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    Gateway Film Center is the Film Festival in Our Own Back Yard

    “If you go to a major film festival,” says Chris Hamel, president of the Gateway Film Center, “or even a minor film festival, for that matter, there’s a certain energy – from the staff that works there, the patrons who are attending movies. And of course, there’s a ridiculously eclectic mix of titles, so you can see the newest blockbuster as well as a really great selection of independent and smaller titles that maybe you haven’t heard of.”

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    That, in a nutshell, is the concept behind the Gateway, although it hasn’t always been the case.

    According to Hamel, the multiplex at 1550 North High St. opened in 2006, owned by Campus Partners and run by the Drexel Theatre Group. It programmed a mix of mainstream and art house fare, but didn’t perform as well as the Campus Partners hoped. After two years, Landmark Theaters – the nation’s largest art house movie theater chain – came in to run the theater.

    Says Hamel, “They did accomplish the goal of getting the management and operating expenses under control, but from a marketing and programming standpoint, the theater actually went backwards and attendance dropped significantly in the time that Landmark operated the theater.”

    gateway-film-center-02By 2009, Campus Partners turned to Hamel.

    “They asked me to come up with a plan to try to realize the original vision of the theater,” he says. “At that point I was just a consultant, and we came up with the concept that was Gateway Film Center. We wanted it to feel like a film festival every day.”

    Hamel took over as president of the center in December of 2009 with that goal in mind.

    “We decided at that point that the operations, the food and beverage selection, the way the cinema itself ran really needed to mirror that programming.”

    Hamel and company accomplish this goal by scheduling a mix of commercial and independent films for the multiplex, bringing in a constantly changing lineup of specialty programs, keeping concession prices low, and listening to customer feedback.

    We got a lot of feedback in 2012 from patrons who said they loved coming to the Gateway,” he says. “People were surprised to find out we were independent. Gateway Film Center is one of the largest independent film centers in America.”

    Its size, its hybrid programming and its young audience make the center a vibrant but difficult to define venue. Says Hamel of the mix of blockbusters and indies, “The mistake that the predecessors made is they tried to go too commercial or too art. The audience that we get is primarily a millennial audience – 17 to 45 is our primary demographic. They want to see great movies. Sometimes those are giant blockbuster films and sometimes they’re tiny independent films.”

    Hamel addresses the perception that, being so close to Ohio State, the theater caters principally to college students.

    “We obviously get a lot of students,” he says. “About 45% of the tickets we sell are to students, but I’d rather be in a movie theater around college students than middle school students. Plus, I think it brings a lot of energy.”

    With the students mostly gone over the summer, does it negatively impact attendance?

    “I don’t think we struggle that mightily in the summer,” Hamel says. “Of course, that’s when the biggest movies come out. So we may not get the giant rise in attendance that commercial cinemas get, but we also don’t just die on the vine because there are a lot of movies out that people want to see. The fact that the students are gone might actually be an incentive to come to Gateway.”

    Aside from traditional programming, the film center relies on an ever-changing array of series and specials to bring in that crowd. These include Reelin’ and Rockin’, presented with CD102.5 FM with proceeds benefiting charity; the From Book to Film summer kids’ series; the Hoot family film series; and the nation’s longest-running horror film series, Nightmares on High Street.

    “It’s the only weekly horror film series in the US,” says Hamel of the program of newly released horror. Because of that, he says, “We’re inundated with submissions. We probably have more than we know what to do with. And that’s a great problem to have because, for the most part, you’re going to see the best of the independent horror offerings from around the country.”

    Among all the films, series and special programming, the Gateway’s biggest success came by way of a happy accident.

    “Doc Week was the biggest accidental success I’ve had,” says Hamel of the bi-annual festival of nonfiction filmmaking. According to Hamel, in late 2014, he’d booked 4 documentaries simply because of limited options.

    gateway-film-center-03He remembers thinking, “These are all great movies. We should try to tell Columbus, ‘Hey, you want to come out here. It’s like a documentary week!’”

    The success of that first effort has spawned the film center’s most successful returning series, a program that can boast screening every Oscar-nominated documentary in 2013.

    “I think if we ever stop evolving, a lot of the fun of Gateway Film Center would go away,” he says of the eclectic and evolving programming.

    “We want it to be fun.”

    Here are some ways to have fun at the Gateway Film Center:

    Premiering Thursday, May 29

    Maleficent: D) Robert Stromberg; starring Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning

    A Million Ways to Die in the West: D) Seth MacFarlane; starring Seth MacFarlane, Charlize Theron

    Premiering Friday, June 1

    Cold in July: D) Jim Mickle; starring Michael C. Hall, Sam Shepard, Don Johnson

    Wolf: D) Jim Taihuttu; starring Marwan Kenzari

    The Double: D) Richard Ayoade; starring Jesse Eisenberg

    Series and Special Events

    The Science of Superheroes: X-Men: Days of Future Past 

    Shows Fri, May 30

    The final “Science of Superheroes” ends as a panel of comic book enthusiasts and scientists argue what’s more important when it comes to science and superheroes: fact or fiction. Takes place after the 7:30 p.m. screening of X-Men. Free and open to the public.

    From Book to Film: The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) 

    Premieres May 31, 2014

    Gateway’s series with the Columbus Metropolitan Library continues with this contemporary classic, brilliantly adapted from the Roald Dahl book. Directed by the indie king Wes Anderson! Admission is FREE when you show a library card. The series we’ll also host a book fair, and select performances by PB&J Jazz and Actors’ Theater.

    TV on the Big Screen: Halt and Catch Fire  

    Premieres Friday, June 1, 2014

    AMC revisits the PC revolution of the 80s in Season 1 of their new drama pitting a visionary, an engineer, and a prodigy against the corporate behemoths of the time.

    Stage and Screen: Driving Miss Daisy

    Premieres Friday, June 4, 2014

    Filmed live, this is the stage play as performed in Australia by Angela Lansbury and James Earl Jones.

    For tickets, showtimes and information, visit www.gatewayfilmcenter.com

    A full slate of movie reviews is available on my website www.maddwolf.com. You can also follow me on Twitter @maddwolf and like me on Facebook at facebook.com/MaddWolfColumbus .

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    Hope Madden
    Hope Maddenhttps://columbusunderground.com
    Hope Madden is a freelance contributor on Columbus Underground who covers the independent film scene, writes film reviews and previews film events.
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