Presentation given at the International Screen Conference, Glasgow 2014 on how mobile heritage apps can bring the landscape of cinemagoing to life - using the example of the Lost Cinemas of Castle Park app which features over 100 years of cinemagoing in Bristol City Centre from 1896 to the present day. The presentation argues that mobile location-based technology can raise awareness of the practice of moviegoing through different technological eras of cinema, as well as inform us about the recent history, culture and society. The presentation situates this micro history within the wider landscape of developments in new cinema history, audience research and cultural geography. The video embedded in the powerpoint is the demo video used for publication on app store to demonstrate the location-based dimension of the app: https://vimeo.com/53189913

1. “Constellations in the Night Sky”:
Mobile Media and the Landscapes of Cinema-going
Dr Charlotte Crofts (Digital Cultures Research Centre, UWE, Br
charlotte.crofts@uwe.ac.uk @charlottecrofts

2. “Their names were like the constellations in the
night sky, culled at random from Greek mythology,
the ‘Orpheus’, the ‘Gamount’, the ‘Odeon’. Sometimes
I wondered who picked these names, and why, but
no one seemed to know. They had always seemed so
timeless in their neon sky-writing, palaces of
electricity and esoteric magic. Some people navigate
their cities by churches, other by pubs. At an early
age I learned to use the cinemas of Bristol as familiar
landmarks in my explorations of the city. I still do,
even in my dreams.” Ewan McLeod, Projectionist
(Arnolfini, Bristol), Dream On: Bristol Writers on
Cinema (1994).

3. Bristol Cinemas, 1896-present*
Height of cinema-going 1938,
40 cinemas
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
1897
1899
1901
1903
1905
1907
1909
1911
1913
1915
1917
1919
1921
1923
1925
1927
1929
1931
1933
1935
1937
1939
1941
1943
1945
1947
1949
1951
1953
1955
1957
1959
1961
1963
1965
1967
1969
1971
1973
1975
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012
Number of Cinemas in Bristol
*Total of c70 cinemas in
lifetime of the city

4. Lost Cinemas of Castle Park
• The Tivoli (built 1874-1956, 1st
moving pictures 1896-1900,
cinema 1912-16)
• The Bio-Pictureland /Counterslip
Chapel (built 1810, cinema 1908-
1918)
• The Gem (built 1908, cinema
1909-1932)
• The Queens Picture House (1910-
1933)
• The Dolphin (1910-1922)
• The Olympia, later The Tatler
(1910-1963)
• The Kings Hall (1910-1976)
• The Castle Street Theatre (1911-
1926)
• The Clare Street Picture House
(1911-1927)
• The People’s Palace / Gaumont
(1892-present, cinema 1912-1980)
• The Regent (1928-1940)
• The Empire Theatre (1893-1963,
cinema 1931-9)
• The Bristol Hippodrome (1912-
present, cinema 1932-38)
• The News Theatre (1933-1956)
• The Odeon (1938-present)
• The Europa (1973-1987)
• The Watershed (1982-present)

5. Lost Cinemas of Castle Park App

6. Lost Cinemas of Castle Park
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
1896
1901
1906
1911
1916
1921
1926
1931
1936
1941
1946
1951
1956
1961
1966
1971
1976
1982
1987
1992
1997
2002
2007
2012
NumberofCinemas
Year
Watershed 1982-
Tivoli, 1896-1900, 1912-1916
Tatler, Olympia 1910-63
Regent 1928-40
Queen's Picture Hall 1910-33
People's Palace, Gaumont Baldwin St 1896, 1912-1980
Odeon, Unionn St 1938-
News Theatre 1933-56
King's Hall 1911-76
Gem 1909-32
Europa 1973-87
Empire Theatre 1931-39
Dolphin 1910-1922
Clare Street Picture House 1911-27
Castle Street 1911-26
Bristol Hippodrome 1932-38
Bio Pictureland 1908-14

7. Lost Cinemas of Castle Park App
• GPS triggers content in Auto mode
• “Armchair” mode, tap points to get
content
• Link to What’s on in Bristol Cinemas
• Ability to Tweet from within the app
• Ambient cinema music as you walk
round –only available in-situ
• Name, date of cinema
• Single image for each cinema
• Simple play/pause/stop interface
• Emphasis on audio
• Cinema footprints indicated location
• Narration, dramatisation, reenactment,
limited oral history

8. Castle Street District
C1920 c1940

9. Castle Park, then and now
2012 Ordinance Survey Map1900s Map
Maps from Bristol City Council’s interactive GIS map, Know Your Place

11. Pre Cinematograph Act 1909
• The Tivoli musical hall
(1874-1956: screenings
1896-1900; cinema 1912-
16)
• 1st moving pictures June
1896
• Teddy Leon, a Mancunian
showman (and dentist)
• Now Marks and Spencers in
Broadmead pedestrian
shopping area

12. Kingdom of Shadows
MAXIM GORKY
“Last night I was in the kingdom of
shadows, if you only knew how
strange it is to be there. It’s a
world without sound without color:
everything there, the earth, the
trees, the people, the water and
the air is dipped in monotonous
grey: grey rays of the sun across
the grey sky, grey eyes in grey faces
and the leaves of the trees are
ashen grey, it is not life but its
shadow, it is not motion but its
soundless specter… It is terrible to
see, this movement of shadows,
nothing but shadows, the spectres,
these phantoms…”

13. The Gem

14. Journey to the Gem
BENJAMIN PRICE
“On the way to the Gem on Broad Weir,
Father took me through Cheese Lane and
on to Tower Hill, where trams swirled
down to the Ha’penny Bridge, all was
magic. When we reached Castle Street, I
was in a wonderland of lights and
movement. Down Castle Ditch to the
junction of Broad Weir, Narrow Weir and
Philli-I-fi Street. This was the promised
land, the electric lights of Old Market
behind us, I was in the realm of ancient
gas-lit shops and narrow alleys. We
passed all the windows of fascinating
shops, tea rooms, a chip shop, odd trades
like furriers… “

15. Evoking sense of place
• Aural dimension helps bring lost cinemas to life
• Emphasis on audio allows real location to be the “screen”
• “Dialectical montage” / frisson between physical location, media
content and user interface.
• Temporal / spatial oscillation between here/there, now/then,
location/imagination

16. First purpose built cinemas

17. Wider topography of leisure
• Fox’s, the pub on the left of the
Queens Picture House on Peter St
• Lake’s Oyster bar on the right,
where there were no seats, just a
bar where you stood and ate
shellfish.
• The Cat and Wheel was just round
the corner, roughly opposite what
is now the public toilets.
• Next door was the Bear and
Rugged Staff, both run by George &
Co Brewery.

18. The Dolphin
IVY MAY HILLER
“I used to go the Kozy Korner
Picture House. Wounded
soldiers came in to watch
films. I worked there selling
chocolates. There was a young
chap, Fred, a projectionist.
Every Thursday Fred and I
would walk to Temple Mead
Station to send the reels of
film to London and collect the
new reels. Dad always waited
for me around midnight” Also known as Pringles Picture Palace
and Kozy Korner Kinema

19. Clare Street Picture House

20. Theatre conversions

21. Theatre conversions

22. Super Cinemas

23. The Regent

24. “Magic Moments”
• Listening to history of the cinemas whilst standing near where
they used to be is effective (and sometimes affective)
• “Sweet spot” when the app interacts with location, anticipating
what the user is likely to see / hear (Reid, J., Hull, R., Cater, K.,
Fleuriot, C. (2005),“Magic Moments in Situated Mediascapes” in
ACM SIGCHI International Conference on Advances in Computer
Entertainment Technology).

25. Impact of WW2
• Castle Street obliterated by blitz,
including the loss of The Regent
• News Theatre hangs on until 1950s
• Odeon survives bombing, still
operating
• Aspirations for redevelopment
of the bombsite into civic centre
never realised
• New shopping area,
Broadmead, developed to sate
national shopping chains
• 1970s turned into a park

26. The Age of the Car:
Old Market, then and now
Cinema “footprints" overlayed
onto 1949 Map Today, cut off by underpass
Kings
Tatler
Empire

27. Temple Way Underpass, c1968

28. Kings in decline; ceased operating in 1976,
demolished 1982
Adult fare:
Hot Dreams and Man Hungry

29. Shift from City Centre to Suburban
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
1897
1899
1901
1903
1905
1907
1909
1911
1913
1915
1917
1919
1921
1923
1925
1927
1929
1931
1933
1935
1937
1939
1941
1943
1945
1947
1949
1951
1953
1955
1957
1959
1961
1963
1965
1967
1969
1971
1973
1975
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012
Number of Cinemas in Bristol
Height of cinemagoing
in Bristol city centre,
1911-1915
Height of
cinemagoing
across whole
city, 1938
City Centre Cinemas

30. Mapping Bristol City Centre Cinemas
• Spatial visualisation of spaces of cinemagoing (Robert Allen, Jeffery
Klenotic, John Caughie, Maria Valez-Serna)
• Social production of space (Henri Le Febvre)
• Mobilities (Mimi Sheller) – journeys of people and film prints
• Shifting technologies (Apparatus Theory, Christian Metz, Jean-Louis
Comoilli, Theresa de Lauretis), e.g. purpose-built cinemas / coming of
sound
• Politics of postwar redevelopment and car culture (Urban Sociology)
• Class and shifting patterns of consumption (Annette Kuhn, Martin
Barker)
• Historical, spatial and digital turn within Film Studies (New Cinema
History / HOMER: Daniel Bilteryest, Karel Dibbets, Richard Matlby, Deb
Verhoeven, etc.)
• Added value of experiencing this “on location” on mobile device….

31. CARY GRANT COMES
HOME
…FOR THE WEEKEND
11-12 OCTOBER, BRISTOLCary Grant is cited as “the best and most
important actor in the history of cinema”
by David Thomson (The New Biographical
Dictionary of Film), who will be speaking
about Grant’s journey from Bristol-born
Archie Leach to pan-Atlantic gentleman.
Festival Gala double screening at The
Bristol Hippodrome, the very theatre
where young Archie worked as a lad and
was inspired to become an actor – tickets
available now!
Confirmed speakers also include Mark
Glancy (Queen Mary), Kathrina Gltire
(UWE) and Andrew Spicer (UWE).