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No Parc-ing There wasn't a dry eye in the house last week as the landlord for the Cinéma du Parc, Montreal's best-known repertory film den, put spanking new locks on its doors and effectively shut down operations at the three-screen theatre. Co-proprietor Thierry Martin said he was shocked over the move by Crown Life, which he says came amid renegotiations for the lease. "Things weren't going as well as we'd hoped in terms of box office," Martin admits, "but we were paying the bills. We negotiated the current lease four years ago, when we expected things would be better by now." Though many are hoping the Parc will reopen, Martin is uncertain of the cinema's future. The closure puts several film releases on hold, including John Boorman's The General (Behaviour Distribution), which was to open this Friday, March 5, and the experimental NFB feature Desperately Seeking Helen (March 19). "We brought life to that building," says Martin. "We brought the people into the cinema." The Parc was to face rather daunting competition next month, when Daniel Langlois' three-screen multimedia complex X-Centris will open on St-Laurent. A publicist for X-Centris says she's sad to see the Cinéma du Parc shut its doors. "We really didn't see this as competition," she insists. "We're set to do something quite different." --Matthew Hays
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