The Brief

The Los Feliz 3, a vintage triplex movie theater in the heart of the L.A. neighborhood, feels like a time machine. Just below Griffith Park, tucked away near the indie bookstore Skylight Books, the old Hollywood bar The Dresden, and the classic diner House of Pies, it’s an almost idyllic conception of a classic moviegoing experience.

As Sarah Winshall, independent film producer and co-founder of the L.A. Festival of Movies puts it: “This is nice. This is L.A.”

It’s the kind of outing that feels rare in a time when movie theaters of all sizes are struggling nationwide. And the theater itself is an experience. Of the three darling screens inside — one a red velvet shoebox, one with a groovy '70s pastel mural of shooting stars —it's Cinema 1, modern black with green lighting that holds the regular, popular screenings of the American Cinematheque.

The Los Feliz 3 was once an art house theater run by the Laemmle family (yes, that Laemmle) and now it's owned by Vintage Cinemas. It, like all theaters, struggled during the pandemic, but it was able to bounce back with some outside help.

Three theaters, 1,500 screenings

In 2021, the Los Feliz 3 marquee lit back up on Vermont Avenue, featuring the black and yellow logo of the American Cinematheque.

The marquee of the Los Feliz 3 in 2021 after the American Cinematheque began screening there.

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Jared Cowan

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The American Cinematheque, or AC, is a nonprofit organization founded in the 1980s by filmmaker Sydney Pollack alongside Gart Essert and Gary Abrams as a “year round film festival.” With a monumental 1,500 screenings a year and programming ranging from director retrospectives, Y2K favorites and art-house classics alongside special guests and Q&As, the AC has certainly lived up to that promise over the last 40 years. (Yes, this year is the 40th anniversary of the AC’s founding.)

In addition to the Los Feliz 3, the AC also screens films in two other iconic venues that are crucial parts of L.A.’s history: The Aero in Santa Monica and The Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood.

As artistic director Grant Moninger puts it: “We like to think of all of our theaters as different auditoriums and the roads and streets and freeways are lobbies.” He says, “You can go to each auditorium and experience the American Cinematheque rather than it happening all in one building.”

The Egyptian

For years, the AC didn’t have a permanent home, screening films in various theaters and studios around town, until damage from the Northridge earthquake left a historic venue empty and created an opportunity.

The Egyptian Theatre Hollywood post-renovation.

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Kevin Estrada

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Netflix

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In 1996, “the city of Los Angeles sold the Egyptian Theatre to the American Cinematheque for $1,” says Moninger, ushering in the next era of the AC. While Netflix currently owns the Egyptian, the AC has a 100-year lease to screen in the building on weekends.

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#281: Revival House says goodbye for now with a look at one of the biggest programming groups in town, the American Cinematheque. Celebrating their 40th anniversary this year, screening 1,500 movies a year in three iconic theaters across Los Angeles, the American Cinematheque has a movie for everybody, every night of the week. Check out our deep dive into the Egyptian Theatre's history and reopening here.

Revival House: American Cinematheque's Year-Round Film Fest

#281: Revival House says goodbye for now with a look at one of the biggest programming groups in town, the American Cinematheque. Celebrating their 40th anniversary this year, screening 1,500 movies a year in three iconic theaters across Los Angeles, the American Cinematheque has a movie for everybody, every night of the week. Check out our deep dive into the Egyptian Theatre's history and reopening here.

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The Aero

Over in Santa Monica, the AC has leased the Aero Theatre since the early 2000s. The Aero, so named for its aircraft industry ties, has been operating as a movie theater since WWII.

Initially opened as part of the development from the Douglas Aircraft Company in Santa Monica, The Aero ran films late into the night for factory workers, according to professor and historian Ross Melnick. “When you would come off of your shift at 4 a.m. and you were too wired to go to sleep, you could go to the movies."

As the aircraft industry faded, the business of movies picked up, and Santa Monica’s demographics started shifting. It wasn’t a surprise that by the early 2000s, people wanted a movie theater that “mimicked some of the love the Egyptian was getting on the other side of town,” says Melnick.

The Aero’s become a great space on the west side for events and director Q&As without having to “drive all the way from Santa Monica to Hollywood at 6 o'clock at night,” because according to Melnick, “it’d be easier if you go to the moon.”

The Criterion Closet takes discs of the distributor's classic film collection to fans.

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Screenshot, The Criterion Collection

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After a million-dollar renovation by the AC, the Aero reopened in 2005 and often sells out special events and Q&As in “about 14 seconds,” Melnick says. Now with three great venues under their belt, Moninger says the AC is “looking for more.”

The programmers

Like other theaters and programming groups, the AC shut down during the pandemic. Having just sold the Egyptian to Netflix and with the new revenue and time to build out the brand, Moninger says “we decided we were going to come out of the pandemic really hard.”

That meant setting goals like screening 1,000 movies a year and convincing the board to lease the Los Feliz 3 screen. And achieving those goals meant working with a crack team of film programmers.

Moninger says the key was asking, “What if we had a lot of great young programmers with tons of interests that are super dynamic, that can bring in new films, but that know and have a passion about all kinds of films?”

The American Cinematheque hired Imani Davis and Cindy Flores, who joined senior film programmer Chris Lemaire. Together, their work across all three theaters — running new film series alongside regular programming and events like Beyond Fest — has blown the AC's initial 1,000 screenings a year goal out of the water.

Grant Moninger and Michael Giacchino speak onstage at the Beyond Fest Special Screening of Marvel Studios' "Werewolf by Night" on Oct. 5, 2022 in Santa Monica.

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Charley Gallay

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Getty Images

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In addition to loving early 2000s films, Davis says she finds herself focusing on up and coming filmmakers. “I keep an eye out for directorial debuts, and then short filmmakers and local filmmakers,” she says.

It was a focus she knew she wanted to bring to the AC and, last year, she launched PROOF, a proof of concept short film festival that’s coming back for its second year.

“There was a want to do more with short films and emerging talent," she says, "so that’s been special, to have this place where we can uplift and give a platform to people who are up and coming."

Cindy Flores’ love of nonfiction brought a nine-day documentary takeover of all three theaters to the AC. This Is Not A Fiction meant that, as Flores says, “you are gonna go see a documentary and you’re gonna look at this lineup and there is gonna be something in there for you.”

Imani Davis describes the three theaters as each having their own distinct vibe — “there’s something classic” about a film at the Aero, and The Egyptian lets people see a film on “the biggest screen possible” — and that also leads to opportunities for subversion, like screening Jackass in a 100-year-old movie palace during a documentary film fest.

Lemaire heads up the annual festival Bleak Week (that’s a week of films chock-full of despair and bleak storylines, chased with Paddington and Paddington 2), which this year is expanding to the East Coast with showings at the Paris in New York City. Lemaire says the three L.A. venues really allow for an “eclectic idea about what film programming can be.”

But at the end of the day, AC screenings are about an audience and an experience.

“It's cinema. It's the big screen. It's a communal experience that should be shared,” Moninger says. “Art films and commercial films should all succeed next to each other and people should go to the movies and have a great time.”

Check out Bleak Week at the American Cinematheque starting on June 1. You can find the American Cinematheque's whole programming calendar here.

An East Hollywood nursing home that nearly lost its license this year because of repeated state citations for deaths of residents at the facility was cited again last month after another person died.

The California Department of Public Health cited Brier Oak on Sunset after a 92-year-old resident bled to death on Sept. 27. Staff members had continued injecting her with blood thinners over a 40-hour period in violation of clinical guidelines.

It’s an AA citation, the most severe the department issues when violations of care standards are determined to be a substantial factor in someone’s death. The facility faces a $120,000 fine.

These kinds of citations are rare. The department has recently issued, on average, fewer than 20 AA citations yearly across more than 1,200 skilled nursing facilities in California.

Brier Oak has received three AA citations for patient deaths since late 2022.

State regulations require authorities to suspend or revoke the licenses of any facilities that get two AA citations within a period of 24 months.

The state Public Health Department began that process with Brier Oak in May based on resident deaths in 2022 and 2024. But officials dropped that effort later because they say they determined the two patient deaths had occurred 26 months apart — just outside of the two-year window.

A spokesperson for the company that owns Brier Oak told LAist it has appealed the first two citations and is considering whether to appeal the third.

Advocates for nursing home residents say the recent death could have been avoided if the state had taken action.

“There were red flags, and a lot of these red flags existed prior to the death of this poor resident,” said Tony Chicotel, senior staff attorney with  California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform.

The state said Brier Oak has until Dec. 19 to notify the department if it intends to appeal.

What led to the patient deaths?

In the recent death at Brier Oak cited by the state, multiple communication and technical failures by nursing staff led to the patient bleeding out over a period of 40 hours, according to the citation.

The 92-year-old patient was immobile and had been prescribed a blood thinner called heparin to help prevent blood clots from forming. But once a patient is bleeding, those injections make bleeding worse, and potentially fatal.

When nursing staff found bright red blood in the resident’s diaper the day before she died, Brier Oak failed to follow established processes for documenting the bleeding or communicating it to a nurse practitioner or medical doctor, according to the citation.

Nurses told state authorities they delayed informing physicians because they “get mad” when contacted in the middle of the night.

The facility’s staff also failed to fully assess the patient to determine the possible causes of the bleeding and or to properly monitor the issue during crucial periods, according to the citation.

She suffered four internal bleeding episodes over 40 hours and continued to receive blood thinner injections.

The citation says a nurse practitioner at Brier Oak told state licensing authorities later that if she’d been informed about the patient’s ongoing bleeding, she would have stopped the blood thinner and sent her to a hospital.

In 2022, Brier Oak received a AA citation after a 62-year-old woman died from respiratory failure in part because nurses hadn’t been trained to operate her breathing machine.

In 2024, the nursing home got another AA citation. This time, a 63-year-old woman with paraplegia and severe obesity fell from her bed and died while a nursing assistant was changing her. The assistant was alone, even though the woman’s care plan required two staff members.

Who owns Brier Oak?

Brier Oak on Sunset is primarily owned by Genesis Healthcare, a publicly-traded nursing home operator that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July.

Once the largest nursing home operator in the U.S., Genesis was facing billions in debt when it declared bankruptcy, according to court filings. That includes millions in potential damages from lawsuits related to patient care failures.

In a brief statement to LAist, a company spokesperson said it's still considering whether or not to appeal the recent citation at Brier Oak.

The citation should trigger a suspension or revocation of the facility's license, according to state regulations. The latter means it would have to close its doors. The two most recent deaths and citations at the facility occurred within the two-year window.

The California Department of Public Health confirmed it cited Brier Oak on Nov. 26.

The department said the facility submitted a required written response before a Dec. 6 deadline, showing how it will fix the problems and prevent them from happening again..

The department determined Brier Oak was back in compliance during an onsite visit last week, a representative told LAist.

Brier Oak on Sunset currently houses about 150 patients, according to state records.

A bankruptcy judge has stalled the proposed sale of Genesis Healthcare to an affiliate of one of its investors.

Experts say it’s unclear whether the state would revoke the license of an owner who is actively trying to sell and turn over operations to someone else.

It’s been a rough start to ski and snowboard season for California mountain towns. Snowfall is well below average, but Christmas could come with some of the white stuff. Here's where things stand:

Hmmm. Didn’t we just have a record storm?

Yes. That big atmospheric river that hit Southern California last month made it one of the wettest Novembers on records. But since then, it’s been unusually warm and dry, which is not good for mountain towns that depend on snow, and the outdoor enthusiasts that flock to them.

How bad is it?

California’s snowpack is about 20% of normal for this time of the year, according to the state’s snow-tracking website. Southern California isn’t quite as bad off — we’ve gotten about half our normal snowfall so far.

As for the resorts, only about 20% of the terrain at Bear Mountain in Big Bear is open. About 35% of Mammoth Mountain is open.

Can’t they just make snow?

They are, but the unusually warm temperatures have curbed resorts’ ability to make enough snow to open more terrain. “If you're blowing water into 40-degrees, it's going to stay water,” said Justin Kanton, a spokesperson for Big Bear Mountain Resort. “ So as much as people probably would want us to just crank the snow guns all day, every day up here and just get things moving, that's not really possible.”

But there’s a silver lining!

The dry weather has allowed Caltrans to make good progress toward opening Highway 38, said Evan Engle, who chairs the board of the Big Bear Chamber of Commerce. The road typically handles up to 40% of traffic up to the mountain town, Engle said. But it’s been closed since September when it got washed out by Tropical Storm Mario.

Getting it open as soon as possible is key to keeping visitor traffic manageable, and getting supplies to Big Bear.

What’s the snow outlook?

SoCal mountains are likely to see some precipitation around Christmas, said Kyle Wheeler, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. But with temperatures not expected to drop much, it’s uncertain how much of it will be white, Wheeler said.

If you go to Big Bear: 

• If you plan to hit the slopes, get on it early, when the snow is at its best given the warm conditions. 
• No snow? There’s more to do than ski and snowboard. Check this list of winter fun events.  
• Worried about traffic? Consider going up earlier in the week. If you can’t do that, consider taking Highway 18 through Lucerne Valley. It’s a longer route if you’re coming from L.A., but less traveled, and less likely to make you car sick (fewer tight curves). 

The Los Angeles Police Department used more than 2,400 crowd control munitions in response to protests from June 6 to 14, according to a new report.

Officers used a total of 2,431 less-lethal projectile rounds and 35 canisters of tear gas over the nine days, according to LAPD reports. The department recorded 12 injuries officers caused with those weapons.

The LAPD released the missing report last week after LAist identified the use of crowd control weapons on four different days in June that had not been reported according to state law. Assembly Bill 48, which went into effect in 2022, limits when and how crowd control weapons can be used, and requires law enforcement agencies to publicly release reports on their use within 60 days.

A 30-day extension for these reports can be granted in some cases, but the LAPD released this report about three months late even if an extension was justified.

Officials acknowledged they were out of compliance on Dec. 10 before releasing the report, saying the delay “stems from the extraordinary volume and complexity of incidents” over that time.

This report is different from others

It is unusual for a crowd control report to include more than one day, and the report for June 9 through 14 covered six days and “45 sepearte [sic] non categorical use of force incidents.”

It does not describe any of those use of force incidents specifically, and the LAPD has not yet responded to LAist’s request for more detailed descriptions of those incidents.

The report also considered the entire six days to have been one continuous protest, though it included several anti-ICE protests over the week and the national “No Kings” protest on June 14.

Two reports released earlier this year for June 6 and 8 covered single days and provided more detailed descriptions of incidents where the LAPD used less-lethal munitions against protesters.