Scala!!! (18)

"Or, the Incredibly Strange Rise and Fall of the World's Wildest Cinema and How It Influenced a Mixed-up Generation of Weirdos and Misfits."

A rude, raucous and rousing tribute to the legendary London cinema that became an essential counter-cultural meeting point and movie lovers’ melting pot from the late 1970s to the early 1990s.

Painstakingly assembled by Jane Giles and Ali Catterall, this labour-of-love documentary features a treasure trove of ‘you-are-there’ footage and eye-popping cult film clips, along with hilarious, touching and sometimes scandalous testimonies from such regulars as Stewart Lee, Barry Adamson and Adam Buxton.

However, this is no mere nostalgia trip. It’s also a rallying cry to not only defend cinema, but also to make it exciting, dangerous and radical once again.

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★★★✭ A fun, if somewhat nostalgic fan-focused, documentary about a legendary Thatcher-era London cinema famed for its depravity and socially oppressed clientelle. It features new music from legendary Mancunian bass player and film composer Barry Adamson. ~ ManchesterTheatres.com.

★★★★ A heartfelt tribute to an icon of independent cinema, this richly enjoyable documentary charts the rise and fall of a unique alt-cinephile repertory house which inspired generations of film-makers, artists and musicians. ~ The Guardian.

★★★★ A suitably riotous documentary about the subversive London cinema in which programmers, staff and celebrity patrons of the storied cult screen in London’s King’s Cross recall its anarchic 1980s heyday. ~ The Observer.

★★★★ This genially entertaining film is deeply evocative of a London that has changed beyond recognition, for better or worse, and of a lost utopia of cinema-going as shared experience. ~ Financial Times.