Documentary

Scala!!!

- 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.

Release Date : 2024-01-05

Language :English

Adult : false

Status : Released

Production Company : Fifty Foot WomanChannel XAnti-WorldsBFI

Production Country : United Kingdom

Alternative Titles :

Cast

Character Name : Self

Original Name : John Waters

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Adam Buxton

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Stewart Lee

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : James O'Brien

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Isaac Julien

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Caroline Catz

Gender : Female

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Mary Harron

Gender : Female

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Beeban Kidron

Gender : Female

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Princess Julia

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Kim Newman

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Ben Wheatley

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Ralph Brown

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Graham Humphreys

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : JoAnne Sellar

Gender : Female

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Peter Strickland

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Stephen Woolley

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : John Akomfrah

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Thurston Moore

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : J.G. Thirlwell

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Cathi Unsworth

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Jah Wobble

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Barry Adamson

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Paul Putner

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Jane Giles

Gender : Female

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Alan Jones

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Douglas Hart

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : Matt Johnson

Gender : Male

Character Name : Self

Original Name : David McGillivray

Gender : Male

Reviews

CinemaSerf

@Geronimo1967

2024-01-13

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.