NYC Indie Film Temple Kim’s Video Is Reanimated By Alamo Drafthouse In Basement Floor Of Lower Manhattan Multiplex
02.04.2022 - 00:05
/ deadline.com
After succumbing to the demise of physical home entertainment and then being housed in a mountain village in Sicily, the eclectic holdings of New York City mainstay Kim’s Video have returned home.
Alamo Drafthouse has launched Kim’s Video Underground, a new outpost of the downtown indie film temple, which closed for good in 2014 after a years-long death rattle amid the rise of streaming. It occupies a site on the bottom floor of Alamo’s new Lower Manhattan location, which opened last October beneath an office building near the World Trade Center.
Tim League, founder of Alamo, joined with iconoclastic retailer Youngman Kim and officials from New York and Salemi, Italy (population: 10,000) for a reopening ceremony Wednesday evening. About one-third of Kim’s total collection of 55,000 discs and VHS tapes are available to circulate, with plans to rotate the rest through over time.
Nodding at a tradition begun by soldiers in Napoleon’s army in the 1700s, Kim used a sword to cut open a bottle of champagne being held by Kim. “Nobody died,” League quipped. “Kim’s Video will live forever!”
As with similar home video ventures in North Carolina, Austin and LA, Alamo is allowing patrons to rent discs or tapes for free, though they must put a credit card down and agree to cover late fees. Video, like the food and cocktail offerings at Alamo, offer customers a reason to spend more time at the company’s spaces.
“Today is a homecoming. Kim’s Video is part of New York’s historic film and indie culture,” said Anne del Castillo, Commissioner of the New York City Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment. She added that she lived early in her career on Avenue A, near one location of Kim’s in the East Village. But given she lacked the