SEPTEMBER 201346 WWW.FILMJOURNAL.COM WWW.FILMJOURNAL.COM 47SEPTEMBER 2013
‘T
he time has come. The Capri Theatre needs to get
digital.” Continuously operating since 1941—when the
rst neighborhood theatre in Montgomery, Alabama,
was still known as The Clover—the Capri Community Film
Society, its nonprot operator since 1983, was faced with the
daunting task to go “DCI or DIE.” (We gratefully—and with
permission—lifted those catchy words for our headline.) Noting
“the studios made us do it,” cinema director Martin McCaffery
launched a Kickstarter campaign in April, ultimately raising more
than the $80,000 requested, in addition to “a generous grant”
from The Daniel Foundation of Birmingham that provided the
rst $25,000. DCI it is.
Arthouse Convergence last January. “After that, I just
decided we had nothing to lose, so why not give it a try?”
How are independents dealing with this seismic
change? In the rst of a two-part series, we examine
the work of passionate individuals and groups of people
not only at the Capri but in Tampa, Florida (www.
tampatheatre.org), and Berkeley Springs, West Virginia
(www.starwv.com). They will be joined next month by
equally good folks from Stamford, Connecticut (www.
avontheatre.org), as well as theatres in Santa Monica and
Hollywood, Calif. (www.americancinematheque.com), and
Lichtervelde, Belgium (www.cinemadekeizer.be). All of
them exclusively share with Film Journal International their
thoughts on timing, how they nanced the conversion,
specic challenges they encountered due to their unique
surroundings—and, of course, how programming
philosophies are being impacted. As McCaffery says,
“We’re hoping digital will allow us to expand our
programming.”
While certainly lucky to have such good friends, the
Capri (www.capritheatre.org) is not alone in overcoming the
challenges of digital conversion and in hoping for good things
to come with it. Putting it into perspective, that amount
of money is “more than we spent on 35mm in 30 years,”
McCaffery says in his video pitch. “And it is also more than
we had in ticket sales last year.” Other successful Kickstarters
such as the Catlow (http://bit.ly/fji1012catlow), Patio, Harbor
and Rose theatres as well as Lyric Cinema Café (http://bit.ly/
fji1112kickstarter) have already been proled in these pages.
And McCaffery credits the Crescent Theatre in Mobile, Ala.
as his inspiration, along with the discussions at the Sundance
A
ll of our exemplary movie houses have been around for a
long, long time. At 72 years, the Capri is the youngest in
the bunch (barely, by one year). The Aero Theatre opened in
1940 and is operated by the American Cinematheque, which
also runs the Egyptian in Hollywood. Exhibitor-showman Sid
Grauman launched the exotic landmark in 1922, four years
after the Million Dollar Theatre in downtown Los Angeles
and ve years before his world-famous Chinese Theatre down
the boulevard. The Avon was part of that magical movie year
1939 and our small-town wonders in Berkeley Springs and
Lichtervelde were established in 1928 and 1924, respectively.
“I have to remind people that the Tampa Theatre was
built before sound was even invented,” laughs John Bell, the
president and CEO of the 1926 atmospheric movie palace
that the MPAA recently placed on its list of “the world’s best”
(www.thecredits.org/2013/05/ten-of-the-worlds-best-movie-
theaters). “Since lm is our core business, we were well aware
for several years that digital cinema was coming,” he reassures.
“In July 2012, however, we realized it wasn’t just coming but
that it was here. While there wasn’t any one distributor that
went on record saying they would stop distributing lm prints
to the Tampa Theatre in 2013, that was the message we were
hearing nonetheless. Part of why we had been waiting was our
hope that the digital conversion would be like plasma TVs,” he
laughs. “You know, prices coming way, way down after the rst
ones had come out. Unfortunately that has not been the case.”
The accelerated timing put the nonprot Tampa Theatre
SayS CEO JOhn BEll On thE fundraiSing
Campaign fOr digital COnvErSiOn Of thE
nOnprOfit tampa thEatrE, “WE ElECtEd
tO gO With a mOrE graSSrOOtS Campaign.
m
OSt pEOplE gavE uS $10 Or $50 giftS, But
WE raiSEd aBOut $104,000.”
CLASSIC
MOVIE
HOUSES
the Capri,
nee Clover, 1958
reel life,
before digital
DCI or Die! Kickstarter
G O D I G I T A L
BY ANDREAS FUCHS
DCI or D I E
(3 strony)
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