AS THE lights were switched off at the Kino Cinema for the last time, there was a strange air of unreality. For many regulars, it still had not sunk in that Cork was losing its arthouse cinema.
Kino founder and owner Mick Hannigan was stoically phlegmatic in a brief address from the front of the near-packed 188-seater cinema as he paid tribute to staff past and present who had journeyed with him in the showing of more than 1,000 films.
“Tonight is both the closing night, which is sad but it’s also our 13th birthday which is a cause for celebration – I didn’t anticipate that we would last 13 years but I’m delighted that we have. It’s been quite an adventure and who knows what lies around the corner,” he said.
Before the lights dimmed for the last time and the audience were transported back to the film that launched the Kino, Shine, Kino manager Una Feeley spoke emotionally of the many familiar faces in the audience and how regulars used to have their favourite seats.
In November 1996, Mr Hannigan saw his dream of converting a former pool hall on Washington Street into an arthouse cinema become a reality and he could hardly have anticipated such a successful debut as Shine.
Scott Hicks’s memorable depiction of brilliant but troubled Australian pianist David Helfgott deservedly earned Geoffrey Rush an Oscar but it also provided the Kino with an 11-week long box office hit that firmly established the cinema on the cultural map of Cork.
Among those to attend that opening night was Senator Dan Boyle of the Green Party who, describing himself as “a semi-regular”, again turned out to see the last picture show at the Kino.
Shine was a prudent choice for the final screening, for surely if any film can generate a flicker of hope it must Hicks’s film, which testifies to the endurance of human spirit.
Mr Hannigan hinted at this in his final words. “This particular chapter is finished and closed – we don’t know what the next chapter may be but cinema endures and our mutual love of film continues.”