The future of mainstream cinema in Strasbourg city center in question

• The project for a new cinema behind Les Halles in Strasbourg and the possible transfer of the Vox was not supported during a Eurometropolis council a year ago.

• Despite radio silence on this file, the Letzgus family, which is carrying out this project, still wishes to meet elected officials and decision-makers in order to find a solution on a project on which it has been involved since 2015.

After "the war of cinemas" and "the Vox against attack", "the Vox is resisting" is now on the bill. For almost three decades, the Letzgus family has been leading the cinema scene in downtown Strasbourg (via Schiltigheim). Owner of Vox, the mainstream and central cinema in the city, she is also the founder and minority shareholder of Star cinemas. Problem, the project on which she has been working since 2015, the transfer of the Vox, took the lead in the wing.

The idea of ​​a large cinema was to lead to a complete change of the back of Les Halles, instead of the bus station, but the project was not sufficiently supported.

However, the current size of the Vox screens is "no longer really adapted to general public cinematographic projections and to the new requirements of spectators", explains René Letzgus, the "patriarch of the family" who knows what he is talking about, himself. same director, producer and screenwriter.

A project "which is no longer relevant"

For a year and the announcement of the "rejection" of the project during a council of the Eurometropolis, radio silence. But, far from having given up, the Letzgus family is waiting and asking for a meeting to put things straight with the decision-makers, namely the mayors of Strasbourg and Schiltigheim, the president of the Eurometropolis, Pia Imbs, and why not a representative of MK2. But no response. Contacted on this subject, the city of Strasbourg and the Eurometropolis confirm that the restructuring project behind Les Halles "is no longer relevant and is, in fact, putting a stop to the project to move the Vox to This site ".

As for requests for meetings with elected officials, it is explained that "various meetings took place with René Letzgus more than a year ago, to share this situation which results from political arbitration independent of the dynamics of the cinematographic ecosystem of the territory”.

“Meetings certainly, but which did not succeed since they were not the real decision-makers”, retorts the Letzgus family.

A matter of support

The real problem, believes René Letzgus, is that this project overlapped, "even if it predates it", with the MK2 multiplex project which is to take place at the entrance to Schiltigheim and located... less than 2 km as the crow flies from the Vox. To put it simply, after long procrastination, false announcements, conflicts between elected officials, the city and the Eurometropolis, a change of majority and the arrival of the health crisis, the Strasbourg Vox project moved to the hatch. Even if the latter had competed in a call for tenders which he had, “orally”, won.

This abandonment is also experienced as a “very bad signal for businesses and the attractiveness of the city center”, explained to

Pierre Bardet, director of the association of traders Les Vitrines de Strasbourg. Beyond the Strasbourg cinemas, the city prefers to highlight its "active support for the cinema and audiovisual sector". Since the start of the health crisis, she has mentioned various "operations to encourage the public to find their way back to dark rooms", such as the offer of 35,000 places for the children of the Eurometropolis this fall or even a competition game with 1,000 tickets to be won.

But, for the Letzgus family, there is no question of an end clap.

She still hopes for a productive meeting with the "real decision-makers", but also for MK2 to reduce its sails and, why not, for someone to offer it another solution than the one behind Les Halles, but in Strasbourg.

Negotiations would also be underway... So that this cinematographic saga is no longer devoid of end credits.

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• Movie theater

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