Much as I hate nostalgia, the release this week of Scala!!!, a documentary about the legendary, titular cinema club, gave me a pang. In the early 80s I’d trek to drug-and prostitute-riddled King’s Cross to watch bizarre, hard-to-find movies. These days I vegetate at home, scrolling through homogeneous offerings of Netflix and Amazon Prime. Convenience has killed curiosity.
The creepy, intriguing publicity image of David Lynch’s early masterpiece Eraserhead regularly adorned the Scala’s garish monthly screening calendar. As noted recently, this is one of countless seminal works that are not currently available on any streaming service.
Woe betide anyone who’s binned their DVD player, because these are the things the streamers won’t — can’t — supply
The Scala was founded by Stephen Woolley in 1978 to emulate the eclectic programming of America’s grindhouse circuit: it showed milestone classics and Laurel and Hardy shorts alongside Russ Meyer sexploitation and underground gay flicks. It was the place to see the early, bad-taste works of John Waters and in the 1980s it championed the case of the so-called “video nasties”.
As a club, the Scala could serve alcohol after 11pm, and its druggy, sexy all-nighters were legendary. It inspired a generation of film-makers and other artists — Beeban Kidron, Adam Buxton, Peter Strickland and Stewart Lee are among those featured in the documentary. When its original building in Tottenham St was sold it moved in 1981 to the palatial, domed former King’s Cross Cinema.
This was the building, still smelling of its short-lived stint as monkey house The London Primatarium, that I first entered in 1982. It closed in 1993, impoverished after it was sued for illegally screening A Clockwork Orange, but also beset by home entertainment. The rise of VHS, then DVD, spawned specialist companies who’d track down and reissue 1970s British sex comedies or obscure Italian giallo horror, if that was your bag.
Woe betide anyone who’s binned their DVD player, because these are the things the streamers won’t — can’t — supply. Except this month, when the BFIplayer will show some Scala faves to accompany the release of the documentary. Enjoy it while you can.
Scala!!! is released on January 5
