Life in the cinema

From Cinerama to 3D, the soon-to-be retiring manager of the Bath ABC has watched movie empires rise and fall, genres emerge and die and special effects relegate actors to playing second fiddle, though nothing Keith has witnessed quite matches the reception The Exorcist first received when it opened in 1973.

He said: "When it first came out we had to have people from St John's ambulance and the Red Cross on duty at the cinema because it affected people so much.

"They would go into a coma-like state. Then the film came back 10 years or so later and there was no trouble at all. It might have been at the time genuine shock or just the hype that was put on. But it was very strange."

Keith, 62, has been at Bath ABC on Westgate Street for 12 years and retires at the end of this week. As the crowds pack in for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, he says he is pleased that families are returning to the cinema in their droves.

It didn't all used to be good clean fun, however, as he recalled: "We used to get a lot of damage in the Sixties with the rock 'n' roll films.

"The seats would get slashed and torn out.

"Sundays used to be the worst ones, you could always guarantee that if you had a rock 'n' roll film on there would be trouble and you would need extra staff on."

Keith was born in Swindon in 1939 and, after a brief tenure with Odeon cinemas, joined the ABC in Swindon in 1966. The two firms were always seen as bitter rivals, a rivalry that finally put to rest last year when ABC bought out Odeon but decided to retain the latter's name.

According to Keith, the change of name, due to affect the 81-year-old ABC in Bath next year, certainly feels odd.

He said: "They were rivals then. It felt very strange for them to link up last year. People were very proud of the ABC sign, as it's a sign people trust and know."

Always more of a fan of the cinema experience than a film buff, Keith's love of the big screen is well rooted in his childhood: "When I was a kid, I used to have what was called a 9.5 film projector.

"I had a little room upstairs, put a screen up and put on film shows. I suppose it started from there. I love the theatre as well and the two married together."

He added that the cinema, more than any other medium, is always the authentic movie experience:

"I look at video as a reminder of the film that I have seen.

"It's like buying an LP record of a musical you have seen in the theatre. You don't get the impact on the small screen it has to be on the big cinema screen. The video is a memento of the film but if I want to see it properly I would see it on the big screen."

Neither is Keith impressed with the big screen multiplex cinemas that have cropped up in the West Country over the past 15 years, pushing out single-screen cinemas in the style of the Bath ABC with multiple screens and movie-branded popcorn.

He said: "I personally don't like them.

"I call them rooms rather than cinemas. They are built like warehouses. I feel if the cinemas fail, then they can be converted back into warehouses quite easily."

But Keith says he leaves his life in the cinema with great optimism for the future of film production.

"I shall miss it that's for sure. I'm in an old cinema and that's what I love.

I enjoy meeting the

public and presenting a good show.

"When people come to the cinema they want to have a comfortable seat, they want to be able to get their ice-cream and popcorn and they want to sit down without any interruption and watch a nice film.

"That is the joy."

KEITH'S TOP TEN FILMS:

1. West Side Story (1961)

2. Airplane! (1980)

3. Where Eagles Dare (1969)

4. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

5. Schindler's List (1993)

6. Showboat (1951)

7. Moulin Rouge (2001)

8. Shrek (2001)

9. Scrooge (1951)

10. The Birdcage (1996)