The fall of the cinema

With the headline, I'm not about to carelessly predict the end of cinema and either link-bait or be a merchant of doom. I mean it more in a literal sense - the Odeon Cinema in the heart of Glasgow city-centre closed a few years ago and is now being demolished. I'm a romantic at heart though, and while it still stood, proudly astride two streets, like a beacon on a corner, I had this vague notion that someone would save it.

I saw my first movies in there - I remember seeing classics like Sound of Music, and later Reservoir Dogs and so many in-between and after. I went on dates there, I went with pals there, and once I'll admit I even stood on the corner and she didn't appear. I won't tell you how long I waited. I was also an aspiring film reviewer in a past life, and saw many press screenings there too. I even bored people with the fact that ODEON stands for Oscar Deutsch Entertains Our Nation, after the founder.

There's still an Odeon just across the water, a twenty minute walk away, and an awfully tall Cineworld multiplex around a corner or two. I'm not so misty-eyed therefore, but there was something charming about this Odeon that now lies in rubble. Old school I guess you may call it. But I guess we move on, and given the location, this is now prime city-centre office and retail space. A wise man once opined that Glasgow would be a nice place when it's finished. It's too often just a shame that we need to throw out a lot of the past in order to get to the new.