Architecture of the Feature Film, 1915–25

Abstract

In the period from 1908 to 1914 a number of new motion picture theatres were designed in imitation of fashionable public buildings. Traditionally such designs were based, as May says, on the classical architecture of Greece and Rome.¹ Soon, however, it became possible to find evidence of new motion picture theatres (like Boston’s Modern, opened in 1914 to take an audience of 1000 people) in which classicism had become deeply confused with various European styles. The ruling principle of the Modern’s architecture was Gothic, but Romanesque and romantic styles were also commonly used.² It was not uncommon to find architectural styles thrown together in a mishmash, with the visual excitements of the Gothic or Romanesque oddly framed by ‘the Doric, Ionic and Corinthian pillar associated with classicism and reason’.³