Its accompanying theater, then run by AMC, opened with 24 screens in 1997, and quickly became one of the hottest properties in the nation. Mall culture was already dying in the 1990s as shoppers flocked to outdoor shopping centers like Huebner Oaks. Even before the Bijou opened as Santikos’ art house, San Antonio’s older mall theaters, including those in North Star Mall, Ingram Park Mall, Windsor Park Mall, and Rolling Oaks Mall, had closed. Streaming may have had an impact, but it wasn’t the only thing.Ĭonsider that the Santikos Bijou was the last of the suburban mall-based theaters operating in San Antonio (*Rivercenter Mall's AMC is still operating). So why did the Bijou close? Was it just the Netflixes and Amazon Primes of the world that killed the Bijou? …and the all-time greatest, when Ted, head of food prep at the Bijou, made over 100 bloody horse-head shaped cookies to give out to attendees when we screened “The Godfather” in 2010.
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Moderating a thoughtful religious discussion with clergy after a 2016 screening of “The Last Temptation of Christ,” a movie that sparked protests when it opened at the Crossroads 6 in 1988.The "Godfather" cookie delighted scores of moviegoers at TPR's Cinema Tuesdays screening in 2010. Hosting a disco dance contest in 2016 with our screening of “Saturday Night Fever.”.Actor Bob Hinkle visiting with us in 2011, explaining in person how he became friends with Paul Newman and James Dean, and choreographed the famous “hog scramble” scene in “Hud.”.Director Severo Pérez bringing his personal print of “…And the Earth Did Not Swallow Him” to a screening in 2006.The Playhouse cast of “The Wizard of Oz” and the Woodlawn Theater cast of “Mary Poppins” performing in-theater before screenings of those films.Members of Houston’s famous Kashmere Stage Band surprising the audience with a Q&A following a screening of the documentary “Thunder Soul” in 2012.Some of my favorite memories of Cinema Tuesdays shows at the Bijou include:
TPR’s Cinema Tuesdays also showcased current films that hadn’t played in town, even at the Bijou, like the acclaimed Russian film “The Return,” the moving death row documentary “At the Death House Door,” or the Mexican thriller “Miss Bala.” Over 16 summers, thousands of film fans were treated to the best in classic film, which in 2004 wasn’t otherwise showing anywhere else in town. It made sense that this theater, adorned with classic movie posters like “King Kong” and “Casablanca,” and dedicated to art house fare, would be our new home. In 2004, Texas Public Radio moved its summer film series, Cinema Tuesdays, from the AMC Huebner Oaks to the Bijou. (Alamo Drafthouse had not yet expanded to the city of its namesake.) That same year, Santikos announced the Crossroads 6 would be reopened as “The Bijou,” pioneering the in-theater dining concept in San Antonio. In 2001, Santikos acquired the Crossroads 6, and also launched an ambitious theater-building plan with the opening in 2003 of the Western-themed Silverado 16 at Bandera Road and 1604, and the Mayan Palace on I-35 South. Shockingly, the woman I brought along married me a few years later, and remains with me today (though she hasn't revisited any of those titles)!Īct III was bought by a New York-based investment company in 1998, and shortly thereafter rebranded its theaters under the Regal Cinemas banner. I saw “A Clockwork Orange,” “Dog Day Afternoon,” and “The Excorcist” all over the course of one Friday.
celebrated its 75th anniversary by booking an entire week at the theater, devoting each day to a different decade. The Crossroads theater was where I got my mind blown by a new film called “Pulp Fiction,” sitting in the second row with a craned neck as the picture’s massive logo floated upward onto the screen to Dick Dale’s “Misirlou.” A few years later in 1998, I remember Warner Bros.
In that case, the Bijou was the place in San Antonio to go for three and a half decades, under the ownership of Santikos, as well as Act III Theaters and Regal, which operated the Crossroads 6 for about a decade from the late 1980s through the 1990s. That is, unless your idea of a good date movie is something out of the ordinary, something that stimulates the mind and great conversation.
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Before it closed on March 27, 2022, the last movie I saw at the Santikos Bijou was on March 20, when my wife and I went to see the Oscar-nominated Norwegian film “The Worst Person in the World.” The first time I saw a movie at the theater may have been in 1993, when I took a girl I liked to a free screening of Oliver Stone’s “Heaven and Earth.” NOTE: Most viewers would not characterize Oliver Stone’s “Heaven and Earth” as a very good date movie.
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