Dave Boyle looks at the Co-operative's long standing relationship with cinema and how it is embracing change
The Electric Picture House in Wotton is unusual for several reasons. It's not that it's got a famous patron in Catherine Johnson, writer of Mamma Mia, who grew up nearby and came to see her film one day at the 100-seat venue.
It's not that volunteers run the whole show or even that with fewer than 6,000 residents, it's one of the smallest communities with a permanent, dedicated cinema in its own building, showing around 10 shows each week.
What makes Wotton pretty special is that it's one of a handful of co-operative cinemas in the country, owned not by a charitable trust or private company but by its audience, its volunteers and its original investors. Its profits are donated back to the community via the Wotton Recreation Trust.
The co-operative movement has a longstanding relationship with film. It was quick to recognise the power of the cinema as a tool for promoting its alternative vision, which continues to this day; the Co-operative Group are supporting a remake of the 1944 film Men of Rochdale, about the birth of co-operation in 1844 by the Rochdale Pioneers, starring John Henshaw and due for release later this year.
Also noted by the early movement was that many towns of relatively small size had several cinemas. Many of the equally numerous local retail co-ops saw a commercial opportunity, with the first co-operative cinema being opened in Meadowfield, County Durham, in 1915. Foremost was the Dewsbury Co-operative Society, under the direction of Horace Masterman, who worked for the society and was a recognised as a master of marketing films.
At Dewsbury and the other co-op cinemas, trips counted to members' dividends, and the Cinema Exhibitors Association (CEA) was fearful of the threat from the movement – so it attempted to create its own.
Bit when the Co-operative Wholesale Society supported the creation of the People's Entertainment Society in 1942 its peak had already been passed. The post-war decline of cinemas was keenly felt inside the co-operative movement which was itself going through trying times, and the last co-operative cinema closed in 1967 in Horbury, West Yorkshire.
Wotton's cinema re-opened in its current form in 2005, after its commercial predecessor closed. The initial decision to use digital projection (thanks to a grant from the Film Council) was vindicated; at the time, says leading light Jeff Walshe, "It was seen as a bold and brave choice then but it's now standard".
Crucially, digital projection is a much easier piece of kit to handle than 35mm film projection, which means it doesn't use projectionists with specialist knowledge and skills, making running the cinema easier and cheaper.
The Electric Picture House is a part of the independent cinema scene, now numbering more than 1,500, according to Simon Ward at the Independent Cinema Office, which advises and supports them. They're formed either to bring a cinema to remote communities, or to bring less mainstream films to a wider audience.
The same motivations underpin many of the community cinema groups that tend to have less permanent homes, using a variety of exhibition spaces from village halls through to theaters, lecture halls and schools. Wotton's group began life offering community cinema, using its programme to raise funds to get the cinema opened and it remains a member of the British Federation of Film Societies (BFFS) which represents more than 500 community cinemas and film societies across the UK.
BFFS's managing director, Deborah Parker, says their role is "Our role is to help and support people to develop, set up and sustain the type of cinema their community wants, and to advise on the right licences so they're doing it legally."
While many are longstanding societies – the most recent BFFS survey of their sector showed around 16% are 50 years old or even older – nearly two-thirds are less than 10 years old.
One big factor is the long-term decline of the local cinema, which has been confirmed by the multiplex. Whereas once several towns might each have had a small cinema, now its a centrally-located multiplex; while here will soon be more screens than any time since a golden age before the second world war, more people further to travel to get to them.
But this also comes amid a growing movement committed to reopening or providing services and facilities where mainstream providers have deemed it uneconomical for them to do so. The BFFS's annual survey of members showed that on average their societies were located around 7.5 miles from the nearest mainstream cinema.
Another factor has been the growth of an audience more interested in more than a parade of 3D blockbusters and mega buckets of popcorn that drives much of the mainstream experience. There's is now enough of a different crowd to support non-mainstream cinema in greater numbers than ever.
The internet hasn't affected cinema in the same way that it has hit music and TV, not least because the experience is as important as the film and it isn't easy to replicate the communal cinema experience. Indeed, Ward believes that the internet has been a great thing for cinema, as it provides a new way to market films and make people aware of them, driving more people to cinemas and more films being made. "There's a board in our office showing the films on release, and it's twice the size it was 10 years ago – people can be more confident that there is a market for independent cinema," he says.
However, turning that into a working, thriving cinema is still an awful lot of work, though the ICO's guides to groups thinking of doing it are an excellent starting point, as are those by the BFFS for community cinema societies.
The most common form for independent cinema is a charity, which is a tax effective way for surpluses to be reinvested. That comes at a price though, with the costs of complying with charity law added to by the costs of running day-to-day trading through a wholly owned subsidiary.
The ICO guides don't suggest a co-operative structure, but there is no reason why the charity couldn't be a co-operative, as long as the benefits were charitable, or they could forego charitable status altogether.
The biggest benefit would the lower costs of raising the start-up capital required, often the biggest hurdle given the need to find and often renovate a building.
Co-operatives registered as industrial and provident societies can raise capital without the need for an expensive FSA-regulated share issue. Instead they can knit investors and users together in a mutually beneficial relationship.
An added bonus is that such schemes can now be genuinely competitive investments.
In 2009, Ethical Consumer magazine raised more than £250,000 from its readers, and pays 4% interest annually; it's sustainable and affordable to them, and in the current climate, a pretty good investment for their members.
With interest rates at a historic low and predicted to remain so for years to come, social investment can deliver good returns as well as enabling community facilities to be provided on an accountable basis.
Dave Boyle is a researcher and consultant, and a co-operative development worker who blogs at daveboyle.net and is on Twitter as @theboyler
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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/social-enterprise-network/2012/jul/24/co-operative-cinema-opportunity
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