This London cinema is celebrating its 50th this month – and the line-up is all-star

Hackney’s Rio Cinema is celebrating 50 years as a community-run cinema this month with a series of celebrations, screenings and parties.

The six-month-long season, Rio Forever, will be showcasing ‘what the Rio does best’ with ‘bold, eclectic programming; archival gems; and gatherings that bring people together’.

It all kicks off with a party co-hosted with Jeremy Deller, Sports Banger and Doc’n Roll Films, three luminaries of DIY culture who will be taking over the Rio for a celebration of ‘radical creativity, outsider art, music and film’ on Friday, April 17.

Movies are a big part of Rio Forever, of course, with 35mm screenings doubling up as fundraisers for this beloved venue.

Legendary Londoner Sally Potter will be swinging by for a screening (and Q&A) of her epoch-hopping feminist masterpiece Orlando on Friday, April 24, with Hackney’s own Asif Kapadia (Amy, Diego Maradona) intro’ing a 35mm screening of The Godfather: Part II on May 8.

Punch-Drunk Love lovers can book in for a screening of Paul Thomas Anderson’s romantic-comedy presented by Molly Manning Walker (How to Have Sex) on May 19.

Pretty Red Dress writer-director Dionne Edwards, meanwhile, is introducing the Wachowskis’ cult neo-noir thriller Bound on May 22.

There’ll also be a tribute to Rio Cinema OG Clara Ludski, the Jewish Prussian immigrant who turned her family’s auctioneers into a cinema on Kingsland High Street – one of London’s first – in 1909. 

A plaque in her honour will be unveiled as part of The Hackney Society’s Women of Hackney project on

This year, Rio was ranked one of the 100 greatest cinemas in the world by Time Out, one of 12 London cinemas to make the list.

Head to the official site for more programme info and to buy tickets.

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