The last picture show on ribbons of film taped together in the cinema in Queenstown Mall was Kick-Ass 2 last night.
The complex will be closed to the public while Reading dismantles the three bulky film projectors and huge platters, the only way to get the decades-old equipment out of the cramped projection room, for transport to a cinema in Invercargill.
A single projector will be saved for display in the revamped foyer to commemorate the past.
The three-cinema complex will be made digitally 3-D and 2-D capable one auditorium at a time.
It will reopen with its debut digital film White House Down on Wednesday. All three cinemas will be digitally refitted in time to present The Heat on Saturday, which will be an R18 night at which glasses of Champagne and soft drinks will offered to patrons to mark the occasion.
Cinema has been considered an important link to the outside world for the once-isolated community of Queenstown since the 1860s, when lantern slides entertained the first settlers and miners.
Lakes District Museum director David Clarke said the ''grandfather'' of movies in Queenstown was engineer Horace Tompkies, who arrived in 1913.
''He was best known for the tourist launches that he ran on Lake Wakatipu, but he also set up the town's first movie theatre in Queenstown's original town hall in Ballarat St [now Winnie's Gourmet Pizza Bar]'', he said.
''The first movies were silent, usually accompanied by a pianist. When the technology changed and sound arrived, Horace moved with the times and the theatre was affectionately known as 'Tompkies' Talkies'.''
Mr Tompkies sold his theatre to George Cochrane. Mr Cochrane, who later became Queenstown's mayor, installed an opening roof, meaning on a warm summer's night a movie could be watched while the stars shone above.
