Cinemas - memories

[Freddy]

Last year I found an old diary of mine from the mid sixties, looking through it I was amazed at the amount of times we went to the cinema in a week. Some weeks it read "Mum took us to the Regent". "Dad took us to the Classic Allerton". (the entrance to that was tiled, with a marble fish pond in the middle of the foyer) "Queued up with my sister to see A Hard Days Night " and then on Saturdays we would go to the childrens matinee.
Not only was cinema affordable then, we would often go and see two/three double features a week but more importantly in Liverpool we had three cinemas in an ordinary suburb on the same road and within walking distance of home as well as four or five on the local bus route and less than 10 minutes away.
Now of course nearly all of them are gone,as well as the spontaneity of simply going. So really the point of this ramble is to see how this compares with other forum users and their memories of the picture houses.
regards
Freddy

[Gibbie]

Thanks for your note, Freddy.

Did you grow up in Liverpool? Have been there once with my dad. He took me to the Albert Docks in the early 80s where he boated in to go on to Southampton to go to France in the 40s. My uncle also went through and marched to the train in Lime Street station. At the time, dad said much was the same, but of course some updates happened.

Over here, we used to have very nice cinemas to go to also. The really nice ones like you mentioned were usually downtown in cities or towns. Usually, up north, one had to go to Chicago, where I grew up, to go to the theatre cinemas which were an event. Although, there was a theatre in the next town, Highland, called The Town Theater, where one would go to see international and limited releases. It had the red velvet and all and was a little cinema, but provided that elegant air of entertainment - very adult, in the old sense. They would have refreshments of patrons at the Intermission (remember those). I think the 70s were when things moved to the cheap buildings and shabby cinemas. In the late 80s / early 90s the multiplex, smaller, but nicer, cinemas appeared - interesting to note how small these new theatres actually are and are quite maze like. Many people talk about American culture effecting all these changes. It is really a certain kind of corporate culture that is very consumerist in design, like a "nice" fast food take away.

Enough of that, the elegant enterteinment is what is gone and the care of doing a good job to entertain the audience is what is missing. Also, really too - costs have gone up quite a bit to make such memorable theatres.

Thanks for your notes on the mid-sixties. I am further interested on what your impressions of films were then and other theatre experiences.

Gibbie

[Steve Crook]

Freddy: Last year I found an old diary of mine from the mid sixties, looking through it I was amazed at the amount of times we went to the cinema in a week. Some weeks it read "Mum took us to the Regent". "Dad took us to the Classic Allerton". (the entrance to that was tiled, with a marble fish pond in the middle of the foyer) "Queued up with my sister to see A Hard Days Night " and then on Saturdays we would go to the childrens matinee. Not only was cinema affordable then, we would often go and see two/three double features a week but more importantly in Liverpool we had three cinemas in an ordinary suburb on the same road and within walking distance of home as well as four or five on the local bus route and less than 10 minutes away. Now of course nearly all of them are gone,as well as the spontaneity of simply going. So really the point of this ramble is to see how this compares with other forum users and their memories of the picture houses. regards Freddy

Have a look at the BFI / Screenonline site and their page of Film Facts. That includes a page about cinema admissions 1933 - 2001.

In the mid sixties cinema attendances were in decline and many cinemas were being turned into bingo halls (or just pulled down). If you had that much choice of where to go in the mid sixties you were doing well. The peak attendance was really in the 1940s.

Steve

[Gibbie]

SteveCrook: Have a look at the BFI / Screenonline site and their page of Film Facts. That includes a page about cinema admissions 1933 - 2001. In the mid sixties cinema attendances were in decline and many cinemas were being turned into bingo halls (or just pulled down). If you had that much choice of where to go in the mid sixties you were doing well. The peak attendance was really in the 1940s. Steve

Excellent point, Steve!

Worthy of a Ph.D. dissertation.

[Freddy]

Steve, from memory but verified by a couple of friends here are the picture houses. I have not included the ones in Liverpool city centre which numbered approx. eight.
From the Broadgreen area of Liverpool.
Regent: 5 minute walk away, Saturday Matinee, closed late sixties now a block of flats.
Curzon: practically opposite the Regent, closed early sixties, now a supermarket.
Dovecot: on the same road as the above but a mile along the road. closed sixties.
ABC Tuebrook: about a mile away, no more than mile and a half. Saturday Matinee(the minors of the ABC) closed early seventies now derelict.
Abbey: 5 to 10 minute bus ride away, a cinerama, closed in the seventies, part bingo hall, part supermarket.
Classic allerton: 10 minute bus ride away, large cinema closed to make way for a supermarket, with a studio cinema next door.
Woolton: 10+ minute bus ride away. one of the oldest in Liverpool, 1925, still going strong as one of the last independents.

These were all in the suburbs of Liverpool, there were others but out of reach of walking or the local bus route. If I was lucky then so were many others, but of course we lived in a city.

As you can see though there are only two left of those and the closure dates do fit the facts, however behind the facts is of course the simple pleasure of going to the cinema and enjoying yourself.
regards
Freddy

[Steve Crook]

Freddy: Steve, from memory but verified by a couple of friends here are the picture houses. I have not included the ones in Liverpool city centre which numbered approx. eight. From the Broadgreen area of Liverpool. Regent: 5 minute walk away, Saturday Matinee, closed late sixties now a block of flats. Curzon: practically opposite the Regent, closed early sixties, now a supermarket. Dovecot: on the same road as the above but a mile along the road. closed sixties. ABC Tuebrook: about a mile away, no more than mile and a half. Saturday Matinee(the minors of the ABC) closed early seventies now derelict. Abbey: 5 to 10 minute bus ride away, a cinerama, closed in the seventies, part bingo hall, part supermarket. Classic allerton: 10 minute bus ride away, large cinema closed to make way for a supermarket, with a studio cinema next door. Woolton: 10+ minute bus ride away. one of the oldest in Liverpool, 1925, still going strong as one of the last independents. These were all in the suburbs of Liverpool, there were others but out of reach of walking or the local bus route. If I was lucky then so were many others, but of course we lived in a city. As you can see though there are only two left of those and the closure dates do fit the facts, however behind the facts is of course the simple pleasure of going to the cinema and enjoying yourself. regards Freddy

It sounds like the scousers kept their cinemas going for longer than a lot of the rest of the country - well done them.

Round our way (S.W. London) they started turning them into bingo halls in the mid sixties. Some still are. Others have become supermarkets or DIY centres or have been pulled down.

A few good ones remain though, but they are now often supported by a trust or something similar so that they can show the mainstream films to make a bit of money and then show the good films as well. But they are fighting the march of the multiplexes (terrible places).

Steve

[Freddy]

Agree with you there Steve, The Woolton cinema has never changed but perhaps that is because the residents of Woolton village keep supporting it and the owner works very very hard and is now hoping for lottery money. There is another one in the north of Liverpool the Plaza Crosby cinema which is a charity and run I believe by volunteeers
http://www.plazacinema.org.uk/
But sadly everything else is without soul.
regards
Freddy
ps also look at the BBC local site
http://www.bbc.co.uk/liverpool/localhistory
put in cinema in top right corner search engine

[ 15. August 2004, 00:24: Message edited by: Freddy ]

[Pam1927]

You've made my day, Freddie! I'm delighted to hear that the Woolton cinema is still going! I used to go there regularly as a kid in the 60s.

I also used to go to the Abbey cinema in Wavertree. I remember when they put in the Cinerama screen, and seeing 'How The West Was Won' in the full Cinerama version... you could see the joins though!

Like you, I remember going to the cinema regularly in the 60s, locally and in the centre of town. However, I only go to the NFT now (and have done for about the last 20 years), mainly because I got so hacked off with the distracting behaviour of the audiences... in fact the last time I did go to an 'ordinary' cinema, the woman in the seat next to me had brought the full packed lunch with her (part of which was the most god-awful smelling tuna salad... and I'm a veggi too!) and she spent most of the picture scoffing. My stomach now insists that it's the NFT or nothing!

[Hackett]

Of the three Cinemas I went to as a child the Frorida is now a shitty night club and the Rialto is a closed down bingo hall. The only one left is the ABC which they turned from a fantastic looking theatre into three shoe box's back in the 70's.

[smudge]

Here in Wolves we managed to sustain our last two cinemas for quite a while, but then the Odious (Odeon) turned into a Bingo hall and the long since tripled ABC (Cannon at the time of it's closure) really was a fleapit before it's demise in the early 90s.

We were then served (for a while) by our Arts Cinema, The Lighthouse, which rarely - if ever- lived up to it's promises or potential.

We now have a Cineworld nearby, whose engineer nevers seems to set up the Dolby quite right (to these ears, anyway !); where all the screens are run by one projectionist and few people care if the framing/focus is out.

Oh yes, and the price of the 'food' can far exceed the admission cost.

I have dim childhood (halcyon) memories of the old Gaumont, where bands such as The Beatles used to appear and where cinema was truly a big screen experience....

Now it's a Wilkinson store violent

SMUDGE

[smudge]

Forgot to add....

Ironically the old Odious is now a listed building. wink

Shame they couldn't have kept it going as a Cinema.

Anybody else know of any local authority-run picture houses, like the old Colisuem in Portmadoc ?

SMUDGE

[Freddy]

Hi all,
What fascinates me about the converted cinemas is that if you look up to the outline/skyline of the building no matter what it is at present you can always tell it has been a cinema. Its architecture is far greater than the use it is being put to now.
regards
Freddy

[smudge]

This is most certainly true Freddy !

I am often a hazard to traffic if I spot an old picture house on my travels - there's me craning my neck in all directions to get a good look as I go shooting past.... blush

It's a wonderful fact of lazy economics that occasionally cheapskate businessmen buy them up and can't be bothered doing much conversion. Hence occasionally you still get to see some glorious Art Deco frontages above the new shop.

If the name's high enough up - or part of the building as was their wont back then, you still get to see it in several cases.

For ages there was a cracking old one on my beat which still had it's old neons up - even though it had been converted into a sweatshop

SMUDGE

[Pam1927]

The Abbey cinema that Freddy and I knew so well is an amazing building. Even though it was a supermarket last time I saw it a couple of years ago, I suppose at least the frontage hadn't been defaced in any way with naff signs and gawdy posters, though I suspect that's more to do with the fact that it's in a conservation area than any aesthetic sentiments on the part of the supermarket owners! :)

[smudge]

Some of the smaller cinemas that clung on longest round here now seem to be turning into pubs. The one where we all used to go see the family films (ON THE BUSES etc blush ) at least had a concession initially, by have an antique projector as a centrepiece. But even that has gone now.

I like discovering the long forgotten ones which were slap bang in the middle of big residential areas.

Late last year they demolished a big one on the Narborough Road, Leicester. As they tore down the drop down walls which had gone in for tripling in the 70s, you could see behind it all the original and unfaded Art Deco bits.

Tragic

SMUDGE