United Cinemas Shinsei 16

AMC Theaters opened the AMC Riverside Mall Shinsei 16 under the management of AMC Theaters Japan on March 25, 2000, featuring 16 screens and a grand total of 3,108 seats, marking the second largest Japanese AMC out of the five that served nationwide, with the largest being neighboring Nagoya’s AMC Holiday Square 18 that was now operated by United Cinema as the United Cinemas Toyohashi 18. The powerful launch of this megaplex also caused one closure in Ogaki, which is the Ogaki Toho Kaikan in October of that same year.

When United Cinemas took over the AMC Theaters Japan chain is when the theater was renamed United Cinemas Shinsei 16 on July 1, 2005. This lasted until March 14, 2011 despite Japan in the middle of healing from one of the worst earthquakes in the nation’s history, things went downhill for the theater. When Cinema Alliance LLC took over the megaplex that day, two of its auditoriums closed, its seating capacity being downgraded from 3,108 to 2,037, and was renamed the Gensei Riverside Cinema.

Exactly two weeks after that, the entire theater closed its doors on March 24, 2011. Its not the theater, but it was Riverside Mall itself. It was revealed that Kairyu, the company’s owner, had informed the landowner that he was giving up on management. Two weeks later on April 6, 2011, BIGDADDY, a real estate management company contracted to attract and manage tenants, was attempted to reopen the facility after fully aiming to attract tenants and open it fully within the year. But this never happened. It was confirmed that they discovered that the city of Motosu had seized the facility due to unpaid water and sewerage fees, bathing tax, and property tax. Landowners and tenants also owed hundreds of millions of yen, but Kairyu was unable to contact them. The landowners filed a civil lawsuit against the current and former management companies (a Rio Yokoyama HD affiliate) demanding the return of the land and payment of rent.

During this time, Yamada Denki opened his own store on a corner of the premises on May 25, 2012, but on September 27 of the same year, a settlement was reached in a lawsuit seeking the demolition of the building and the vacating of the land. Even after the settlement, the site remained open because the mall’s bus stop was installed on the north side of the building, but as of December 15, 2014, the site was closed to the public, and the bus stop was relocated to a road outside the site. When the site was renamed “Kairyu Riverside Mall”, the name of the bus stop was also changed, but was changed back shortly after the temporary closure. Renaming a bus stop is quite expensive, but Gifu Bus was forced to change the name.

In 2017, the landowners’ association paid the unpaid property taxes and other dues through a third-party payment system, and Motosu City lifted its seizure of the building in late March and began demolition work in April. The Aeon Town Motosu was built at the former Riverside Mall’s site.

Within the 16 screens in total, Screens 9 through 16 have the same amount of seats as Screens 1 through 8. Screens 1 and 8 are the largest with 455 seats while Screens 4 and 12 are the smallest with 95 seats. The rest of the auditoriums have ranging capacities of 117-261.

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