San Francisco’s pop-up Peephole Cinema
It’s no secret that the theatrical filmmaking business has been in danger, as the desire to see new films on the big screen has gone down in recent years.
While it is easy to blame these trends on Covid-19 and the related shutdowns, which made many audiences more comfortable watching new releases at home, it was merely a flashpoint within an industry trend that had been emerging for nearly a decade. Due to streaming services and the variability of viewing online, simply going to see a new film on the big screen no longer feels like as big a deal as it once did.
A lack of desirable new material is also an issue that the industry has struggled with. While the summer of 2023, which saw the duelling releases of Barbie and Oppenheimer, was a rare cultural moment, attempts to replicate the same phenomenon haven’t taken off, and finding a way for audiences to get excited by both what they are seeing and the nature of its release has been a significant challenge, but a new pop-up programme in San Francisco may have cracked the code.
Residents of the California city, as well as those who are visiting, may have noticed a series of peepholes in the Mission District. Even though they are literal ‘holes in the wall’, these installations offer patient viewers an opportunity to lean over and watch short films through a peephole. The material is taken from classic silent and animation shorts from the very earliest days of Hollywood.
The Peephole Cinema project was established by Laurie O’Brien, an animation expert who had previously developed similar creations in Brooklyn and Los Angeles. While another cinema was put into the San Francisco airport, O’Brien’s intention with the project is to showcase this unique era of cinema to a wider audience, who may not have checked it out otherwise.
While the underground advertising campaign isn’t drawing in massive crowds, the endeavour has both attracted the interest of dedicated sightseers and presented a compelling opportunity for anyone who has passed through the area. The nature of its presentation is closer to the type of attraction one might see at a circus or fair than a traditional movie theatre, and that is enough to gauge people’s interests.
While it might feel a bit silly to compare the effectiveness of the Peephole Cinema to the existential question facing the industry right now, it does showcase a unique psychological effect.
If watching the film is an experience in its own right, it doesn’t really matter what specific film is being shown. Although a majority of the audience going to the Peephole Cinema probably aren’t expecting a collection of silent and animated shorts from Hollywood’s earliest eras, that doesn’t mean that they won’t check them out when given a unique opportunity to do so.
Beyond being a fun pop-up experience that shows an interesting new way to watch these films, the Peephole Cinema series is playing an important role in terms of preservation. A vast majority of cinema from this era has been lost, and there’s always the danger that disinterest in saving these films will result in a similar crisis. Hopefully, those who visit the Peephole Cinema pop-ups will remember that.
