to the Big Apple and there really isn't anything sleazy about 42nd Street at all (although the Duane Reade outside Port Authority feels a little grubby). I visited J&R on Mobius recomendations and picked up:
Pee Wee's Christmas Special
Pee Wee's Playhouse #1
Northern Exposure Season 2
and...uh...The Powerpuff Girls: 'Twas the night before Christmas.

All good prices but the sticker on Pee Wee's Christmas special tore the slipcase.
I also visited Kim's and felt very underwhelmed by a) the selection and b the prices.

Anyway, thanks once again for all the helpful advice.

Scott,

Are you sure you went to the right Kim's Video? The one on Bleecker St. and Lafayette has a fairly limited sales stock, but Mondo Kim's on St. Marks Place has an entire floor devoted to video sales, and it's hard to imagine you'd find the selection limited, especially when it comes to cult/horror titles and "rare" titles on DVDr.

Prices are 15% off list, which isn't too bad.

It was definately the one on St. Marks. I was was expecting a veritable Aladdins cave of esoteric DVD's and didn't feel that I'd found it. It may not have helped that my wife was stood with her arms folded glowering at me the whole time I was in their either :D