When I first tried to get together the big film debate I tried to find a date that Tom Lawes from the electric cinema could do.
He was really supportive but due to his incredibly hectic schedule we just couldn’t find one. He wanted me to put forward his comments about why the Electric couldn’t show Synechdoche New York at the time of its release:
“From Friday 22 May we started showing Synecdoche NY, Cheri and Encounters at the End of the World in just one week. The week before that we showed British indie Is Anybody There and micro budget film Shifty along side high quality mainstream films like Star Trek.
We would normally have shown a film like Synecdoche NY on release date but as happens occasionally at this time of year it clashed with two of the biggest 2009 releases Star Trek and Angels & Demons. Distributors of new films don’t let us split the screens so in this particular case it wasn’t possible to show all three during one week.”
I also had a conversation with Dorothy and Louisa from the MAC who are busily working away to get this great facility up and running for its big reopening next year. So again they couldn’t make it but really wanted to feed in the following:
“When the MAC reopens in Spring 2010 we will be running a cinema programme similar to the one we ran prior to closure - including significant independent and art-house content.
I hope the reintroduction of mac to the cinematic landscape in Birmingham will go some way to address the concerns being discussed.
It is also worth mentioning that mac will have a new double height 250sq metre gallery, fully equipped for artists’ film/ video installation based work, and there will be a greater emphasis on this in our gallery programming. We will run a full media arts-based learning and participation programme in our newly created digital studio.”
All things to be discussed Mon
Great to have these comments ahead of the debate - will feed them into the discussion. One thing for Monday’s audience to consider is whether this is a debate about Arthouse cinema at all. If Odeons and Cineworlds in other cities took the decision to show Synecdoche on the week of release then why didn’t Birmingham’s? If fact why didn’t our multiplexes show it at all?