Scala!!! main backdrop
Scala!!! main poster

7.8/10 • 9

2024-01-051h 36m

Documentary

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

This feature-length big screen documentary tells the riotous inside story of the infamous sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll repertory cinema which inspired a generation during Britain's turbulent Thatcher years.

Directors
Jane Giles, Ali Catterall
Editors
Edward Mills

Top Billed Cast

View Credits
  1. John Waters

    John Waters

    Self

  2. Adam Buxton

    Adam Buxton

    Self

  3. Stewart Lee

    Stewart Lee

    Self

  4. James O'Brien

    James O'Brien

    Self

  5. Isaac Julien

    Isaac Julien

    Self

  6. Caroline Catz

    Caroline Catz

    Self

  7. Mary Harron

    Mary Harron

    Self

  8. Beeban Kidron

    Beeban Kidron

    Self

  9. Princess Julia

    Princess Julia

    Self

Reviews1

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CinemaSerf Avatar

CinemaSerf

Jan 13, 2024

7/10

This is quite a fascinating documentary following the fate of a cinema that even John Waters said "shocked him". It wasn't always on the same site in Central London, but the "Scala" name quickly became a magnet for all those who didn't conform to the more mainstream - with their own behaviour and/or attitudes and/or taste in films. Using an astonishing amount of well researched actuality and some interviews with the folks who worked there or attended over the years, we learn of a place that offered a venue for any combination of the Bohemian, the decadent, the drugged up, boozed up, gay - and, yep, even the serious film goer as it originally opened and closed many years later with "King Kong" (1933)! I did live in London in the late 1980s and King's Cross was a dump - full of hookers, rent boys and you never strayed far from an heroin needle. The "Scala" thrived amidst this alternative and hedonistic environment and though I don't know that I quite qualify for the groups that regularly used the place after midnight, my two visits were fun and never intimidating - the sound system there was not the best! Porn, horror, martial arts, cartoons - nothing was off limits until the local council took exception to "A Clockwork Orange" (1971) and the subsequent legal fracas pretty much put paid to the place as a cinema. It's split into parts that illustrate the rise and fall of what was essentially an establishment that didn't really matter in which building it was located. Sticky floors, sticky seats, dark "back massages" offering a range of facilities from a sleeping berth to a shagging one. It can't resist the usual bit of Mrs. Thatcher-bashing at the end which adds a bit of authenticity to a cinema that existed precisely because it was so anti-establishment and pro free-spirit. It reminded me a little of the "Studio 54" (2018) documentary. A place that was legendary and fun and necessary - probably still is. Very watchable on a big screen if you can.

Media

  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster
  • Scala!!! poster

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Status
Released
Original Language
English
Budget
--
Revenue
--
Keywords
movie theater