Plans to renovate “Movy Club” in the Brussels municipality of Forest have been officially published, Cinenews reports. First built in the 1930s, the cinema has fallen into disrepair.
The cinema closed its doors to the public in 2011 and was acquired five years later by the Brussels-Capital Region in the view of reviving the emblematic location. The local government also purchased land surrounding the cinema for future development.
According to plans officially published by “openpermits.brussels”, the government intends to undertake an ambitious renovation of the cinema to return it to its former glory. The last time the cinema was modernised was in the 1950s.
Credit: Brussels Heritage
In a comment to Bruzz, Damiaan De Jonge, spokesperson for the Secretary of State for Heritage and Town Planning Pascal Smet, said that “the protected areas, in particular the entrance hall, foyer, the cinema hall, and projection booth, will be restored with great respect for the original design, in order to preserve the soul of the building.”
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Concretely, work will be carried out to replace insulation and bring the cinema up to current noise pollution standard. This means that the cinema will open with fewer seats, down from 220 to 188. This reduction in capacity will largely be offset by the acquisition of a neighbouring building, which has a projects and workshops space called “de Club”.
The new cinema will collaborate with the CINEMATEK Film Archive. The cabinet of Rudi Vervoort expects that work will begin on the cinema in 2024. Full plans for the renovation can be found online.
