The Secret Cinema is a London-based phenomenon that shows classic films in site-specific environments to create a more immersive experience. The films on which the events are focussed tend to have a ‘cult’ element – The Shawshank Redemption was screened in a former prison, Back to the Future on a recreation of Hill Valley in East London, close to the Olympic stadium. With immersion comes cost. The latest event is centred on the 1980 film, The Empire Strikes Back, the second and arguably the best of the original Star Wars trilogy, and boasts a ticket price of £75. That is actually the cost of a family ticket to see films in some London cinemas (ahem – Odeon), but we’ll let that pass.
Secret Cinema depends on a built-in fan base who know and love the movie being screened. The experience is about deconstructing the original movie, to make you think about elements of the illusion created by the filmmakers. It doesn’t make you see the movie in a new way, since Secret Cinema is about environment rather than character. But it makes you think ‘would I be able to survive incarceration’ or be able to ride a skateboard down a busy street. You find yourself asking: is the Power of Love a curious thing/makes one man weep and another man sing? You might not need a credit card to buy that thing – but who carries £75 in cash these days?
So how are the organisers of Secret Cinema likely to stage the cliff-hanger middle child of creator George Lucas’ imagination? I had some ideas.
Location: A refrigerated warehouse, something like a former meatpacking factory, to simulate the ice planet of Hoth. Walls painted white. Guests are told to arrive in parkas and padded trousers (you usually get detailed instructions with a Secret Cinema ticket – and no ‘selfies’ allowed). At the entrance you are presented with slices of carved Taun Taun, so you can indeed say ‘I thought they smelt bad on the outside.’ I will probably pass. Suddenly, you get pelted with ping pong balls, representing the Imperial probe sent to discover the location of the rebel base. (That’s also why you need your parka, people.)
The AT-AT attack. Empire’s first big set piece is a battle on the surface of Hoth, in which Imperial Walkers, known as AT-ATs, advance on the rebels – though why they couldn’t just land straight on the base and say ‘surrender, rebel scum’ has always puzzled me. Part of the audience would be sworn in to join the Empire and given ‘walkers’. They would be required to walk a distance of fifty feet, whilst pelted with fuzzy balls by the other part of the audience sworn in to join the rebel alliance, and given a briefing by a female cast member with a funny hair do, who illustrates that there is no glass ceiling in space. Audience members will be required to sign a waiver for accidental injury. (Comment: there’s a lot of pelting in this show.)
How to train your ice monster. Indigenous to Hoth is a white-haired ice beast, who is probably the audience member who has queued for a return ticket the longest. There are people who fly to London especially for the show. They were the most disappointed when the opening of Back to the Future was postponed. As audience members, you will be put in the ring with such a beast and asked to calm it using non-violent means. Singing, poetry, and telling bad jokes are all permitted, until it rips off its own arm. ‘Take it – you’ve earned it,’ it says in Ice Beast language.
Splitting up again. After successfully abandoning their base with minimal injuries, the rebels go in different directions. Luke heads off to the Degobah System, which seems rather a large area to find Obi Wan Kenobi’s former teacher. (Isn’t a system a means of solving something?) Han Solo heads towards an asteroid storm, being a big fan of 1980s video games, and the rest of the rebels join Commander Adama (Lorne Greene) for that short-lived but subsequently re-imagined TV series, Battlestar Galactica. You will be asked to go with Luke to the green planet or join with Han and be swallowed by a large version of the xenomorph from Alien. I predict most people will want to meet Yoda.
This time it’s personal. Personal information is usually demanded of ticket holders to Secret Cinema. It’s not simply that they have to be physically fit and need an EHIC (European Health Insurance Card) – apparently all the universes in The Empire Strikes Back are in the EU – but this time they might ask for biographical information, specifically, how you get on with your father. Did he use the excuse that your mother hid you from him as an excuse for not paying child support? Why as children were you not required to declare that someone in your family had respiratory problems? Those who go to Degobah, depositing their uneaten samples of Taun Taun in R2-D2 wheelie bins, will have to carry a sack on their back and enter a room dressed as a cave. There they will encounter an actor playing their father, who complains about their life choices, and asks them to move to South London. (He’s getting old and wants to have his children around him.) When you respond negatively, he says, ‘OK, no need to cut my head off.’
Never tell me the odds. Gambling metaphors are de rigeur in science fantasy series, from ‘may the odds be in your favour’ in The Hunger Games to Han Solo’s rejection of applied mathematics in The Empire Strikes Back – he constantly silences C-3PO , who has been re-programmed by ‘Bet Fair’ – in-play odds and the ability to cash-out at half time. Secret Cinema will hold a seminar on probability, exploring the likelihood of certain scenarios, like Imperial Cruisers depositing garbage in space. You wonder why the Empire does not recycle. Maybe that’s why there is rebel alliance.
The Sky City of Bespin. How will the organisers of Secret Cinema recreate the sky city? Easy – someone just holds up one of Harrison Ellenshaw’s illustrations. In another room, you are invited to have lunch with Darth Vader. He will tell jokes and in addition will invite Julian Assange (who appears by video link) to the soiree. No droids allowed.
I’m Luke Skywalker, I’m here to rescue you. (OK – that’s a line from the first movie.) Vader will quit the lunch early because he has important bonding time with a family member he hasn’t seen since (breathes heavily). You have to remember that he allowed his daughter to be tortured with a probe in the first movie, so you won’t be feeling optimistic. You get to have another fight with your father, who threatens to cut off your allowance. ‘All right,’ you say, ‘no need to rip my hand off.’
I love you. I know. Towards the end of your spell in the old abandoned meat packing factory – by now you know it smells bad on the inside – you will be invited to get a cast of yourself as an ice-lolly (it’s a summer show). You will be scanned in a box. Then a reduced version of the scan will be used as a mould. Then it will malfunction (the organisers will be briefly up Sith creek) and you’ll be given a Star Wars ice lolly circa 2002.
Give yourself a hand. At the end of The Empire Strikes Back, Luke gets a new hand and Lando Calrissian and Chewbacca head off to rescue Han Solo from Jabba The Hut. At least that’s what they say. In a different room, you find cast members playing Lando and Chewie in a casino. ‘Tell me the odds,’ declares Lando happily. The ‘cantina band’ from Star Wars is playing. You will then be asked to take your seat to watch the movie.
Tickets for the Secret Cinema performance of The Empire Strikes Back are now on sale
