The sad and sorry story of Bristol’s short-lived IMAX cinema

Bristol’s biggest cinema screen is also one of the city’s most well-kept secrets. The recent Forbidden Worlds film festival made use of it. And it’ll be used again for the upcoming screening of Tollywood blockbuster RRR. But if you arrived in the city during the last 15 years, you may be forgiven for not even knowing that we once had an IMAX cinema. This is its unfortunate story.

Back in 1994, IMAX was all the rage and there were two rival plans to build a dedicated cinema in Bristol. One of these was an ambitious, council-backed multi-media complex proposed for Canons Marsh. This would include a discovery centre, environmental records archive and electronic zoo. It was the brainchild of Bristol filmmaker Christopher Parsons, formerly of the BBC’s Natural History Unit.

Six years later, on April 20 2000, the cinema threw open its doors to the public. Now part of what was known as the Wildscreen @Bristol project, this was the third IMAX cinema to open in the UK. It wasn’t the biggest, but the huge 68×48 ft screen was certainly large enough. The opening programme comprised a trio of documentaries: Everest, Blue Planet and The Secret of Life on Earth.

Tobe Hooper’s original ‘Poltergeist’ on the giant IMAX screen at the Forbidden Worlds film festival

Sadly, this new age proved to be short-lived. The main problem was that although the 40 minute science and nature documentaries dominating the programme looked stunning on the enormous screen, that novelty quickly wore off. And these American productions were often strikingly banal, with feeble storylines and awful narration. There followed a brief attempt to diversify into more entertainment-oriented fare, which yielded such dismal offerings as Haunted Castle 3D. Hopes were raised when Disney embraced IMAX technology with the format’s first full-length feature, Fantasia 2000, which proved a huge success on release back in 1999.

The Bristol IMAX projection booth: still in full working order

Alas, while some movies worked brilliantly in IMAX format, distributors elected to chuck a lot of digitally remastered crap at the giant screen. A string of flops (Open Season, Poseidon, Ant Bully, etc) hit revenues hard. If people weren’t flocking to see these films in multiplexes, they certainly weren’t going to pay a premium price to watch IMAX versions. Only Superman Returns lived up to commercial expectations, though some punters felt a little conned to find that the promised 3D element comprised just a handful of scenes running for around 20 minutes.

Behind this wall lurks the former Bristol IMAX cinema

Financial difficulties were cited when it was announced that the Bristol IMAX and accompanying Wildwalk exhibition were to close in April 2007, with the loss of 45 jobs, in order to save the more popular Explore attraction. A petition was launched to save the IMAX, which enjoyed 141,000 admissions in its last financial year, but this was to no avail. Wildwalk then became the Bristol Aquarium and the cinema continued to screen films as part of that attraction for a few more years.

Subsequently, blockbusters like Blade Runner 2049, Skyfall, Mad Max: Fury Road, Dunkirk, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol and Tenet have all made excellent use of the format. But they came too late for the Bristol IMAX.

Eventually, the cinema was mothballed, with all the original projection equipment remaining in situ. And that’s where it remained, mostly forgotten until the Forbidden Worlds festival came along earlier this year.

Images supplied by the Forbidden Worlds Film Festival. Main pic: The Bristol IMAX auditorium.

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