General Cinema was a nationwide chain of movie theater

Movie theater

A movie theater, cinema, movie house, picture theater, film theater is a venue, usually a building, for viewing motion pictures ....

s that operated from 1935 until 2002. The theater chain, in its prime, operated approximately 621 screens, some of which were the first cinemas certified by THX

THX

THX is a trade name of a high-fidelity audio/visual reproduction standard for movie theaters, screening rooms, home theaters, computer speakers, gaming consoles, and car audio systems. The current THX was created in 2001 when it spun off from Lucasfilm Ltd...

. Its mascot was Popcorn Bob and his Candy Band, which graced the company's policy trailers from 1993 until 2002 and were created by Lucasfilm

Lucasfilm

Lucasfilm Limited is an American film production company founded by George Lucas in 1971, based in San Francisco, California. Lucas is the company's current chairman and CEO, and Micheline Chau is the president and COO....

. For a time, General Cinema also owned the department store Neiman Marcus

Neiman Marcus

Neiman Marcus, formerly Neiman-Marcus, is a luxury specialty retail department store operated by the Neiman Marcus Group in the United States. The company is headquartered in the One Marcus Square building in Downtown Dallas, Texas, and competes with other department stores such as Saks Fifth...

 and the publisher Harcourt Brace, as well as radio stations in several major markets. The company suffered greatly when it filed for bankruptcy protection in 2000 and what remained of the company afterward was acquired by AMC Theatres in 2002. With the acquisition, the Credits program merged into the MovieWatcher network.

The General Cinema Corp. trademark was placed up for auction on December 8, 2010.

External links

• Some Early History of General Cinemas From the Grand Opening Ad of the Cinema in Daytona Beach, FL