By David Fear

WHEN ALPHONSE FELDER helped organize an outdoor screening of Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo in North Beach's Washington Square last October, he'd expected two to three hundred curious onlookers. Close to a thousand people showed up. "We were overwhelmed by how responsive the neighborhood was to the idea," Felder admits. "I mean, Marin has been doing this for close to 10 years, and it happens in other parts of the country. But it just confirmed that there are ways to bring film to local areas in this city in creative ways, and to remind people of the value of being able to walk to a movie. We see a lot of the same spirit in these events that exist within neighborhood theaters."

Felder should know. Having grown up in San Francisco, he has fond memories of frequenting the Inner Sunset's Irving Theater and the Mission District's New Mission Theater. Both are no longer in business: the Irving was torn down, and the New Mission has lain dormant for years. With an estimated three dozen local theaters having closed their doors permanently over the past 20 years, and several more potentially on the hit list, the neighborhood cinema is becoming an endangered species.

Luckily, these once mighty movie houses have an ally in Felder and his nonprofit organization, the San Francisco Neighborhood Theater Foundation. Founded in 2002, the group grew out of a sense of civic duty and the desire to prove these so-called dinosaurs are relevant. "There was a group of us who were concerned that a number of these neighborhood theaters were closing and not much was being done about it," Felder says. "Plus, we were frustrated that the only arguments in favor of keeping these theaters open was nostalgia-based – everyone mentioned the 'charm factor,' but no one talked about the economic factor. We wanted to refocus the discussion on the value these bring to neighborhood commercial districts."

The organization fought to keep the Marina's single-screen Presidio Theater from being transformed into a Gorilla Sports gym by circulating petitions, instigating public hearings, and alerting the city's planning staff to the proposed plans. The space not only remained standing but also was bought by local businessperson Frank Lee, owner of the Richmond District's Four Star Theatre, and it will remain a movie theater. "Our plan right now is to tentatively reopen the space as a working movie house in August," Lee says. "There's no question they paved the way for this. It could very well have been a gym by now."

"We've been a lot of things over the years," Felder muses. "We've been activists when the Cinema 21 on Chestnut Street was shut down and the owners wanted to put a Walgreens there. We've been mediators, we've been facilitators, we've been incubators in terms of helping people come up with creative concepts for these venues that haven't been tried. Look at the Parkway Theater in the East Bay, which serves beer and wine. There's no reason something like that couldn't work in this city and still be profitable."

The organization plans to continue fostering the idea of community-based moviegoing outside the cineplex mind-set. A recent outdoor screening in the Mission District's Dolores Park brought 1,700 attendees, a number the group hopes to increase when it returns to Washington Square to show The Maltese Falcon May 29. Portions of donations collected at screenings will go toward Save the New Mission, a grassroots collective dedicated to saving that currently inactive theater. Felder's organization has also been talking to the owners of the recently closed Alexandria Theatre in the Richmond about the possibility of it remaining a movie house.

"There's an idea that neighborhood theaters – especially single-screen theaters – just aren't economically sound. But that's not true!" Felder exclaims. "Local businesses benefit from foot traffic, local residents benefit from having a movie theater close by, the city benefits from both an amenities standpoint and a historical standpoint. What I'm pleased with is that folks now think twice about just tearing these buildings down. It's been an important transition, and we hope to ensure that these theaters stick around for a long, long time."