Cinemas are a public treasure – a vital site for film magic and discovery and invaluable places of economic exchange, social communion, and personal escape and solace.
With the lockdown of so many cinemas in the UK, Europe and around the world, we face a crisis that is undermining the business of public film exhibition and threatens to shutter countless cinemas for good. That’s why we are launching an editorial campaign to celebrate, cherish and defend these spaces for the future.
#MyDreamPalace will be a communal celebration of the magic of moviegoing. Over the next winter months, and until cinema curtains roll up and the lights go down, we’ll be asking filmmakers from across the world to reflect on their favourite and formative cinemas in the time of Covid.
We’ll also be spotlighting the people who make cinemas work, from projectionists to ushers to programmers. And we’ll explore what kind of cinema ecosystem we want to emerge from this crisis.
We ask you our readers to join in: tell us about your favourite dream palace and what makes it so special. Join us on social media in posting pictures and videos of treasured cinemas, stories about memorable experiences you’ve had in the audience and observations about what makes film-going an irreplaceable rite. Tag your posts #MyDreamPalace and we’ll share as much as we can. And if you want to drop us any private pitches or suggestions, please email us at s&s@bfi.org.uk.
While we wait to again be – to paraphrase Susan Sontag – kidnapped by movies, sitting in the dark alongside anonymous strangers, overwhelmed by the physical presence of the image in front of us, here’s remembering what Tilda Swinton hymned as the “wild wide screen”.
Edgar Wright launches our campaign
My dream palaces: Edgar Wright revels in a life at the movies
Launching our My Dream Palaces celebration of our cinemas, British writer-director Edgar Wright pens an ode to cinemas great and small – from his childhood watching blockbusters in Bournemouth to the socially-distanced screenings of 2020.
By Edgar Wright
Mark Cousins takes his torch to the Edinburgh Filmhouse
Filmmakers’ Dream Palaces
“Savour the NFT”: Gurinder Chadha on watching and shooting films at her favourite cinema
By Gurinder Chadha
“It was a validation of their stories”: Sarah Gavron on showing Rocks in the cast’s own East London locality
By Sarah Gavron
“It was fairly anarchic…” Nick Broomfield recalls Greek cinema under the stars with all-natural extras
By Nick Broomfield
Oliver Laxe on a profound encounter with Carl Theodor Dreyer on a day of reckoning for Spanish politics
By Oliver Laxe
“We can’t be so individualistic that we lose these shared experiences”: Lulu Wang on why the world needs cinemas
By Lulu Wang
“You’ve got to pick what you think is important in this world and make sure it survives”: Richard Linklater on sharing the gospel of cinema
“You’ve got to pick what you think is important in this world and make sure it survives”: Richard Linklater on sharing the gospel of cinema“The theatre experience transcends all the lines that separate us”: Regina King on her dream palaces
By Regina King
“Viva cinema!”: Luca Guadagnino immerses himself in electric shadows
By Luca Guadagnino
“Cinema is an oneiric medium and the cinema hall transposes you there”: Chaitanya Tamhane on his dream palaces
“Cinema is an oneiric medium and the cinema hall transposes you there”: Chaitanya Tamhane on his dream palacesLynne Ramsay on the magic behind the velvet curtain
Lynne Ramsay on the magic behind the velvet curtainKleber Mendonça Filho on Recife’s Cinema São Luiz, his hometown picture palace
By Kleber Mendonça Filho
“Cinema is my happy place”: Francis Lee celebrates cinemas as community spaces
By Francis Lee
Christian Petzold on discovering The Deer Hunter one wintry night in Berlin
By Christian Petzold
Cate Shortland on escaping suburbia in Australia’s arthouse cinemas
By Cate Shortland
Małgorzata Szumowska on American movies and communist Krakow
By Malgorzata Szumowska
Viggo Mortensen on watching widescreen epics in 1960s Buenos Aires
By Viggo Mortensen
John Akomfrah on why the Rio in Dalston is more than a cinema
By John Akomfrah
Guy Maddin recalls his anarchic teen years at the Gimli Theatre, Manitoba
By Guy Maddin
Ritesh Batra on the New Roshan Talkies, a cinema frozen in time from old Mumbai
By Ritesh Batra
Zhu Shengze on watching movies in Wuhan and the oasis that is Missouri’s Ragtag cinema
By Zhu Shengze
Wanuri Kahiu pays tribute to Nairobi’s Fox drive-in cinema
By Wanuri Kahiu
Richard Stanley hymns London’s Scala cinema
By Richard Stanley
Céline Sciamma on the Cinema Utopia, the cinema of her teens
By Céline Sciamma
Peter Strickland on the Husets Biograf, Copenhagen’s cinematic cabinet of curiosities
By Peter Strickland
Mark Cousins on Sarajevo’s Obala cinema and watching films in a war zone
By Mark Cousins
Rian Johnson on the distinct charm of the New Beverly Cinema
By Rian Johnson
Cinemas and the coronavirus
Ten key cinema workers on the way out of lockdown
By Katie McCabe
“We’re on a war footing”: independent cinemas stand their ground against the pandemic
By Charles Gant
The numbers: the coronavirus effect on the UK box office
By Charles Gant
Lockdown lessons: 13 UK film industry leaders on coping with Covid
By Isabel Stevens
Lockdown lessons: BFI CEO Ben Roberts on UK film and the Covid crisis
By Isabel Stevens
Lockdown lessons: Sheffield Doc/Fest director Cíntia Gil on defending the collective experience of cinema
By Trevor Johnston
Turkish cinephilia in the time of Covid-19: quarantined but not forgotten
Turkish cinephilia in the time of Covid-19: quarantined but not forgottenMore celebrations of cinema from our archive
Let there be projector light: 80 films that take us inside cinemas
By Thomas Flew
Expanding your world: Bertha DocHouse in the Curzon Bloomsbury
Expanding your world: Bertha DocHouse in the Curzon BloomsburyLondon’s Cinema Museum is keeping cinephilia alive. Can it be saved?
London’s Cinema Museum is keeping cinephilia alive. Can it be saved?Cinephilia down the ages: a Museum of the Everyday
By Pamela Hutchinson
Lang may yer lum reek: Glasgow at the movies
By Emma Jackson
Welcome to the Overnight: 48 hours at a cinephile retreat
By Charlie Shackleton
The three o’clock rite: Ingmar Bergman’s home cinema
The three o’clock rite: Ingmar Bergman’s home cinemaAn open letter in defence of Moscow’s Museum of Cinema and its professional staff
An open letter in defence of Moscow’s Museum of Cinema and its professional staffThe smouldering screen: Kevin Brownlow on the lustre of nitrate
The smouldering screen: Kevin Brownlow on the lustre of nitrateTug of love: a cinema pilgrimage with Tilda Swinton and Mark Cousins
By Nick James