British independent cinema is currently experiencing an extraordinary wave of success. Films including Ben Wheatley’s caravanning serial killer comedy, Sightseers, and Peter Strickland’s homage to sound design, Berberian Sound Studio, were considered to be the best of last year, with both winning at the 2012 British Independent Film Awards. But these are films that the residents of Bournemouth couldn’t easily see, instead being fed a diet made up of exclusively blockbusters and other multiplex fodder.
Surprisingly for such a large town, Bournemouth lacks a dedicated independent cinema. Only the films that reach the local Odeon are widely available, leaving the town’s cineaste population lacking the fruits of the indie world. Catherine Bray, contributor to the BBC’s Film 2013 and editor of Film4.com, speaking close to Channel 4’s London headquarters, said: “Growing up in Bournemouth, I wasn’t really aware of the variety of cinema out there because the films that came to Bournemouth did tend to be the mainstream ones. It is disgraceful that people can be so culturally excluded by the fact that they don’t live in an enormous city.”
It could be argued that Bournemouth is merely a microcosm of wider society, with audiences shying away from independent cinema. However, the success of films such as Once Upon A Time In Anatolia and Bart Layton’s innovative documentary The Imposter, rising from obscurity based solely on word of mouth, shows that this is not the case. There is still a taste for independent cinema and so it is strange that Bournemouth does not embrace indie films as much as other major towns and cities.
For Bournemouth residents, Poole’s Lighthouse Arts Centre is the nearest outlet for independent films. Contrary to the arguments of those who suggest that indie cinema is confined to the desires of devout movie fans, Lighthouse sells over 200,000 tickets a year with non-ticketed events increasing this attendance to around 300,000 people, which is more than double the population of Poole. It is, however, too far away for Bournemouth residents to consider it as a regular place to visit to catch the latest indie flicks. Paul Ridd, responsible for programming Lighthouse, suggests “they generally have quite a broad taste at Poole; an interest in foreign and arthouse films as well as mainstream films. I think people are perhaps a little bit more reticent about taking a risk because of the recession and they don’t have so much expendable income, so if they’re going to go to the cinema they have to go and see something they really want to see.”
If this is true and people are now reluctant to take a risk on films, then actually a traditional independent cinema may be an ideal solution. In Bray’s words: “people are realising that independent cinema is a brand that is not only the content in terms of the films, but also the experience.” Indie cinemas provide an experience that the everyday multiplex cannot hope to replicate. A trip to an independent cinema isn’t just a film: it’s a night out. The Picturehouse cinema in Hackney has three separate bars and a high quality restaurant, which is a far cry from a bucket of Pepsi and a massive box of ludicrously over-priced popcorn. This suggests that independent cinemas are the type of establishment that could cater to what is perhaps a more sophisticated and mature audience than the average multiplex. The people who cannot afford regular visits to the cinema would surely be far better served by an independent cinema and so it remains baffling that Bournemouth lacks such a place.
In a world where any film is available online within days of its cinematic release via illegal means and within months via legal services like Netflix, it’s easy to suggest that independent cinemas no longer have a role to fulfil. If audiences want to access these films, it is now possible for them to see them whenever is convenient for them to do so. They no longer have to adhere to the schedules of a cinema; especially an independent establishment that may have only one or two screens. However, this does the majesty of independent films an injustice, as Bray explains with visible enthusiasm. “Some arthouse cinema is made to be seen on the big screen. When you’ve got a fantastic cinematographer like Laurie Rose who did Sightseers, it’s a shame that work is being lost by being viewed on these small screens.”
Whilst it’s common to see Bray’s enthusiasm for someone championing an independent film about which they are passionate, blockbusters rarely engender the same level of support. “You could go to the Bournemouth Odeon and find a blockbuster playing to a relatively empty screen,” she notes. “So it’s a shame that they perhaps have lost the will to experiment.” This does appear to be a trend; distributors being unwilling to take a risk on a film that could either succeed immensely or crash and burn and then being surprised by their success. It would seem then that the issue is not with audience demand, but with distributors being shy about taking risks.
Niels Michael Wee, responsible for Bournemouth’s BUtiful Film Festival, doesn’t think Bournemouth is ready for its own independent cinema. “I believe that a culture of appreciation needs to be fostered here before a cinema can get a somewhat stable income.”
For whatever reason, it is clear that Bournemouth has been somewhat forgotten in the field of independent cinema. Ridd says: “I wasn’t aware there was a big gap in Bournemouth. I didn’t realise that there wasn’t a cinema that was showing arthouse films.” There is an issue there of which no-one is aware, which leads to two groups of people losing out. Firstly, the audiences who don’t get to see some of the greatest films out there and secondly, the distributors who don’t get to receive the contents of their wallets.
Tom Beasley
