Alpine Cinema

6817 5th Avenue,
Brooklyn, NY 11220

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Showing 151 - 175 of 196 comments

Theaterat
Theaterat on May 12, 2005 at 9:57 am

Brooklyn Rob… The Coliseum had mostly English speaking fare, but on occassion they would have a Spanish language film according to a Hispanic friend of mine who lived in the neighborhood. The Terminal, at Dean St. and 4th Av. showed Spanish films near the end of their run- late 60s early to mid 70s. Dont remember a movie house at 4th.Av. and 29th.St. but at 4 th. Av and 16th.St. there is a Strauss auto shop in a building that looks like it was a movie house at one time.The classic theater shape is undeniable. At one time Brooklyn had over 200 movie theaters, but now we are down to a mere 12.

BklynRob
BklynRob on May 11, 2005 at 2:49 pm

I think it was on the south side. It later became a bowling alley. Paradise lanes maybe,not sure.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on May 10, 2005 at 6:37 pm

BklynRob— 4 Ave and 29 Street on the west side of 4 and south side of 29? Ja, you’re really jogging my memory. Perhaps. But a third- or fourth-run emporium in any case, at least in the mid-1940s when my memory begins. I’ll consult FDYB.

BklynRob
BklynRob on May 10, 2005 at 3:03 pm

I remember Robert Hall & TSS also. But I always remember the Coliseum showing Spanish films. Did anyone ever remember a movie theater on 4th Ave. & 29th Street? It was a bowling alley at one time,then a gas station. For some reason I have a vague memory of seeing “Attack Of the 50ft. Woman” at this theater. I am probably mistaken.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on May 10, 2005 at 9:05 am

Yes— On 4 Avenue in the 60s, there was also a used car dealership owned by Jack D'Amico. I always thought it odd that, aside from the Coliseum on 52 Street and the Terminal on Dean Street, 4 Avenue sported no movie theaters. As a kid, I held the firm belief that every major avenue should be lined with movie palaces.

Theaterat
Theaterat on May 10, 2005 at 8:44 am

Box Office Bill… Quess the old memory ain`t that bad after all!As a movie obsessed kid I was sure there was a theater here and, lo and behold, there was! It is amazing that this theater does not have its own entry in “search theaters”. I found it in the entry for the Sunset.I used to go shopping in this area with my parents way back when, and it was a great place to go on a Friday or Saturday night. I remember a Woolworth, Davega appliances and a great toy store. We also used to go to the Times Square Store(TSS) on 4th av. and 61st, and the Robert Hall clothes shop across the street on 62th. st.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on May 9, 2005 at 9:19 pm

The Vanity: yes! That was there then, and likely the theater that I confused with the Sunset. If it was on the south-west corner of 5 and 56, then, yes, that was the Vanity.

Theaterat
Theaterat on May 9, 2005 at 7:13 pm

Box office Bill… I checked the “Sunset” in search theaters and came up with another theater on 5th. a. and 56th.st. in the Sunset Park area. It was owned by Interboro and it was called the “Vanity”.This may be the lost theater I vaugely remember from the early 60s.According to the entry, this theater had no air conditioning. Must have been like an inferno on a hot day.They probably charged a little less than average to get in.

Theaterat
Theaterat on May 9, 2005 at 7:10 pm

Box office Bill… I checked the “Sunset” in search theaters and came up with another theater on 5th. a. and 56th.st. in the Sunset Park area. It was owned by Interboro and it was called the “Vanity”.This may be the lost theater I vaugely remember from the early 60s.According to the entry, this theater had no air conditioning. Must have been like an inferno on a hot day.They probably charged a little less than average to get in.

Theaterat
Theaterat on April 30, 2005 at 7:29 pm

Bklyn Rob….You ain"t missing anything!

BklynRob
BklynRob on April 30, 2005 at 6:02 pm

I recall as a kid taking the bus to the Alpine to see “Help” with the Beatles. It was a nice big single theatre then,now as a multiplex it is terrible. The last time I was there was about 1990 and it was very bad!I could hear the movie in the next theatre-the walls seemed paper thin.Also it was too small,dirty & very crowded. I never have gone back.

Theaterat
Theaterat on April 28, 2005 at 11:41 am

Box Office Bill…..Gilda was rather sophisticated fare for a 4 year old, though the stage show sounded like fun! I was not weaned off Disney until I was 8 years old!

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on April 26, 2005 at 6:49 am

Here’s a photo of the Alpine in 1946. It comes from Brian Merlis and Lee A. Rosenzweig, “Brooklyn’s Bay Ridge and Fort Hamilton: A Photographic Journey” (Brooklyn: Israelowitz Publishing, 2000), p. 131.

View link

The double feature on the marquee lists “Gilda” and “Blondie’s Lucky Day.” Since the Rita Hayworth classic opened at RCMH on 14 March of that year, the photo was likely shot in the following May.

The cranky kid at the extreme right could very well have been me, since I was approximately his age at the time, and defiantly in character. I would have been pestering my mom to take me to the Alpine, even though we had already seen the feature film some weeks earlier at Loew’s State, where it had moved after RCMH. At the State, “Gilda” was accompanied by a stage show that featured a memorable puppet act, the chief reason (I think) why my parents (bless their hearts) took me to see that steamy film (and people wonder why I behave the way I do).

jbels
jbels on April 25, 2005 at 11:50 am

The Alpine showed a midnight preview of Carrie when they were showing Norman, Is That You?

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on April 23, 2005 at 10:19 am

I just consulted Film Daily Year Book of 1950 again, and found that the Alben is indeed listed (I missed it because, in scanning the columns for a theater on 3 Ave, I failed to see its address printed off-center on the right side). Its address was 5406 3 Avenue (ergo between 54 and 55 Streets) and it held 447 seats. It is not listed in the FDYB of 1954, so it surely did not survive the introduction of widescreen in ‘53.

Theaterat
Theaterat on April 22, 2005 at 8:54 am

Box Office Bill… Yes, there were excellent Norsk delis, but only 3 or 4 remain. There even was a good restaurant called the Trondheim not too far away from the Park on 5th. Av. They had great herring and meatballs, not to mention the fresh cheese and breads. It too is history.There also was a great hobby shop called Stanleys on 4th.av near 49th.st. Remember going there with my friends, and building those great Aurora and Revell ship and plane models.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on April 20, 2005 at 4:10 pm

Theaterat—

Yes— I’ve been following your postings on the Ratz, and have realized that the hole-in-the-wall on 3 Avenue in the 40’s could not have been named the Ritz. That’s was a curious conflation on my part, mixing two theaters in the 40’s, one on 3 Ave, the other on 8 Avenue. But I still retain their images as distinct in my mind’s eye.

Alben: I would never have recalled that name (it’s either cognate with the ancient name for Britain, “Albin” or “Alban,” or else it commemorates a partnership between two guys, Al and Ben? likely the latter, given that time and place). There’s no listing in the Film Daily Year Book of 1950 (I’m certain that it was still operating then).

I dimly recall the Center, but not the Berkshire. I’ll check on them in the Film Daily Year Book when I’m in the library. PhilPhil sounds up to speed on all of it. I moved from Brooklyn in the late 1960s, so have only a phantasized recall of it, enhanced by bookish data.

Ja, ja, ja, die 40’s verr a Nordisk neighborhood — great delicatessens, and a Norwegian language newspaper, Nordisk Tidende, printed on 63 Street and Ft. Hamilton Pkwy, no?

Theaterat
Theaterat on April 20, 2005 at 2:33 pm

Error Above…. The Park was not demolished ,the inside was gutted. The building still stands, and is a supermarket now.

Theaterat
Theaterat on April 20, 2005 at 10:53 am

Thany you Box Office Bill! You are a wealth of infomation. I remember the Park, even though I never went there. I remember being in that neighborhood probably in Oct 1965 with a friend. His grandmother(wno was Norwegian) lived in the Sunset Park area.The theater was about to be torn down. We asked the workers if we could go inside and take a look. They told us to be careful.I remember a mid size house with 3 blocks opf seats and a small balcony.Another friend who currently lives on 48th. st off 5th av lived in this area in the late 40s. The theater on 3rd av was called the Alben- not to be confused with the RKO Albee. It was a hole in the wall and showed last run fare. Another friend of mine who calls himself PhilPhil{he does not have a computer, so I post his entries under my screen name}recently described the Ratz..sorry, ment the Ritz on 8th. av and 46th.st Qv. Another nabe. He also recalls the Berkshire on 60th.st and 8th.av wich is now a Muslim mosque, and the Center…never heard of it…on 6th av and 55th.st. I wish I had a time machine so I could go back and experience some of these long forgotten theaters , who knows, maybe someday.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on April 15, 2005 at 2:13 pm

Theaterat—

I checked the Film Daily Year Book for 1952 about the Sunset. It appears that, with the reported address of 4705 5 Avenue, the theater stood on the southeast corner of 47 Street, not on the NW corner of 55 Street as I reported above. Unless I’m just mad north-by-northwest, I still hold to my mind’s-eye image of it as a squat greystone building. And my guestimate of its size appears reasonable: FDYB reports a capacity of 564. Since FDYB discontinued listing such theaters around 1956, when the theater still appeared functional, I can’t trace the date of its closing.

FDYB lists the Park at 4322 5 Avenue (that one then definitely on the NW corner of the avenue) with a big capacity of 1,308 (never been there, never imagined that size; can only wish the neighboring comic-and-mag store such stability). And it lists the Coliseumâ€"I’d forgotten that one!â€" with a capacity of 1,102, at 5205 4 Avenue (and so blurring into my image of the Sunset as standing on 55 Street).

Here’s yet another that just occurred to me (and matter for further checking in a yet older FDYB): the Ritz (I think), beneath the Belt Pkwy on 3 Avenue in a mid-‘40s block. I recall it as a hole-in-the-wall, with a marquee designating “Top Fotoplays” but with no space for specific titles. I’ll bet that it started its life as a nickelodeon or silent-film parlor and didn’t survive much into the 1950s.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on April 14, 2005 at 3:24 pm

Theaterat — You’re right: the Sunset Theater stood at the southwest corner (or was it northwest corner?) of (I believe) 55 Street and 5 Ave., with its rear-exit wall on the side-street. I’d check the exact address in Film Daily Yearbook. I remember it as a low greystone building, with a blue-neon-framed art-deco-ish marquee. To judge from the size of the building, I doubt that it had a balcony. It probably sat 500 patrons. Its fare consisted of subsequent runs, and its demise might have occured in the late ‘50s or early '60s. I never entered it.
Thanks for recalling the Park. To this kid in the early '50s, the world’s most wonderful secondhand-comicbook-and-magazine store stood a few doors away. It was a terrific treat for me to go there with a few nickles and exit with an armful of vintage comics and mags, especially ones with coverage of WWII.

Theaterat
Theaterat on March 31, 2005 at 9:23 am

Box Office Bill- Thanks for the info on the Electra and the Stanley theaters. Tell me, Box Office Bill. Other than the Park theater at 41st and 5th av, and the Coliseum on 4th av, were there any other theaters on 5th av.in the Sunset Park area? My memory may be hazy(comes with age0 but I think I remember another theater on th av, probably at about 53 or 53st.This had to be in the early 1960s.Thanks.

Theaterat
Theaterat on March 28, 2005 at 3:44 pm

Box Office Bill….Thank You thakk you.

BoxOfficeBill
BoxOfficeBill on March 28, 2005 at 11:54 am

Born in Bay Ridge in 1942, I lived there (except for some university years) until 1967. And, yes, I recall with gargantuan appetite a good deal about that neighborhood, Park Slope, the Heights, and Flatbush in those years. Especially about movie theaters therein.

The Stanley occupied the space of a present-day mini-supermarket on Fifth Ave between 74-75 Streets. Q.v. my contribution to the Stanley page on this site. Its mate, the Electra, occupied a similar space on Third Avenue and 75 Street. Q.v. the Electra page on this site.

Theaterat
Theaterat on March 28, 2005 at 11:12 am

Box Office Bill….You seem to be a bit older than I. A friend tells me there were movie theaters on 5th Av and 74th St and 3rd Av and 75th St in Bay Ridge. If that is true. please tell me the names and give a description of them, As you can probably see, I am fascinated by them and as a lifetime movie goer and Brooklyn resident, I am trying to compile a complete listing of movie houses in Brooklyn. Thank You.