The Midlands’ go-to spot for a cheap movie screening is no more.

Spotlight Cinemas St. Andrews, located at 527 St. Andrews Rd., has closed, per an update to the theater’s website.

“We would like to thank the many customers over the past 8.5 years for your patronage,” the post reads, encouraging people to visit the chain’s other local location, the Capital 8 theater in northeast Columbia. “We will miss you all.”

The five-screen cinema had operated as the area’s only discount theater, with all screenings costing $3, regardless of time of day or the age of the patron. For this price, the theater offered second-run films that had already been released in more expensive cinemas a few weeks or months after their initial run.

Per the movie theater history site Cinema Treasures, the theater initially opened under different ownership in 1983 and had been operated by Spotlight since 2019.

The theater’s most recent Facebook update on its offerings, posted Nov. 17, had it showing “After Death” (released Oct. 27), “A Haunting in Venice” (released Sept. 15), “The Equalizer 3” (released Sept. 1), “Blue Beetle” (released Aug. 18), “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem” (released Aug. 2) and “Barbie” (released July 21).

The closure adds to a continued dwindling of movie theater options in the Columbia area. At this point, there are only seven movie theaters still operating in the area. The St. Andrews closure leaves three in Lexington County (Regal Northlake Village in Lexington and the Regal Columbiana Grande and AMC Harbison 14 in the Harbison retail and dining district).

The Forest Acres area recently lost two theaters, with the 2022 closures of the Regal Columbia 7 at the soon-to-be-redeveloped Richland Mall and the AMC Classic 10 near Fort Jackson. AMC also pulled out of its spot at Columbia’s Dutch Square Center, but the lesser-known chain BTM moved into that spot and operates what is now the cheapest theater in the Midlands (with adult matinee tickets costing $7 and evening adult tickets costing $10).