The Liberec cinema Varšava celebrates 100 years since the completion of the building, and it is awaiting renovation

Liberec - The Varšava cinema in Liberec is celebrating 100 years since the completion of the building, and it is set to undergo reconstruction. The city aims to finance the repairs of the art-deco style building using European funds from the integrated territorial investments program for the Liberec - Jablonec agglomeration (ITI). If everything goes well, the reconstruction will begin next year; the project already has a building permit, said Ondřej Pleštil, the cinema director, to ČTK today. According to him, the building deserves a renovation after 100 years.

The Varšava cinema building has been on the list of cultural monuments since this spring. Varšava is the oldest stone cinema in the hundred-thousand-strong regional city, with its history dating back to 1908 when the first stone one-story cinema was built. However, in 1922 the original building was demolished, and a magnificent building in the then-modern art-deco style was constructed on its site, designed by the Liberec architecture studio of Josef Effenberger and Fritz Noppes.

Screenings at the building nearly came to a definitive end in 2008, as the city hall then lacked the funds for an expensive renovation costing tens of millions of crowns. Furthermore, it considered the continued operation of the cinema unnecessary and closed it, as two multiplex cinemas had started operating in Liberec. Enthusiasts from the civic association Save the Varšava Cinema partially revived the cinema’s operations in 2014. Today, the Varšava Association operates the cinema and gradually repairs it from ticket sales and grants, but according to Pleštil, the building needs a fundamental renovation.

The association successfully obtained project documentation and a building permit in 2018 thanks to the cross-border EU project Cinema on the Third / Kino hoch drei. The reconstruction of the cinema has been listed by the Liberec city hall among the projects for which it seeks to draw European funds under the so-called integrated territorial investments (ITI), where up to 2.8 billion crowns are available for the agglomeration. The estimated costs for the cinema reconstruction are preliminarily set at 50 million crowns, of which the city hall aims to obtain 28.6 million crowns from ITI.

The celebrations of the cinema will begin on Thursday at 19:00 with the premiere of one of the most anticipated Czech films of this year – the film Dawn, and will last until Saturday, October 7. "Saturday morning will be dedicated to children, and we will start at 10:00 with a screening of the popular Czech comedy Long Live Ghosts. At 14:00, we will then show children the animated film about the conquest of the North Pole - Titina, the dog polar explorer," added the cinema's dramaturg Naďa Hetešová. Visitors can also look forward to concerts, guided tours, and creative workshops. Admission to the program is voluntary, except for the festive premiere of the film Dawn.