“SCALA!!!” pays documentary tribute to a landmark London cinema

As much as films deserve celebration for their cultural contributions, so too do the cinemas that show them, at times courageously. Directors Ali Catterall and Jane Giles’ documentary “SCALA!!!” is, therefore, a most welcome tribute to a landmark London cinema, one, quite astonishing in terms of its history. For the Scala theater offered daring independent films from 1978 to 1993.

Based on Jane Giles 2018 book, “Scala Cinema 1978-1993,” co-director Giles knows in detail Scala’s ups and downs. Program manager from 1988-1992, Giles was arrested in 1992 for showing “A Clockwork Orange,” a 1972 film withdrawn from circulation in the U.K. until director Stanley Kubrick’s death in 1999. However, that event was the tip of the iceberg for a theater that flaunted conformity for fifteen glorious years.

Through interviews with over fifty Scala devotees, one hundred plus film clips, and archival footage, the documentary “SCALA!!!” moves rapidly through the cinema’s history: location moves, all night screenings, progressive and pro-union benefits, plus decidedly outrageous, occasionally raucous audiences, and two cats, Roy and Huston who, occasionally, made unexpected appearances in the auditorium. Flashy montages honor the repertory of horror, sexploitation, satirical, LGBTQIA+, cult, and other counterculture films.

Above all, Scala became a haven for fringe fashion and  avant-garde individuals. Among them were men and women who became iconic musicians, artists, screenwriters, and filmmakers, including Mary Harron, Isaac Julien, John Akomfrah, Peter Strickland, and many more. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t spotlight the interview, interjected at a relevant moments, with John Waters, a visitor to Scala and one who had his films screened there. The stories told with joy and amusement entertain in delightful ways. Musician Barry Adamson’s original soundtrack enhances the speeding documentary.

The film lives up to its full title: “SCALA!!! Or, the incredibly Strange Rise and Fall of the World’s Wildest Cinema and How It Influenced a Mixed-Up Generation of Weirdos and Misfits,” Celebrating the unconventional, iconic, wild, and wacky legendary cinema, “SCALA!!!” screens Friday, July 26, through Sunday, July 28, at Webster University’s Winifred Moore auditorium, at 7:30 each of those evenings. For more information, you may visit the film series website.