A cultural underdog

It isn’t hard to find offbeat and thought-provoking flicks in L.A., but drive south a bit and it’s another story. As a friend once said, “Being an art-film fan in Orange County is like being a liberal in Texas: You’d better really want it.”

Having been both, I can understand the trepidation other Orange County film fans are feeling these days.

For a time in the ‘90s things were looking pretty good. We’d long had a few classic indie art and foreign film houses to turn to -- the Port in Corona Del Mar, the Balboa Theater in Newport Beach, the Bay in Seal Beach -- when the then-dominant Edwards Cinemas chain expanded its specialty offerings beyond Newport’s venerable Lido to its University site across from UC Irvine and then its South Coast Village 3 and Town Center 4 complexes, both within walking distance of South Coast Plaza.

Film buffs started feeling positively heady with the birth of an international film festival in Newport Beach.

Things got so rosy five years ago that Edwards folks teamed up with South Coast Plaza honchos and South Coast Repertory and O.C. Performing Arts Center execs to christen an Orange County Theater District across from one of the nation’s top shopping malls. They showed a splashy movie trailer hyping the movie theaters and tony nearby restaurants, and promised even more to come for the serious film fan in the years ahead. We sipped champagne at the reception and felt smug.

Now I look back on that period as our cinematic Camelot, that one brief shining moment when Orange County film fans felt inferior to our northern neighbors no more.

The Balboa closed a decade ago, one of many art and repertory houses shuttered by the VCR revolution. We felt the loss, but with the growth elsewhere, it seemed an aberration, not a warning sign. Then the long-ailing Port died.

The bottom really fell out when Edwards Cinemas filed for bankruptcy two years ago.

We fretted as several of their theaters were taken over by other companies. Luckily, the Rancho Niguel and Brea Plaza, which came back as Mann and Captain’s Family theaters, respectively, still mix some offbeat fare in with their mainstream stuff.

Back at South Coast, there’s one art-house complex where there had been two.

But we’ve still got the Lido (now a Laemmle Theatres house) and Edwards University theaters (part of the Regal Cinemas chain), and the Bay somehow holds on year after year.

We continue to support film series at UCI and Chapman University, and even though the ambitious Newport Beach film fest nearly went belly up, it came back under new management. L.A. may still have roughly twice the number of film societies and theaters where art, indie and revival films are shown, but in a lot of ways we thrive on our cultural underdog status.

We cling to any sign that reinforces our belief that things will get better.

Now that we’ve believed our way into a World Series championship, the hope for a few more O.C. art houses doesn’t seem quite so Frank Capra-esque. And it’s worth it, hoping for more chances to experience films like “La Vita e Bella” (Life Is Beautiful), “The Crying Game,” “Like Water for Chocolate,” “The Usual Suspects,” and “Howards End,” films that enlighten and inspire, hold a mirror up to the human condition, make us think -- and, in rare instances, change our lives.

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Art houses in O.C.

Edwards South Coast Village

1561 W. Sunflower Ave., Santa Ana

(800) 555-8355

Edwards University

4245 Campus Drive, Irvine

(800) 555-8355

Regency Lido Theater

3459 Via Lido, Newport Beach

(949) 673-8350

Bay Theatre

340 Main St., Seal Beach

(562) 431-9988