Friday, June 16, 2000 Q'way could be stinker   By Tom Hennessy Staff columnist One of the worst films I ever saw was "Dune," the 1984 adaptation of Frank Herbert's science fiction novel. A 5-year-old watching it knew from the get-go that "Dune" would be just awful. For one thing, the plot was set up by a long opening narrative that was as incomprehensible as a tax proposal by Gray Davis. It amazes me that Hollywood can produce such celluloid disasters. Scores of people appeared in "Dune," and scores more were involved in producing it over several months. In all that time, apparently, no one had the chutzpah to say, "Hey, this is a lousy movie!" When I brought this up to a friend recently, he theorized that no one spoke up because scrapping the film would have put people out of work and botched contractual deals and ego-driven dreams. The movie scenario is analogous to a real-life horror unfolding in downtown Long Beach: the Queensway Bay project. To belabor the analogy, Q.B. has "bad movie" written all over it. With no public hearing and no review yet by the State Lands Commission, the city proposes to convert what may be Long Beach's 18 loveliest acres of public land into a commercial complex with a crap-shoot chance of success. Once hyperbolized as a veritable eighth wonder of the world, the complex has been whittled down and revealed as simply one more shopping mall. What's more, all this is in the hands of a developer whose performance so far in acquiring leases has been anything but reassuring - and this in the midst of a booming economy. We are told the project is essential to the future of tourism in Long Beach. Those who have trouble buying that, who cannot envision masses pouring in from Oshkosh to see a movie at Q.B., shop at its Old Navy, or eat in one of its ho-hum restaurants, are branded as being disloyal to the city or, at least, not having its best interests at heart. When responsible citizens raise questions about the project noting, for example, that it will compete with businesses only a half dozen blocks away the reaction of some officials is simply to stiffen their resolve. Alternative proposals for the site are ridiculed or simply ignored, as if considering them would be an admission of bad judgment. There are no fallback plans here, no A, B or C. In fact, Queensway's atmosphere rings with the echoes of past citizen-be-damned schemes: the El Dorado sports complex, the 911 tax, the attempt to put a communications center in Stearns Park. We also are told the Q.B. project is essential to the future of the neighboring, financially-strapped Aquarium of the Pacific. And we are told this by, essentially, the same people who failed to coordinate the timing of those two projects. Integrated into this iffy story is the curious lease with Edwards Cinemas, the project's most important tenant, a lease which, without a brick being put into place, already has had to be renegotiated. I keep coming back to something Robert Paternoster, the city's point man on the project, told me weeks ago. "If they just open the doors and say, 'You all come,' it won't be successful. They're going to have to have the fireworks, the boat races, or whatever every night." So far, the Queensway Bay project does not have the feel of fireworks and boat races. It has, as noted above, the feel of a bad movie. Tom Hennessy's viewpoint appears Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. He can be reached at (562) 499-1270, or via e-mail at Scribe17@aol.com