Scala!!! Or to give it its full title ‘The Incredibly Strange Rise and Fall of the World’s Wildest Cinema and How It Influenced A Mixed-Up Generation of Weirdos and Misfits’ pretty much does what it says on the tin, with the kind of love and reverence that you can only have if you were one of that mixed up generation.
In its third physical reincarnation and its cultural peak, the Scala cinema rose above the drug-addled red light scene of 1980s King’s Cross. A fair amount of those drugs leaked into the venue fueling the All Night movie fests that it was infamous for. If there was a movie that was too obscure, too risque, or just too messy for mainstream cinema it found its welcome there.
The Scala was the heart of a cultural cauldron. It sat between The Bell, an icon of queer 80s music culture, and Gay’s the Word bookshop, the place where queer conceptual thinking got put down on paper. So it naturally found its gay audience. But it also attracted the poor artists, broke musicians and fervent activists who were railing against the Thatcher government and its war on unions, gay visibility, and counterculture. The Scale programming, even when it was pure entertainment rather than politics, promoted an aesthetic and an attitude that nurtured the disaffected and the misplaced. Whether you liked chainsaw massacres, driller killers and sexploitation, or preferred arty French erotica and American B movies you could always find something to watch. As long as your suede pixie boots didn’t get stuck to whatever that unmentionable substance was that coated the floors and some of the walls.
Directed by Ali Caterall and Jane Giles they do a cheeky yet smart job of placing the venue in its musical, political, and cinematic context. More fun than a Cultural Studies lecture it still provides the kind of satisfying and thoughtful in-depth analysis that explains why it was such a beloved institution. Largely done by face-to-camera testimonies from the ‘weirdos and misfits’ who loved it, including John Waters, Paul Burston, Princess Julia and Isaac Julien, its high-impact graphic designs and iconic movie clips make you feel like you are inhaling the real thing in all its seedy glory.
Queerguru Contributing Editor ANDREW HEBDEN is a MEDIA and cultural STUDIES graduate spending his career between London, Beijing, and NYC as an expert in media and social trends. As part of the expanding minimalist FIRE movement, he recently returned to the UK and lives in Soho. He devotes as much time as possible to the movies, theatre, and the gym. His favorite thing is to try something (anything) new every day”
Andrew reviewed this film at BFI London Film Festival
