The Kennington Bioscope is a regular cinema event featuring live accompaniment to silent films that takes place at the Cinema Museum.

French and American crime serials have a secure place in the history of early 20th century popular culture and how it influenced modern art. But was there any equivalent in Britain? Indeed, what was happening in British cinema during the ‘teens, when cinema attendance was reaching its climax? There were in fact British crime serials, and some evidence of their popular appeal, including among the rising generation of young artists, as well as some establishment figures. But none of this has yet become part of Britain’s received cultural history. So come and discover what Britain’s first cinephiles were watching, and the criminal appeal of Three Fingered Kate and Ultus, the Man from the Dead.

We will also have a rare screening of Adrian Brunel’s satire on “film” types, So This is Jollygood (1925) found in the Cinema Museum’s film collection. The evening will finish with two more rarities: the surviving footage (about half) from the French thriller Protea III: Race with Death (1915), starring Josette Andriot, and the lost episode four of the British serial Dr Sin Fang (1928), both on 35mm from the Christopher Bird collection. You can’t see these anywhere else!

Ian Christie is a historian, broadcaster and curator, currently Professor of Film and Media History at Birkbeck, University of London.

Live piano accompaniment from Colin Sell and John Sweeney.

Silent film with intertitles which may be suitable for the deaf and hard of hearing.

Tickets & Pricing

£7. Seats are limited, so please arrive early or request an invitation using the email kenbioscope@gmail.com.