Cinemark Tinseltown USA - Shreveport

8400 Millicent Way, Shreveport, LA 71105
(318) 798-6400


Review submitted by by "James" on 06/27/2007

Since Hurricane Katrina relocated movie production in Louisiana from New Orleans to Shreveport, the town is well on its way to becoming to the Hollywood of the South. But that doesn't mean Shreveport's a great place to live for film buffs. In fact, if you love movies, there's exactly one place in town to go see them--Tinseltown.

Though the city had maybe five other theaters before Tinseltown opened, within a year it had none. In fairness, the screens of the new movieplex were larger, the sound effects louder, and of course there was stadium seating. These features may have wowed the locals, but visitors will be hard-pressed to notice any differences from other stadium-style movie houses in other parts of the country.

Tinseltown isn't a bad theater, exactly, but kinda sucks in several ways:

1. Because it is the only game in town, they tend to select the lowest common denominators and the reliable hits, and shuffle them rapidly. Despite this fast rotation, Shreveport misses lots of films. Casual movie fans in Shreveport react to about a third of movies nominated for Oscars by saying, "When did that come out?"

2. The audiences at Tinseltown are--Shreveporty. They like to interact with the movie, people in nearby rows, and their cell phones.

3. No student discounts. It makes sense that they'd offer no student discounts, since they're the only game in town.

4. Bathroom cleanliness does not seem to be a priority--picture the filthiest bathroom in the filthiest dive bar on a really busy Saturday night and you'll have an idea what to expect.

5. Availability of parking and the length of lines on weekend evenings are almost unbearable unless you're one of those people who like to camp out for movies. Did I mention Cinemark is the only game in town?

Of course having said all of this, I've been to about a 100 movies at Tinseltown and never had my experience ruined by any of these factors. It's not a total disaster, just kinda lazy since it's local monopoly.

Cinema Grade = C