Reg. Trib. Milano n. 418 del 02.07.2007 - Direttore responsabile: Elisabetta Brunella

International Edition No. 166 - year 15 - 10 July 2020



 
more than 15,000 subscribers

 
CINEMA-GOING IN EUROPE IN THE TIME OF THE PANDEMIC
MEDIA Salles is offering in a glimpse the first comprehensive info about cinema-going during the pandemic, thanks to the collaboration of national and int'l bodies, institutions, companies and professionals from the various European countries.

This maps shows the dates of the beginning and the end of the cinema lockdown.
Please click on the turquoise button.

 
"Et, disait Joseph de ce phono, «quand on n’a pas de femmes, pas de cinéma, quand on n’a rien du tout, on s'emmerde un peu moins avec un phono» ".

Marguerite Duras, "Un barrage contre le Pacifique",
© éditions Gallimard, 1950.

 

THE DATES OF THE CINEMA LOCKDOWN


© copyright MEDIA Salles


 

ALL DIFFERENT ALL DIGITAL

This column hosts portraits of cinemas in Europe and the rest of the world which are quite different from one another but have in common the fact that they have all adopted digital projection.

In this issue, the column ALL DIFFERENT ALL DIGITAL is again devoted to the German capital: following focuses on the cinemas hosting the Berlinale screenings and on Kino International, comes the turn of an overview of Kiez Kinos, i.e. the nearby cinemas that mark various neighbourhoods in Berlin.    

Kilometre Zero: Kiez Kinos in Berlin
by Patricia Hampton

Let's be clear, this is not a survey but a personal impression of the city's specific local cinema-going experience (the so-called Kiez Kinos or neighbourhood cinemas). "Neighbourhood" is the key-word. The Kiez Kinos are typically single-auditorium enterprises, seating no more than about 100 spectators (often far fewer) and offering varied and independent programming with several screening slots throughout the day for a mainly local audience. Some slightly bigger, independent cinemas may also feel like they belong to the category.

The area explored here is roughly limited to Kreuzberg / Neukoelln, where a vast choice of cinemas is available, from the big, popcorn-and-coke Cineplex Neukoelln in the Arcaden shopping mall (9 theatres, 2553 seats) to the tiny IL KINO with its small wine bar and very decent food (52 seats) on the corner of Nansenstrasse, but options also embrace the independent, no-frills FSK Kreuzberg in Oranienplatz, a glass and industrial steel art-house venue with two smallish auditoriums, as well as a number of mainstream multiplexes. The huge Cineplex is popular with my grandson who is an Avengers fan and likes popcorn but perhaps hasn't forgotten that his first experience of the big screen was when he was five, at a tiny, nearby cinema called Sputnik Kino, on the top (fifth) floor at the back of a block of flats near Suedstern, to watch a beautifully made cartoon called Zarafa about a giraffe, where we chatted to another family sitting next to us. There were old sofas and armchairs as seats and a nice little bar with tin sculptures scattered around. Sputnik has two small auditoriums now, one seating 77 and the other 20. It still counts as a Kiez Kino!

They're my favourites, one of their great virtues being that they always show films in the original language with subtitles - but that's not all! They're close to home (most neighbourhoods have them), so you can make up your mind to go out at the last minute without needing public transport; they're informal and inclusive; they have a personalized offer of food and drink, typically reasonably-priced (but decent) wine or beer and hot ‘snacks' but some do popcorn, too; the décor is warm, personal, creative and conducive to chatting with your fellow spectators, making it a community experience; most program throughout the day and the offer is varied and interesting, from specific-interest to arthouse, to the quality mainstream of the moment. There are film weeks or little festivals and some space is given to local filmmakers. Apart from IL KINO and Sputnik, another ‘local' venue that embraces all of these advantages is Wolf Kino. I watched the popular La Favorita there one evening but there are also mother-and-baby mornings and opportunities to view arthouse and independent films. Another favourite is the Moviemento (around 90 seats I'd guess and I believe Berlin's oldest cinema) in Kottbusser Strasse, offering varied and imaginative programming and catering not only for little kids or adults but also for pre-teens. Or the Neues Off in Hermannplatz (187 seats), a lovely little theatre that started up in the late ‘Twenties and was renovated in ‘Fifties style when it became part of the Yorck Cinemas group in 1979. Smaller and slightly further away in Friedrichshain is the b-ware Ladenkino, where grandson (then aged 8) and friends went to watch a film on their own as a birthday present.

Many of the smaller cinemas use creative tactics to keep afloat, from the all-day programming for targeted audiences and attractive foyer bars to special-offer vouchers and selling their own products, ranging from T-shirts and baby-jumpsuits to shopping bags, to books and DVDs of lesser-known films. For the better-off and design-conscious, at 500 euros Wolf Kino will even sell you a personalized cinema seat- the traditional wood and red-plush armchair- with your personal tag on it. At the moment of writing, like their cousins in other countries, they are temporarily closed as a precaution against Covid-19. The question is, will they be able to re-open and stay open, when social distancing will mean selling fewer seats? Some, like Moviemento, are already struggling, in the latter case because of the building being sold as a result of gentrification in Neukoelln/Kreuzberg. But they're doing their best: IL KINO offers takeaway wine beer and food with a cinema poster… there is a crowd-funding appeal.

"Smaller and local" (kilometre zero) is increasingly seen as an answer to some of the downsides of globalization and the neighbourhood cinemas put this into practice. My impression is that they're fighting hard because they mostly come into being not out of purely commercial interests but out of a passion for the cinema. Quality before quantity. I'd say they deserve support for this and for their social and community value alone- cinema literally "from the cradle to the tomb".

(Per leggere il testo in italiano cliccare qui)

IL KINO

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
IL KINO
Berlin
1
1
NEC NC900C DLP Cinema Projector 2K

One of the next issues of the dgt will focus on IL KINO

FSK Kreuzberg

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
FSK Kreuzberg
Berlin
2
2
Sony

FSK Kreuzberg

Sputnik Kino

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
Sputnik Kino
Berlin
2
2
Barco / Sony

Sputnik Kino

Wolf Kino

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
Wolf Kino
Berlin
2
2
Christie CP2208 - 2K
Christie CP2215 -2K

Wolf Kino

Moviemento

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
Moviemento
Berlin
3
3
Christie

Moviemento

Neues Off

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
Neues Off
Berlin
1
1
Christie

Neues Off

b-ware Ladenkino

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
b-ware Ladenkino
Berlin
2
2
NEC

b-ware Ladenkino

Cineplex Neukölln

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Germany
Cineplex Neukölln
Berlin
9
9
NEC

Cineplex Neukoelln

NOT ONE LESS

Cinema Comunale
Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Technology
Italy
Cinema Comunale
Condove
1
1
CHRISTIE CP2210 with server Qube

The cinema in Condove, a municipality of 4,500 inhabitants, 400 metres above sea-level in the lower Valsusa around thirty kilometres from Turin, is back again. This alone is good news: a cinema re-opening at the service of a small community. But much more is going on in Condove: the theatre, which belongs to the municipality and was officially closed on the first of September 2019, is to be managed by the local Tourist Board and the Valsusa Filmfest. And this is the other piece of good news: Condove is at the heart of an ambitious, pioneering adventure, the Valsusa Filmfest, founded in 1997 with ANPI (The Italian National Association of Partisans), the Environmental Committees and the Gruppo 33 association, a festival devoted to the themes of recovering historical memory and protecting the environment.
One of the Festival’s objectives is in fact to contrast a trend that for years now has been transforming Valsusa into a mere corridor or a dormitory for residents whose lives necessarily revolve around Turin, either for work or to enjoy cultural experiences or entertainment.
De-industrialization of the Valley is one of the factors that sparked off this process. It is no coincidence, then, that Condove is still the driving force behind another venture which - through the cinema - aims at recovering memory including that of a lively industrial past: the production of the docufilm entitled “We are the children of the Monce - history and stories of an twentieth-century factory town.” In this production, also supported by the Valsusa Filmfest and the Municipality of Condove, the director Luigi Cantore, a native of Valsusa of course, narrates the role played, economically and socially, by the "Officine Moncenisio". Founded in 1906 to produce rolling stock (from carriages for the Aosta/Pré Didier railway to the trams of Cagliari), over the 70 years of its existence, the factory left its mark on several generations in Valsusa. How could a territory so dedicated to the cinema be left without a theatre?
And now more good news: for the reopening to happen a digital projector was needed. It materialized thanks to Gaetano Renda, a historical figure on Turin’s cinema scene and a representative of Slow Cinema. At the moment, the Valsusa Filmfest, “broadcast” online last spring, is celebrating the return of “live” cinema with a short series of screenings hosted on the ex-Monce premises, whilst as from September, the films can be seen at the cinema in Condove. And rightly so.

(Per leggere il testo in italiano cliccare qui)

(NOT) ONE LESS

Cinema Cenisio

Country
Site
Town
No. of screens
No. of digital screens
Italy
Cinema Cenisio
Susa
1
0

 

This column devoted to cinemas which, despite facing serious difficulties, have finally managed to digitalize without closing down or have re-opened after a period of closure, is making an exception here. And it is doing so to speak of the Cinema Cenisio in Susa which, with its seating for one thousand spectators (in a town of fewer than 7,000 inhabitants), was one of the largest single-screen cinemas in Piedmont.
Opened in the ‘Thirties thanks to the initiative of the Contin family, who had started projecting films in 1918 using what had once been a stable, it operated as a cinema and theatre up until 2015, when it found itself facing a crossroads between the digital shift - which would have been too costly - and closure. Why bring this up right now?
In order to pay a last homage to Sandro Contin, the person to whom so many inhabitants of Valsusa owe their love of the cinema - real cinema: fine films on the big screen, viewed together with other spectators, who may have been strangers but were immersed in the same story and the same images following on one another in the dark. To the death of Sandro Contin, a competent exhibitor with a passion for films, always present in the cinema and affable with his audiences, the weekly La Valsusa has devoted a long article which has the merit of bringing to life and highlighting what the experts would call the social value of the movie theatre, the role it plays in the cultural life of the territory and how it functions as a pole of aggregation and so on.
The Cinema Cenisio was all this. And without ever resorting to an English formula - the most exotic term was ‘cineforum’ - the Contins created a ‘brand’ (for half of Valsusa, it was the Contin cinema), succeeded in ‘audience building’ (initiating the students of the local high school to the works of Dreyer, Bergman, Visconti, Pasolini ...) and promoting ‘customer loyalty’ (you went to the cinema with blind faith). This is why it is impossible not to regret deeply that the Cenisio/Contin lost its battle against the ‘digital divide’.

(Per leggere il testo in italiano cliccare qui)


To quickly get to the previous issues, click on these buttons!
 


 
MEDIA Salles
Piazza Luigi di Savoia, 24 - 20124 Milano - Italy
Tel.: +39.02.6739781 - Fax: +39.02.67397860
E-mail: infocinema@mediasalles.it