Wivenhoe Wittertainment

18 March 2013 » No Comments

New season [sort of] - new boiler as well for Wivenhoe Moving Image, the independent group that aims to bring community cinema to Wivenhoe and the surrounds. Some heating hiccups came the way of the Philip Road Centre base in January. As Moira from the group explains in the soundcloud below, although this was frustrating, there is some optimism looking ahead.

The very future of the Philip Road Centre as a community facility is well known. Owned by Essex County Council, the current daytime education facilities will come to a close in the summer. The What Next question has been lingering over Wivenhoe locals that use the space in the evenings.

Fixing the roof - or boiler - whilst it isn’t raining in cash rich reserves, probably isn’t a priority for a penny pinching local authority. But the ECC bods over in Chelmsford proved to be rather helpful to the Philip Road users, showing some willingness to keep the facility in community use.

Moira also updates in the podcast with the progress in listing the Philip Road Centre as an Asset of Community Value with Colchester Borough Council. The Localism Act allows any community group to have a six months heads up to buy any building, prior to it becoming available on the free market.

Working with the Wivenhoe Community Assets Forum, a formal application for CBC to consider listing the space should be rubber-stamped by Wivenhoe Town Council on 18th March. Which all means that Moving Image can then hopefully go about the business of putting on films, something that the volunteer led group is proving to be half-decent at.

Recent success stories coming out of the town include a sold out screening of Searching for Sugar Man, a documentary that tries to find the mysterious 1970′s musician Rodriguez. Executive Producer Sheryl Crown kindly took part in a Q and A session, showing that there is an appetite for film discussion within Wivenhoe.

Other big name producers have recently been scouting the hyperlocal patch as possible future filming locations. Moira explains a little more about the recent visit of Mike Leigh to the town and his interest in Wivenhoe as a location for his soon to be filmed Turner biopic. Yer man Mike just happens to also be the Patron of Moving Image. He took a great interest in the group in-between eyeing up the William Loveless Hall (*possibly*) for the Turner pic.

And then there is the Moving Image schedule itself. Moira launches a new season of films during our chat. It’s as diverse as the Moving Image audience itself, covering comedy English Heritage sites, Iranian hostage dramas and Hitchcock masterpieces.

It’s a clever and tricky move for Moving Image to re-schedule the missed films during the boiler woes. There is also talk of *shhh* some cinematic action as an additional strand to the Not the May Fair Bank Holiday weekend of musical and cultural celebrations in Wivenhoe.

It takes much more than a buggered boiler to mess with Wivenhoe Moving Image.

Full schedule: (all films are screened at the Philip Road Centre with an 8pm start time, unless stated.)

23rd March, Rust and Bone - NOTE 8:15 start time