My friend Joe Meyers knows as much as Anthony Wiener does about posting viral pix on yfrog. He found this sign at the Avon in Stamford. Apparently, “The Tree of Life” is a little too out there for even art-house audiences.

The epic, artistically ambitious “Tree of Life” was highly anticipated by fans who are kept starved by unprolific  director, Terrence Malick. Over four decades, Malick has directed six feature films. His first work, Badlands, is mesmerizing for reasons I just can’t grasp. It was on Turner Classic Movies a few months ago, and was chosen on the Frank Decaro Show listeners were to view and discuss.

I would say the 1973 Sissy Spacek/Martin Sheen movie had a strange, haunting quality to it. “Tree” sounds simply strange and I’m completely on the fence about whether to see it or not. Salon wrote a good explainer for the piece that sort of nudges me into the theater, despite the film’s length and apparently unsatisfying resolution. Somebody out there please tell me what to do.

“Hollywood seems to have room for only one reclusive and very slow working genius at a time and Malick is filling that slot now,” says Mr. Meyers.

Downtown Bridgeport’s own art theater, if that’s the term for it, is finally about to open. It’s facade was finished a couple of years ago, and it’s been torture looking at what appears, from the street, to be a functioning cinema gathering cobwebs.

I’ m not certain what caused the delays, but now the Bijou is finished and very real. Its schedule has been posted.

Live events have yet to be announced, but the stage is equipped for that too.

Of course, for me, the main event is the bar. Giant tubs of cola don’t cut it for me when I’m watching a movie. Years of watching films, in comfort, at home, have spoiled me. And I’d prefer to sip a cocktail while watching the credits roll.

This is a big advance for Bijou Square, Phil Kuchma’s project that has already brought in Two Boots, Epernay, Space, the Bijou Square Wiine Shop and the late lamented Las Vetas coffeehouse, which couldn’t quite hang on until the theater opened. One of my coworkers is enjoying her life living on the apartments above the retail shops.

Downtown Bridgeport hasn’t had a movie theater downtown since the screen on Fairfield Avenue — which was a porn theater, and then a “family” cinema — closed in the 80s. Next door was Sol’s Cafe, which was a hangout for reporters at the Post and Telegram, back when reporters hung out in bars. Sol’s became a respectable restaurant years ago. Now, the Bijou Theater is about to return, making room for live acts, as well.

The exterior was restored a few years ago, and looks great. Upstairs, its second-floor ballroom and viewing balcony house Antinozzi Associates, and being architects, you know that their interior spaces look fantastic.

But with the Downtown Cabaret and the Playhouse on the Green in crisis, is this timing a little odd? Maybe, but developer Phil Kuchma may possesss the right alchemy to make this work. The neighborhood as a whole has been building, after a long, slow decline that started after World War II. Until then, the area was an active center, containing Howlands departement store, Sears, Barnum Hotel, Koenig’s Art Shop and an early iteration of the King Cole market.

Here is some history on the place.

And more here. Note the sarcastic remarks about the likelihood that the cinema would ever reopen.

Photos here.