Urgent plea as Scotland's ‘Screen Machine’ service faces end of the road
It has been bringing the magic of the movies to the Highlands and islands for a quarter of a century.
But now a much-loved mobile cinema service is facing the end of the road without intervention from the Scottish Government.
An urgent appeal to secure the future of the Screen Machine has been launched to coincide with its 25th anniversary this month amid fears it may only be able to run until the spring.
Regional Screen Scotland, the publicly-funded body which runs the Screen Machine, has revealed it needs to find £1.4 million for anew 80-seater cinema. and it is urging supporters to ask the Government to meet half the cost of the replacement for a Screen Machine that had to be retired after 17 years due to increasing unreliability and numbers of cancelled screenings.
Regional Screen Scotland, which wants MPS and MSPS to back its campaign, secured £176,641 from Government agency Screen Scotland for a loan of a mobile cinema unit from France to ensure screenings went ahead this year,
With Screen Scotland insisting it cannot fund another hire when the lease expires in April, there are warnings the service will have to be “wound down” without the prospect of a permanent replacement.
An official appeal page on the Screen Machine website states: “This September, the Screen Machine service will mark its 25th anniversary. Whilst this is a cause for celebration, there is reason for concern. "We urgently require significant investment to enable us to commission the construction of a brand new and greener Screen Machine.
“A new Screen Machine will cost approx £1.4 ma nd need between a year and 18 months to build. We need the Scottish
Government to provide 50 per cent of the cost. That will enable us to pay a deposit and begin the construction process. We will then em bark on a massive fundraisingeffort to bring in the balance .”
Regional Screen Scotland’s Harriet Warman, development co-ordinator, said: “We need the public’s help to write to the first minister or their local MSP, asking for Scottish Government funding to commission a new, more sustainable Screen Machine, so we can continue to provide this important service .”