This Cinema Must Not Close!

COMMUNITY TAKES MATTERS INTO ITS OWN HANDS.

The Super movie theatre is the last cinema left in Valdagno.

The city is not big, it never was - neither in terms of population, which amounts to more or less 25,000 people, nor in terms of size or popularity - but during the 20th century, which can be considered the city’s golden age, not one, not two, but three separate buildings served as movies and/or theatres. The fact that nowadays only the Super survives is a red flag, especially if you consider that, in recent years, also this last cinema has been struggling to remain open; it has been closed for the past year as the business was on the verge of bankruptcy. In general, if you look at the broader picture, this is nothing new for Valdagno - many services and shops around the city are closing down for one reason or another, but this specific case felt different. Leaving Valdagno without a movie-theatre felt like leaving a hole not only in the city, but in the community itself: letting the cinema close permanently was not an option. Thankfully, the opportunity to turn around the fortunes of this business came at the right time and to the right people, and so the project “Il Teatro della città nelle tue mani” (The theatre of the city in your hands) started to come together.

Everything began in 2023, when the paperwork to transfer the ownership of the business from the local church to the municipality of Valdagno was initiated. At the bureaucratic level, the final handover was scheduled for early 2024 while the public call for the management of the activity will be published in August. This transition period has left a large empty window during which the cinema would remain closed and unused, an undesirable prospect considering the already precarious condition of the organisation. Instead, it was necessary to give continuity to the Super, while, at the same time, seeking new approaches, as past ones had proven ineffective. For these reasons, the local church, as a private entity, decided to delegate supervision of the activity to another group of people during this transition period, leaving them carte blanche, and with complete authority over the project.

This is the moment when the masterminds of the theatrical group Livello4 came into play. They have been active in Valdagno since 2010 and for their long period of activity they developed strong, long-lasting bonds with the community. The group had wanted for years to acquire a fixed location in which to operate, so when the opportunity presented itself last August, they started to design a project to cover the period from September 2023 to the end of July 2024.

But why am I writing about this initiative? It is certainly not the first project to try to keep a cinema alive, right?

In reality, what makes this proposal interesting, not only from a technical point of view, but also from a social perspective, is the decision of adopting participatory methods, meaning that the community itself is directly engaged in the decision-making process of the project. For Valdagno this is an exceptional opportunity: it is the first-time citizens have the chance to make their own decisions regarding the management of a public place. In the past, the most that citizens were asked for was to give their opinion, which could then be considered or not when making decisions at a higher level. With “Il Teatro della città nelle tue mani” that is not the case. It is an innovative approach, but when interviewing Maria Perardi, a member of Livello4, it was clear how, for her, it was almost an obvious choice to make the project participatory:

With this mindset, the community becomes the core and the heart that moves the project. The movie-theatre is theirs, they are the ones that will benefit from the provided services, so why not set it up in a way that suits them best? That is what is happening in Valdagno: they are taking a public space and making it a ~real~ public space.

From a design point of view, this led to the project being organised in two distinct phases. The first focused on promoting the project, and coming into contact with the citizens through different communication channels and official meetings, during which the first participatory methods, the Wall of Proposals and the Open Space Workshop, started to be implemented. The second phase, implemented from the beginning of 2024, was completely participatory: voluntary based workgroups focusing on different crucial topics will design and program the next steps and activities of the project, taking complete ownership of the decisions taken. In the meantime, while the workgroups are coming together, Livello4 is organising theatre and film festivals on different topics, trying to involve all sections of the population to increase the participation and engagement with the project.

As it is clear, the proposal is already very varied and interesting, although the project is still in its early stages. For this reason it is difficult to predict which results will be achieve but, despite that, “Il Teatro della città nelle tue mani” seems to have a great potential to become a successful project which will have a larger impact than expected, not only for the cinema itself, but for the town as a whole. Valdagno being a small city that does not have a very strong sense of community, and from which young people are slowing moving away due to a weak sense of belonging and few opportunities, means projects like this one can boost the chances of the city to become more welcoming and open, not just for young people, but also for other communities usually excluded from collective actions.

Livello4 is a dynamic group composed mostly of young people who are very proactive, and see culture as a tool to bring people together again. It is a ‘learn by doing’ process, but their decision to employ participatory methods is very innovative for the context in which they operate, and it feels like the right path to start promoting change. Other than having great support from the municipality and its representatives, the response they are receiving from the population is positive, and many people have come forward to actively participate in the process.

Sadly, the loan for use granted to Livello4 will expire between July and August 2024, and, consequently, a public call will be needed to determine the next management of the movie-theatre. Despite that, Livello4 is already planning to participate and the positive results that they are obtaining and the support they are gaining from the community will surely work in their favour. I am definitely rooting for them!

This project is crucial for Valdagno, it is the positive push that the city needs to start a new and needed journey towards a rebirth of its cultural life. I’d like to conclude with the wise words of Maria, member of Livello4, as she answered the question "What is a city without a theatre for you?":

“What is a city without these spaces? It is a stationary city that can certainly devote itself to other aspects, even taking advantage of other channels of culture, such as Netflix, but that will not question which are the core values of community life.

Theatrical arts can be mirrors of how our lives are going as Italian and European citizens, and how this world we live in is going. The collective confrontation that is needed on these issues can be found at the cinema and theatre, and this is why we are committed to keeping the Super open for Valdagno, especially with the participation of the community.”

Contacts:

Teatro Cinema Super: https://www.teatrosuper.it/

Instagram: @teatrocinema_super

Facebook: Teatro Cinema Super

Photo credits: Livello4

Inspired by the cinema in Valdagno, we've collected stories from community cinemas worldwide. To subscribe to our newsletter and discover more about these and other empowering initiatives related to this topic, email us at toldpadova@gmail.com