Redbrick

Secret Birmingham: The Electric Cinema

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Written by Victoria Shires

It’s not every day that you stum­ble upon a new artsy gem in a con­crete jun­gle almost by acci­dent.  Birmingham’s The Elec­tric in Sta­tion Street is the old­est work­ing cin­ema in the UK, pre­dat­ing its Not­ting Hill name­sake by two months.  Sit­u­ated only a short two minute walk from New Street sta­tion, it is so close to the hus­tle and bus­tle of this mod­ern city that we call home yet the ren­o­va­tion and restora­tion of the cin­ema in 2004 to its 1930s Art Deco look trans­ports you back decades.

Cel­e­brat­ing its cen­te­nary year last Decem­ber, the cin­ema has seen many a change since its open­ing in 1909. The Elec­tric, which orig­i­nally showed silent movies, served as a news the­atre dur­ing World War II and has pro­gressed from show­ing mainly art house and con­ti­nen­tal pic­tures to the large vari­ety of inde­pen­dent and intel­li­gent main­stream films that we see today, even indulging in a stint of porno­graphic film show­ings in the 1970s.

The screen rooms them­selves house rows of vintage-seeming red vel­vet chairs with a sec­tion of sofa seat­ing at the back; each sofa named after one of the cin­ema greats, Lau­rel, Hardy and Diet­rich for example.  

The ‘Text Waiter Ser­vice’ is avail­able to those lucky enough to be sit­ting in the sofa seat­ing and this, teamed with the inti­mate atmos­phere, makes The Elec­tric stand out from the more com­mer­cial cin­e­mas that we visit on a reg­u­lar basis.  

The con­ces­sion dis­count (yes for NUS!) and the fact that we should take advan­tage of the only inde­pen­dent cin­ema left in the city today makes The Elec­tric a must-visit.  Whether you want a one-off film, the big lat­est release or the occa­sional poster sale, make sure you get down to The Elec­tric at some point this term.  

For more details go to www.theelectric.co.uk

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This article was posted on February 7th, 2010 at 6:18 am.