On the High Street back watching the film of your choice

So Eltham has its own cinema again.

For any one who can remember the Well Hall Odeon, the ABC on the high Street and the Gaumont this will be good news.

There may even be those who remember the old Eltham Cinema Theatre which opened in 1913 and was demolished in 1968.

I say remember it but long before it was knocked down it had ceased showing films which just leaves us with the three of which the Odeon renamed the Coronet struggled on the longest, finally become empty in 2000.

Although I do think it provides the image of a closed cinema in that warning about the dangers of film piracy shown at the pictures.

Any way I look forward to how the consultation goes and the prospect that once again on the High Street you will be able to “sit back and enjoy a film.”

In the meantime here is a reminder of how things went during the back end of the 20th century.

This is the ABC which closed its doors in 1972 and was demolished soon after

It had stood on the corner of the High Street and Passey Place for half a century.

It was opened as the Palace Cinema in 1922, showed its first talkie in 1930* and for a few brief years from 1966 to 69 was where I went with first Pamela, then Jenny and finally Ann, but that is a story for another time.

Picture; the demolition of the ABC in the High Street courtesy of Chrissie Rose.


* ELTHAM IN OLD PHOTOGRAPHS, John Kennet, 1991