Twelve pictures of a swift, standing still.
Or take the drum by its edge and flick it. Arrow keys push it round; Space brakes it.
Drumlight is an independent two-screen cinema in a restored hall in Brompton. We choose every film we show: new ones from around the world, seasons of older ones, and silent films with a live pianist on Sunday mornings.
What's on this weekOpen Tuesday evening, and Wednesday to SundayFive films, each shown in the shape it was made in, with the masking closed in round the narrower ones. Choose one for its times, then your seats.
A woman crosses a salt lake with a handcart and a box camera, and takes one photograph a day.
That is nearly all that happens, and it's enough. There are long stretches without talking, and in the big room you hear the wheels on the salt. For anyone who likes a long look at a big place.
Wed 6.30 · Thu 11.00 · Fri 7.15 · Sat 1.00, 7.30 · Sun 3.00 · Tue 7.00
Two neighbouring farmers, one wet winter, and the fence between them rebuilt post by post.
Hardly anyone talks and a great deal gets done: augers, strainers, wire and weather, and two people who know each other well enough to say very little. For anyone who likes watching work done well.
Wed 2.00 · Thu 3.45 · Fri 6.00 · Sat 11.00 · Tue 6.30
Two old friends run a river ferry through its last summer, arguing about tea, the tide and who steers.
Quietly funny, and full of weather: fog in the mornings, flat light at noon, and a ferry that crosses the same few hundred metres of water a great many times. For anyone who has shared a job with a friend.
Wed 11.15 · Thu 6.00 · Fri 1.30 · Sat 5.00 · Sun 12.45
A tailor walks a finished coat across town to the woman who ordered it, and is stopped at every corner.
Every stop is a small favour for someone, and every favour takes a little longer than the last. Gentle, very well dressed, and funnier each time you think it's nearly over. For anyone who has ever been late with good reason.
Thu 2.00 · Sat 3.30
A silent film on Sunday morning, with our pianist down at the front.
A kite, a jetty and one very windy afternoon, told without a word. The piano does the talking, and the weather does the rest. For anyone who has held on to something in a strong wind.
Sun 10.30
Seats you choose on this page are held for you at the desk in the foyer. Collect them there up to ten minutes before the film.
Take your cup in with you.
The counter opens half an hour before the first session. There's tea by the pot, coffee, orange and apple juice, popcorn made here in the foyer with oil and salt, and a cake each week from a baker nearby. The cups are real ones: bring them back on your way out.
New films from around the world, and the silent films on Sunday mornings, with the piano down at the front below the screen.
Seasons of older films, documentaries, and the slower films that are best seen close up, six rows from the screen.
The hall was built for dances and meetings. We restored it and put two rooms inside, one big and one small, and kept the tall windows in the foyer. We choose every film ourselves, and we watch each one through before it goes on the programme.
We start every session ourselves, from the little room at the back of the hall with a window onto each screen. Most films arrive as files; some of the seasons still come on reels, for the old projector we keep oiled for them.
Before each film we set the masking at the edges of the screen to the shape the film was made in, so nothing is cropped and nothing is stretched.
The grey either side of a square film isn't a gap. It's the masking, closed in to the shape the film was made in.
Sunday 10.30 · The big room
Hold the String, Agnes runs an hour and four minutes and has no soundtrack of its own. Our pianist watches it through a few times in the week before and plays what she sees: a walking tune along the jetty, something quicker when the wind gets up, and nothing at all for the long moment the kite hangs still.
Silent films were made to be played along to, so each Sunday is a little different. Come a few minutes early and sit on the left, where you can see her hands.
Doors and tea from ten.
This spring's season
Six older films in which people go somewhere slowly: on foot, by cart, by boat. Thursday and Saturday afternoons through October and November, in the Academy shape they were made in.