When I was a kid — and this will age me, for sure — I saw my first movie alone at AMC Countryside 6: Star Wars.
Back in the day, Countryside was the nice, shiny mall in town, where your rich friends bought all their school clothes and you could ice skate on a rink inside.
Furthermore, a six-cinema theater back in the day was huge — a megaplex. Earlier in the 1970s, there were just "twins," and then later the houses grew to four- or five-plexes (like Clearwater's Mall's brick-built cinema, where I saw thousands of movies growing up).
Comings and goings aside, I am especially pleased to share that the Countryside's well on its way to to be legit again — especially now plans to build a fancy new Cobb 12 multiplex.
This article appears in Feb 3-9, 2011.