13 Coventry Street,
London,
W1D 7DH

0871 200 2000

add to my map

Standard Ticket Price & Discounts: £8.50 after 5pm and weekends, £6 before 5pm weekdays, £6 Concessions (Mon to Fri), £5 Children (all week).

Capacity: Screen 1 (550), Screen 2 (250), Screen 3 (145), Screen 4 (155), Screen 5 (125), Screen 6 (95), Screen 7 (90).

Facilities: concession stands.

Special Offers: Mega-pass (yearly passes) available.

The UGC Trocadero is one of two multi-plex cinemas in the West End - the other being the Warner Village West End. It is located smack in the middle of the Trocadero Centre, but isn’t clearly sign-posted at the Piccadilly side - in fact there’s nothing outside the Trocadero Centre to indicate the presence of a cinema inside.

There are seven screens in all, two of which are of a decent size and seat over 200 people. However, the small screens are REALLY small, and you may feel cheated if you pay full price and end up in screen 7. Sight-lines (how easy it is to see the screen if someone is directly in front of you) are good in each screen, but the seating itself is uncomfortable and fails to provide ample leg-room, even in the biggest screens.

To make matters worse, the back of each seat has what seems to be a cast-iron drink-holder welded to it – I defy anyone to walk along the row and get into a seat without banging their shins. The sound quality in each screen is also substandard, though this may be the fault of the films themselves – certainly, a sample ‘test’ film had unintelligible dialogue in places.

The UGC Trocadero has the usual concession stands, of which there are two. It’s a difficult place to find your way around, though – there may well be a bar, but if there was, I couldn’t find it. The décor is generally dark and uninviting and appears in need of a good scrub.

The one area in which the UGC Trocadero scores points over the Warner West End is in price: a full-price ticket is £1.50 cheaper, though a discount ticket is only one pound cheaper than the WWE’s discount price.

Unfortunately, it has to be said that the excellent seating and sound quality at the Warner West End means that it’s actually worth paying that extra money (despite both places still being too expensive in general principle), especially as both places always seem to be showing the same films.

Sadly, then, the UGC Trocadero compares unfavourably with its main rival, despite having marginally cheaper prices. Perhaps it’s time the place underwent a revamp?