Flea pits
London cinemas we liked
London was once full of cinemas. A roll-call of the deceased from London-RIP's neck of the woods includes the Finchley Gaumont, Hendon Classic, Golders Green ABC, Golders Green Ionic, Muswell Hill ABC, Hampstead Classic... I think you can see where we're coming from here. It's the same story all over London.
London cinemas RIP: Odeon Temple Fortune - Scouts, Digby and HRH
One suburban cinema that sticks in the mind is the Odeon Temple Fortune. This is partly because it was an absolutely massive place, more stadium than flea pit, in the middle of nowhere (or somewhere between Golders Green and Finchley, same thing). This obscure picture palace was also noteable for some of the live shows it hosted, including a memorable evening with the Red Army Dancers in the middle of the Cold War, and the Gang Show. This played here after moving from the nearby Golders Green Hippodrome. For those of you who don't know, the Gang Show is when Cubs & Scouts sing, dance and what have you. At least, I think it is. To tell the truth, I never saw the Gang Show and I'm not sure how many times it came to the Odeon, but I remember that on one occasion at least, the queen was guest there. Imagine - queenie in our little corner of the world. Sadly, London-RIP never did actually see the queen either. But I did see the last film ever shown at the Odeon Temple Fortune before it was demolished and turned into sheltered housing in the late 70s. It was called Digby, the Biggest Dog in the World. It should have been called Digby, the Biggest Turkey in the World.
London cinemas RIP: Arty art houses - the Camden Plaza
Before multiplexes, cinemas were different from each other. And you couldn't get something more different to the Odeon Temple Fortune than the Camden Plaza. It always seemed such an arty art house. It's impossible to imagine going to the Saturday morning pictures at the Camden Plaza or being carried out of there screaming after the shooting scene in Bambi. Like others of its ilk, it sold flapjacks and coffee rather than Coke and Kia Ora and showed obscure foreign films, but it always had more cachet than the Screens etc.
It was right in the middle of Camden and, like Compendium, was an integral part of the area, doing much to give it its 'alternative' credentials. In fact, the Camden Plaza was such an arty art house that it featured in one of the ultimate art house movies - Radio On, by Chris Petit, but London-RIP remembers it more for 80s films like Diva. It closed circa 1994. Around this time, there was a sort of desperation about keeping a cinema in the area. I recall that at the cinema in Parkway the genial manager would introduce every flim - trying to personalise the atmosphere, I suppose and drum up some enthusiasm about movies, which was flagging at the time. I guess it worked, because, although it was closed for a time, the Odeon on Parkway remains today.
London cinemas RIP: Late night line-up
The late night movie was an essential feature of many a Friday and Saturday night in the 70s, partly because videos hadn't been invented yet, and partly because cinemas provided somewhere to go when the pubs closed. I think mainstream cinemas ran late-night showings of their regular programmes, but being an arty type, I usually opted for the independent flea pits - Screens, Everyman, Scala, even the Rio if I was feeling adventurous. They always seemed to show the same films - Peformance, the Night Porter, Don't Look Now - and foreign ones such as works by that arch-miserablist Fassbinder which made you ardently wish you were back in the pub. They were good movies, but not terribly exciting, especially if you'd seen them a dozen times, and one had to rely on nasty art house coffee and other stimulants just to stay awake as Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie got it together one more time.
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| Message: | 9/9 |
| Date and time: | 13/05/2011 at 14:37:23 |
| Sender: | gary |
| 1970s Sunday afternoons/evenings Regent Street Poly. Remember seeing a Marx Bros double bill there and it was the only time I saw a cinema audience applaud a film at the end. Saw Wicker Man there, Deliverance...so many movies. | |
| Message: | 8/9 |
| Date and time: | 13/05/2011 at 14:33:34 |
| Sender: | gary |
| The sleaziest cinema I ever came across, without a doubt, was in Wilton Road near Victoria. Can't remember the name now but it was notorious. I ventured there only once because I wanted to see this film (an early J.Nicholson movie called Psych Out, as it goes) and it had never turned up at any of my regular movie-going haunts and I thought I'd never get to see it if I didn't take this opportunity (this was the late 70s, before YouTube, before DVDs, before the Internet remember). The cinema was packed but I got the impression that I was the only person there specifically to see the film. The audience seemed to be mainly alcoholics/drug users and homeless people who had come in to keep warm or to have a kip. Anyway the film was ok. Of course if I'd known DVD would be invented in about 25 years time I'd have waited. | |
| Message: | 7/9 |
| Date and time: | 13/05/2011 at 14:05:54 |
| Sender: | gary |
| Anyone remember The Essential Cinema in Wardour St (circa 1976?). It may only have been around for a short time. Saw 'Who's That Knocking At My Door' (Scorsese) there. I went to the Everyman a few times in the early 80s and didn't like it. I seem to remember it was quite small and each time I went there were people who spent the whole movie having a conversation (which is one of the reasons I gave up going to the cinema.....this was a problem you might encounter anywhere but I think I went to the Everyman 3 times and each time people were talking all the time so in my mind the Everyman became a place I didn't want to go back to). | |
| Message: | 6/9 |
| Date and time: | 13/05/2011 at 14:00:24 |
| Sender: | gary |
| Best cinema I ever knew was the Electric in Portobello Road. Started going there in about 1976. Great double bills of foreign films or film noir or anything you can imagine. They used to sell great home-made food and coffee. It had a wonderful homely vibe - miles away from he slickness of the West End. I remember once sitting there waiting for the film to start and heard felt something down by my feet and it was the cinema cat wandering by. It was apparently the oldest purpose-built cinema still running in the country. Some time in the 80s I think it was revamped. The name and building still exist but the inside has been totally redone and certainly the spirit won't exist any more. (I believe it still shows films but functions mainly as a meeting place for the rich and famous) | |
| Message: | 5/9 |
| Date and time: | 13/05/2010 at 17:27:51 |
| Sender: | Sue b |
| There were at least two cinemas on the so called 'murder mile' that is Lower Clapton Road. I used to go to Saturday morning pictures there to see weekly episodes of Flash Gordon. I saw Bambi in a cinema that became an extremely dodgy nightclub I think. | |
| Message: | 4/9 |
| Date and time: | 19/10/2009 at 23:35:49 |
| Sender: | 50s-rick |
| Went with 2 friends on a Saturday afternoon to the Temple fortune Odeon to watch a Western. The usherette would flash her torch in our direction and tell us to 'Shut up, or the manager will throw you out'. That's when we cheered as the baddies were shot up/thrown out of town. If there was nothing on at the Odeon we would cycle down to the ABC in Golders Green Road. Happy days. | |
| Message: | 3/9 |
| Date and time: | 10/08/2009 at 13:12:28 |
| Sender: | nicky.molloy@hotmail.com |
| would anybody have any shots of the old gaumont cinema edgeware road.Worked there in 58 Regards Nick | |
| Message: | 2/9 |
| Date and time: | 11/11/2008 at 22:48:42 |
| Sender: | Jools Rools |
| A Little Bit Ritzy Cinema, Brixton There is a new souped-up version called the Ritzy, but it's not a patch on the Eighties version. They would sell cakes and coffee in the foyer which you could take into the theatre with you, and, of course, smoking was allowed. There used to be bands playing there too. A band called the Murphy Federation played there once. They were all off their heads and really bad. The audience started throwing vegetables at them which they had just bought from the local market. Those were the days. | |
| Message: | 1/9 |
| Date and time: | 23/01/2007 at 14:44:06 |
| Sender: | aidan mcmanus |
| I remember most of the cinemas from my youth as being flea pits.Growing up in NW london there was the Edgeware Road Odeon,ABC Edgeware rd,Classic Praed st,Swiss Cottage Odeon,two in Westbourne Grove,Kilburn had the ABC,State,Grange and two down the Maida Vale end that I cant remember the names of,it seems amazing today that all of these could have stayed in business but like you said there were no videos in those days.The only one still going is Swiss Cottage but now as a multiscreen.My favourite was Praed St as they let us in to AA films underage and then turned to a strict porn only policy in the late 70,s,heavy raincoat action,the shittiest one was the Edgeware Road Odeon,22p to watch Live and Let Die in 1973 with about 3 other people in the school holidays,proper 30,s art deco building that was tuned into an indoor market in the 80,s,demolished and now the whole block is being used as a car park,probably would have made money today if it had survived | |
