Max Vigar is a home-educated 14-year-old writer. He is based in Margate and writes articles, poetry, stories on a variety of themes, and articles related to Thanet.
Here he explores the new home of Kent Film Foundation and its Ramsgate Community Cinema – and why a government fund might help create a bright future:
Ramsgate filmmaking and arts charity Kent Film Foundation has been uprooted, sadly leaving their old home on Ramsgate High Street, after 20 months in the venue.
“We were given notice on 1st August,” says Jan Dunn, founder of the organisation. “This was 11 months longer than we thought [we’d be able to stay] which was great.”
Kent Film Foundation (KFF) – and its Ramsgate Community Cinema- have been through disruptive moves multiple times in recent years but has managed to continue offering invaluable resources to the community. They educate young people interested in film, by running a weekly youth filmmaking club.
They were even mentioned in The Guardian, highlighted among 1600 sites in the UK as an example of what a community cinema should be.
As a member of their young people’s filmmaking club, I have seen and experienced how valuable this group is, enabling anyone aged between 11 and 19 to create their own short films, taking them to shoot on-location around the town, and introducing them to industry professionals, creating an opportunity for future careers in the film industry. They also offer excellent screening events for those of us wanting to learn more, with Q & As accompanying the films.
Jan and the team are frustrated at a lack of meaningful support to acquire permanent premises, with rejected Community Asset bids for buildings on Thanet District Council disposal lists, despite support from residents. They have also attempted to acquire premises from private freeholders without success.
Jan said: “We offered a good price to purchase our previous venue with funding the charity could access at that time but to no avail. However, it has remained empty since we vacated it, as is the old shop next door which has remained empty for years.”
A search across the town centre, with constructive help from Ramsgate Space, a CIC that helps local businesses and community organisations access the town’s many empty shops, at times proved frustrating.
Jan said: “It was proving very hard to find another empty shop… as there are numerous High Street shops that appear to be available but with freeholders who are just sitting on them.”
She adds that one freeholder, “did not even know he owned the building!”
Thankfully, KFF has managed to secure a new venue, albeit not a forever home, in Albert Street.
“It’s actually a cluster of rooms that I think were most likely intended as offices,” Jan explains.
The team of creatives have worked hard to make a new space in the Paragon Works complex in Albert Street, near Waitrose — a location that already shows promise for the community it serves.
Jan said: “We have got a large central room where the technical team, led by local filmmaker Joanne Postlewaite, have managed to modify into our new screening room.”
There is also another useful space with an editing room for the young filmmakers, which will facilitate the cutting and polishing of many short films in months to come.
Jan added: “We hope this brings an affordable, if intimate, venue to other organisations that we have been partnering with, as well as a great smaller music venue for launching local bands and to start our long-planned youth theatre to complement the film clubs.”
The move has meant a reduction in seating space from 60 down to 38, but Jan says: “We are making the best of it, with some help from a wonderful team of residents again, volunteering to help”.
Financial challenges are an ongoing battle, because renting a property means more funding must be found through grants. Jan added: “We cannot build the business until we have our own premises to mould”.
The charity, like most, is almost entirely grant-reliant and the KFF team “feel passionately that the youth film clubs should remain free to attend and with high skilled professional film mentors at the helm,” adding “a community cinema should be for the community and we are determined this remains a pay-what-you-can cinema.”
Jan retains a positive outlook for the future: “With the tangible support of 15% of the town’s population physically signing a petition in support of Kent Film Foundation’s (thwarted) attempt to acquire the old Granville Cinema (in 2022) we hold out hope that, literally, the voice of the people is actually going to be heard this time around”.
Funding heading for Ramsgate may also offer a helping hand to the Foundation. The £20m Plan for Neighbourhood Funding for the town is marketed by the government as a fund spend dictated entirely by “what the residents want.”
A portion of this spend could help the charity finally acquire the premises it has long deserved.
Kent Film Foundation offers events for the community. Film screenings take place on Wednesday evenings and Friday afternoons. The eclectic programming has been praised – from classics made in the ‘50s and ‘60s to more recent titles that may have just missed out on the screens of the big chain cinemas – or you could visit one of the live music or poetry events KFF hosts throughout the year.
Hearing Jan’s words, seeing and experiencing the gemstone of local assets that Ramsgate Community Cinema and Kent Film Foundation are, I truly hope through the new Plan for Neighbourhood funding there can be an offer of help to find them somewhere to operate, and to stay.
Find out more about Ramsgate Community Cinema at: https://www.facebook.com/ramsgatecommunitycinema/
Visit the Kent Film Foundation website at: https://kentfilmfoundation.co.uk/
Is this the same group who wanted to take over the Granville?
Dot, it’s a pity they didn’t as they are much more education and community orientated and soon the Winter Gardens will be Thanet’s home for commercial theatre and some.
Cinema is still an important part of our cultural expression and galvanises communities.
Good luck to the KFF