Lottery funding set to rescue 1930s cinema

THE future of a 72-year-old cinema in Aberfeldy is likely to have been secured after a lottery award, a campaign group said this morning.

Birks Cinema in the Perthshire town was given £539,905 from the Big Lottery Fund.

The money will be used to refurbish the building and contribute to running costs in the first five years of its operation.

The Friends of Birks Cinema group previously secured funding which allowed them to buy the building and weatherproof it.

The latest grant was provided through the fund’s Growing Community Assets programme and took the campaigners over their funding target of £1.8 million.

All that remains now is for the cinema plans to be approved.

Charlotte Flower, who chairs the friends group, said: “I can’t express just how excited we are to have gained such an award and recognition from the Big Lottery Fund. They have been fantastic to deal with and now we can take big steps forward to get the project up and running.

“Discussions are ongoing with the Scottish Rural Development Programme on the project overall and it will take a few weeks to complete due diligence on the whole package. But now that we are able to confirm the Big Lottery Fund award, we are very confident.

“It helps us go beyond our basic funding target and it provides a jumpstart to establish the cinema as one of Highland Perthshire’s must-visit attractions.”

The cinema was built in 1939 but has been derelict for 30 years. Local people formed the campaign group in 2006 to reopen it as a traditional-style cinema.

The group is now a registered charity with 450 members and Holywood actor Alan Cumming is its patron.

Actor Emma Thompson has also contributed to the campaign by donating a drawing for a “blind auction” held last year to raise money for the project.