Now there are plans underway to create a Cinema City-style complex across from the Supreme Court. While plans to open multiplexes downtown, in the new Alrov Mamilla Avenue Mall and at the Sherover Center in Talpiot have come to naught, it seems that this latest initiative, spearheaded by the Jerusalem municipality, may actually come to fruition.

The initiative is part of a larger plan to increase tourism and promote culture in the capital city by making the government complex more accessible to the general populace and increasing the city's cultural offerings.

The proposed "Cinema City" fits both bills, with its location in the federal government quarter and its grand movie-going plans. The complex, which is being designed by the architectural firm Kolker-Kolker-Epstein, will hopefully bring Jerusalem's cinema scene to a new level, with 15 screens, a museum dedicated to Israeli cinema - which has undergone an upswing in popularity in the past few years with film festival accolades and even Oscar nods - a Bible museum and art galleries.

According to architect Opher Kolker, a key player in the project's planning team, "Although the project is still in the planning stages, we are talking about an area near the Supreme Court, which we are transforming into a 15-screen cinema complex. What does this mean for Jerusalem culture? There are almost no movie theaters in Jerusalem right now and we are going to open 15, so you can draw your own conclusions."

Hope just may be on the horizon for Jerusalem's film aficionados.

Illustration courtesy of Tzachi Vazana for Kolker-Kolker-Epstein.