Burg Theater (cinema)
The Kino Burg Theater in Burg (near Magdeburg) is the oldest and until today (2020) continuously operated purpose-built cinema in Germany.
history
The engineer Otto Wohlfahrt opened the Walhalla in 1908 in a residential and commercial building on the corner plot of Schartauer Strasse / Franzosenstrasse as the city's first permanent cinema, but it was destroyed by fire in 1910. On January 11, 1911, he submitted a building application to the city of Burg, which was approved on February 2. Within 13 weeks he had a purpose-built cinema built on the property at Magdeburger Strasse 4.
Due to the experiences from the fire in the Walhalla , particular attention was paid to "fire safety and quick emptying" in the new building. Wohlfahrt had the building equipped with a sprinkler system , fire taps, fire extinguishers and four emergency exits. Comfortable and spacious flat-seated seating and a ventilation system ensured comfort.
Advertised as the “first, largest and most modern special light theater in the province of Saxony”, it was opened on June 3, 1911 at 4 pm under the name of the Palast Theater .
At the beginning of the 1920s, Dr. Pape ran the cinema and ran it together with the Roland-Lichtspiele, also opened in 1911, on Paradeplatz. In 1939 he wanted to convert the Palast Theater into one of the most modern cinemas in Germany. This was to be achieved by an annex offset by 90 °, which should extend to Schartauer Straße. This new building was intended to expand the previous pure cinema operation with a theater venue. Pape had already received approval from the Reichsfilmkammer, but due to the beginning of the Second World War , he was no longer allowed to be carried out.
During the GDR era, the cinema was then run by the state and, in 1985, a cinema bar (Visionsbar - a bar in the cinema with a view of the screen) was added. From 1955 to 1991 it was called the “Theater of Peace” - officially at the request and suggestion of the citizens of Burgundy because a palace did not meet their expectations.
After the reunification it got its current name. In 1997, long-time employee Wilfried Schlaak took over the building and operations from Ufa . Since 1998 it has been operated by the Becker company, which also runs the cinemas in Oschersleben and Wernigerode.
architecture
The Burg Theater is a purely purpose-built cinema with a hall. The hall height is 8 m, the hall depth 35 m. Originally the screen had a size of 20 m² and the hall was equipped with a coffered ceiling, 650 amphitheatrically aligned folding chairs and a box gallery.
In 1985, following the trend in the GDR, the cinema was converted into a club cinema ( folding seats were partly replaced by armchairs and coffee tables). For this purpose, a cinema bar (Visionsbar) for 30 people was set up in the rear third of the hall and a bar and cloakroom extension was built to the side. The parquet seating was reduced to 250 seats and the hall was covered with heavy dark brown minor curtains.
At the beginning of the millennium, modern row seating was installed and the capacity was limited to 154 seats. Cinema still exists in this form today.
In front of the cinema is a two-story entrance building. The entrance and checkout areas are located on the ground floor and are separated from the exhibition area by two swing doors . In the latter you can see old projectors and spotlights as well as information on cinema history, and this is also where the access to the toilets is located. Offices and demonstration technology can be found on the first floor. The entrance door was originally in the middle of the entrance area, but was moved to the right side in the course of renovations and the simplification of the facade.
The (historical) meaning
The Burg Theater is the oldest cinema building in Germany that is still in operation today and one of the oldest cinemas at all. There are older cinemas in Germany, but these are housed in residential and commercial buildings. The Burger cinema building was built exclusively for the purpose of a movie theater.
In the region between Magdeburg, Dessau-Roßlau and Brandenburg, it is one of the few cinemas still in operation in rural areas alongside the Genthin cinema.
Present and Future
The cinema has been struggling for years with falling visitor numbers and rising operating costs. The operator at the time therefore wanted to close it at the end of 2009. As a result, an initiative to preserve the cinema in Burg was founded, from which the association “WEITBLICK e. V. ”emerged. The latter now continues to operate it as a community-run, sustainable, regional, cross-generational and non-profit cinema. After a renovation break in summer 2010, the Burg Theater was reopened on September 10, 2010.
Technical specifications
The Burg Theater has a 50 m² screen and a Dolby Digital 5.1 sound system. Since April 2014, both digital and analog films can be shown in the Burg Theater. A projector from Christie is used for digital film projection. A Czech projector (Meo 5X) from the 1970s is available for showing 35mm films. 116 spectators can be seated in the stalls and 37 in the cinema bar.
Web links
Individual evidence
Coordinates: 52 ° 16 ′ 14 ″ N , 11 ° 51 ′ 7 ″ E