Daniel M.'s Profile

There's a sign in their window today saying the Department of Public Health revoked their license to serve food.  I think that might be all you need to know.

This place has gone seriously downhill in the last year or two.  Projection and sound are getting sloppier all the time (in the years I've gone here, the projection and sound has gone from pretty uniformly good to being atrocious about 50% of the time).  The projection is increasingly dim (they either aren't replacing the bulbs or they're turning the power down to save a few dollars) and the sound is increasingly muddy.  Speakers short out.  It's clear nobody's taking care of the equipment.

You should avoid any movie in Theater #3 because the screen is damaged and marred, so there's a huge blotch in the middle of the left half of the screen, visible and distracting in all but the darkest scenes.

At some point, they stopped caring if the movie experience was any good at all.  It's an unfortunate loss for independent and foreign film fans in San Francisco.

The first film I saw at the Clay was Brazil, in its original run, in 1986, when I was 18 or 19.  Damn, I'm getting old.  How did that happen?

Anyway: as a single-screen theater that shows a lot of foreign films you can't see anywhere else, I'm favorably disposed to the Clay from the start.  It falls short in several respects, but I still find myself here often because I appreciate the content.  Landmark sends programs a lot of their foreign-language films into the Clay.

The auditorium itself is long and narrow, with an aisle nearly down the center, so the percentage of seats I'd characterize as "good seats" is small, especially if you aren't among the lucky few who snag a seat in the row with a large gap in front of it for patrons using wheelchairs.  If you use a wheelchair, you'll have pretty much the best seats in the house, which isn't always the case, especially in the age of stadium seating.

The seats aren't Medieval torture devices, but aren't especially comfortable either.  The theater offers plastic cups and a pitcher of water in the lobby, which is very civilized, considering that theaters make the lion's share of their money at the concession stand (most of your ticket price goes back to the distributor, the studio, etc.).

Projection is hit-and-miss.  On a few occasions they've been trying a little too hard to wring a few more hours out of a projector bulb that needed to be replaced.

For a long time, the Clay employed unusually unpleasant, snotty employees, which isn't typical of the Landmark chain of theaters.  This era appears to be over--hopefully for good.  The staff still has a bad habit of leaving ticketholders standing outside, even if it's pouring rain, until just a few minutes before the movie starts, even though the theater has a decent-sized lobbby, and even when it was quite clear the cleaning of the auditorium was complete.  Most Landmark theaters, like the Clay's cousin on Geary, the Bridge, are a bit more laid back about that sort of thing.

The Clay is easily accessible on Muni.  If you choose to drive, and you can't find parking near the theater, consider parking at one of the Japan Center garages (the Annex Garage under the Kabuki if you'll be back by 1:30 a.m., the Main Garage under the Japan Center mall if you'll be later than that) and taking the 22-Fillmore up to the theater, or just walking.  This may prove faster than orbiting blocks in Pacific Heights in an endless search for an open space.  Walking back from the Clay to the Japan Center is all downhill, so it's a pretty easy walk for most people, even if  you've just gotten out of a midnight showing and you don't feel like waiting for an Owl bus.

The Clay has its drawbacks, but gets a marginal thumbs-up for showing films, especially subtitled foreign films, you would otherwise have to rent on DVD (if you could find them on DVD at all).

We've had two excellent meals here.  Each dish has presented a variety of flavors, served with sauces that complement, but don't overwhelm, the main dish.  We've eaten mostly at off-peak hours; at peak hours, the cavernous space might be pretty noisy, especially if, as I've heard is common, there's a big crowd around the bar.

The decor is swanky but not overwhelming, and the wine list offers a nice variety of things to try.  Give some thought to the four-course tasting menu on the cover of the menu; a series of wine pairings is available with it.  Also, if you opt for the tasting menu, keep in mind that not everyone at the table needs to order the same four items; this is not obvious from the way the menu is worded.

Their advertising promises a wide array of beer, wine, and spirits, and the store delivers, in narrow aisles densely packed with everything from microbrews to a half dozen brands of absinthe.  The staff was quite helpful when I asked "do you have more of this?" and someone scaled a ladder and found me an unopened case of this.

They lose one star for having a parking garage that's quite harrowing to get in or out of: a narrow entryway with sharp turns and ample opportunity for slow-speed head-on collisions.  Park on the street, if you can, and avoid the garage.

The food here is nothing to write home about; it's pretty standard diner fare, and overpriced to boot.  I'm tempted to add a third star, however, just because they're open late, and San Francisco rolls up the sidewalks so damned early that finding a place to eat at 11:00 p.m. or midnight is a bit of a challenge.

The place is clean and brightly-lit, and service is usually quite speedy.  And if you park in the Fifth and Mission Garage, you can get to Mel's without running the gauntlet of creepy panhandlers on the north side of Mission that you'd have to run if you went to the 24-hour Denny's across the street.

I suggest ordering the onion rings in lieu of the fries; the onion rings are pretty good while the fries are just average.

Believe the hype.  You pay more to see movies at Arclight, but they're presented brightly, in crisp focus, and with great sound.  If you have a problem, the place is crawling with staff, and I even saw an usher admonish someone for failing to put away their cell phone.

After you see a movie at Arclight, you'll realize every other film you've seen elsewhere has been out of focus.

Arclight is high on the list of reasons to live in LA.  Seriously.  I say this as someone who lives in San Francisco.  How often do you hear San Franciscans say nice things about LA?  Yeah.  So heed my words: Arclight is ten different kinds of awesome.  If they opened one in the Bay Area, I'd never go anywhere else to see movies.

The food's okay, but the bitchy attitude brings this three-star joint down to one star.  Having eaten there before, we planned to have dinner there after catching a movie.  I stopped in to ask when they closed.  They told me.  When I came back about 20 minutes before their stated (and posted) closing time, they said they were closed and piled a lot of attitude on top of it.  Their location is convenient to the heart of the Castro, but they won't be getting a return visit.  The food doesn't justify the demeanor.

This is an exceptionally friendly, family-run diner offering American breakfast and lunch food at astoundingly low prices, especially for the increasingly upscale Inner Sunset.  The hash browns are to die for; if your dish doesn't come with them, ask for a substitution to get them.  Portions are generous and the food is much better than any other diner-type establishment in the neighborhood (most of which charge more).

They have quite a few regulars; there's a reason for that.

Everything about the Kabuki sounds great in theory, but falls apart in practice.  They're clearly aping the premium movie experience offered by Arclight in Los Angeles, but where Arclight excels, Sundance fails completely.  They offer reserved seats, but good luck finding any staff to enforce the seating.  (Arclight, on the other hand, has so many ushers that it feels like a police state, albeit a delightful and satisfying police state.)  They promise superior projection and sound, but movies are often shown out of focus and with serious sound problems.  A theater's first priority should be proper presentation of its movies, but at the Sundance Kabuki, movies are an afterthought, an accessory to the eco-friendly decor and upscale cafés and bars.

Except at peak hours, the theater is pretty much staff-free (or run by invisible leprechauns) so creepy, noisy people wander into the theaters.  The seats are nice, but the movie is unlikely to be in focus.

I've tried several times to contact a manager at Sundance to complain, but they never reply.  On the other hand, when I made a complaint at the often-reviled AMC Metreon, a manager responded to my e-mail almost immediately.  Sundance cares about the environment, and they care about the food and drink, but they don't care about the movies, and they certainly don't care about you.

It's a nice venue for the San Francisco International Film Festival, mostly because SFIFF takes over the joint from the (imaginary?) people who run it the rest of the year.  But avoid this place for movies at any other time.