The last picture show
Cardiff is not well endowed with cinemas: there are three multiplex chains (Cineworld, Odeon and Vue) showing an unrelenting rotation of whatever manipulative pubescent tripe the mainstream US film industry doles out, plus the two screens at Chapter in Canton, without which the city would have no independent or serious cinema whatsoever. The once universal habit, across class, gender and age, of regularly “going to the pictures” has been more or less wiped out in next to no time by multi-channel TV, DVDs and downloads; yet another collective experience banished by the ever-accelerating obsolescence capitalism requires to keep profits growing.
The 3rd Soundtrack Festival, an excellent exploration of the relationship between film and music, takes place around the city this week (see www.soundtrackfilmfestival.com) – making it a good time to record the cinemas that, within living memory, were all over Cardiff. So here, in chronological order of opening, is their story*. They were big, it…
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