The former site of the Qingdao Seaman’s Club, located on No. 17 ,Road Hubei, which is also the earliest existing cinema in China, opened to visitors on August 26th. It is learned from the inauguration ceremony that this time-honored building of German neo-Renaissance style and a history of 114 years will be converted into the first movie life house in China named the 1907 Light and Shadow Club. It will be built into an urban cultural living room mainly characterized by movie experience and integrating many elements including music, science and technology, art, books and gourmet food.
Ranging from the already open M·Show Music Theater, small-scale private cinema, VR experience pavilion, R&B western restaurant, film-man coffeehouse, and aesthetic reading space to the interactive film museum under planning, this German-stylish ancient building over 1000 years old, as a major national cultural heritage protection site, will finally get through the historic ashes and make a brand new appearance soon.
The stage with a history of hundreds of years will be reused
Someone remarked that this three-floored German-stylish house built in 1902 by German on No. 17, Road Hubei is both the geographic and cultural landmark of Qingdao in the 20th century. It can also been seen as the first cultural complex of this city. During an authoritative argumentation organized by the China Film Association and the China National Film Museum this June, this place has been verified as the earliest existing well-preserved site for playing commercial films. From then on, its irreplaceable value and significance in the Chinese film history has been established.
We can see on the spot that the stage on the first floor, which has existed for hundreds of years, has been put into reuse and becomes the M·Show Music Theater. The theater will focus on these two topics namely “film” and “history” and make diversified performances including children’s drama, classic dramas, music show, song and dance show, live show by bands and singers. In addition, in the future it will put on the generation show related to the history of hundreds of years, hold folk music festivals, dig up and recommend outstanding music bands in Qingdao. The self-brewed beer from Germany is also another highlight of the theater so the recipe and processing equipment for manually brewing beer has been specially brought in.
The R&B western restaurant on the second floor specializes in German and Italian food. The circle corridor connected with the restaurant and surrounded by a profusion of flowers and plants generates a comfortable atmosphere of enjoying afternoon tea in Monnai Garden. We also find that a dozen of patterned floor tiles with a history of hundreds of years are covered with specially made tempered glass and have become the most precious exhibit in the restaurant. Moreover the old timbers over 100 years ago are also used for the ceiling and counter in the restaurant, revealing a simplistic luxury witnessing the vicissitudes.
A leisure space where time seemingly stops is specially forged in this 100-year-old building. In this space with an area of no more than 300 square meters, there are thousands of varieties of books about film and life. In the future the books on film and television will become the feature and will be supplemented constantly.
In this film life house, there are 15 small-scale private cinemas with different themes. Among these, a cinema covered with rocks and thrilling tunnel atmosphere has attracted many young people to try watching the thrilling films. No matter what the theme is, the family-resembled random decoration and atmosphere can all make people relaxed and comfortable. Moreover people can wear VR equipment to play an interesting vivid game and even can feel the force when the arrow leaves the bow.
According to Sun Dawei, the planning director of Qingdao Guangying Online Film and TV Technology Co., Ltd., the 1907 Light and Shadow Club has actually inherited the function of the earliest cultural complex of Qingdao over a hundred years ago. They sincerely hope people can stay here and experience culture with different orientations.
A experience-based film museum will be built
The film theme and function still remain the core essence of this 100-year-old building to maintain its cultural heritage. According to Sun Dawei, the film advisers here are just like book advisers in bookstores who divide and categorize books elaborately and offer many options. We will choose the films that are suitable for you and put the films into different categories. In addition, we will further segment the cinemas on the basis of the mass cinemas.
It is said that in the future many film seasons targeted at different audiences will be launched including children’s film season, lover’s film season and classical film season and the related shooting activity, meet-and-greet and sharing will also be organized. Moreover the film innovation club, a maker platform mainly composed of Qingdao film and TV practitioners will be gradually set up and built into the largest Internet database by the Chinese film and TV professionals, entrepreneurs and investors as well as the most influential venture capital investment platform for Chinese film and TV industry. Sun Da Wei said: “We are far more than a film watching space. More correctly speaking, we are an advocate of a certain way of watching films and film entrepreneurship”
The film museum on the third floor puts emphasis on interactivity. Besides disseminating information, the museum can offer many cultural innovation products, which can be taken away. Meanwhile a cultural space named “listen and speak” will be established as a open, equal, cozy and sincere cultural exchange and sharing platform in Qingdao and a series of exhibitions, lectures and saloons with different art themes will be organized.
