Who We Are |
Cheltenham Film Society (CFS) was founded in 1945 and currently has over 500 members. We show subtitled and independent films between September and April at the Bacon Theatre in Dean Close School, Cheltenham.
Admission is by annual membership subscription, but members may bring guests. The object of the society is to give the residents of Cheltenham and surrounding towns and villages the opportunity to see a diverse range of the best of international and independent cinema and gems that have been overlooked by the Cinemas in the town. CFS has a Constitution specifying what the Society does and how it is managed. At our AGM on 4 October, 2016, we adopted an amended version. The 2016 constitution. |
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We also have a set of Operating Principles, adopted on 28 January, 2020:
CFS Operating Principles |
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And we have a set of Financial Principles, adopted on 28 January, 2020:
CFS Financial Principles |
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The society is run by a committee of up to 12 members, elected at the AGM at the beginning of each season. We are always looking for help with the society’s organisation and activities.
Current committee members:
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Our History |
Cheltenham Film Society is one of the oldest and most successful membership film societies in the country. It was founded in the final days of the last war, when 450 Cheltonians met at the old School of Art in the lower High Street and agreed on a constitution for a club to show serious films ignored by the town’s five commercial cinemas.
The first film, show at the Daffodil (now a restaurant) in July 1945 was Eisenstein’s Alexander Nevsky. In its first season the society also showed 35mm films at the Ritz (demolished in 2014) and at the Coliseum (demolished in 2011). Later it added a separate season of 16mm films at the School of Art and then the Playhouse. For the first three seasons CFS had 1,100 members, making it the fifth largest society in the country. Also under the CFS umbrella in the early days were the Amateur Cine Group and the Scientific Film Group. It also produced Film News, initially monthly; there was a CFS library of film books; there were talks at leading schools (Lindsay Anderson returned to his alma mater, Cheltenham College); and there was a ‘Third Programme’ of highbrow films with discussions afterwards. Television, and particularly commercial television, caused the society to shrink, as it did many institutions. CFS had originally sold tickets for individual films. Now it moved to a flat fee (“21 films for 21 shillings”) but it no longer had any way of knowing which films its membership actually enjoyed. So in 1970 it introduced a rating system and originally there were only three grades: A (excellent), B (good) and C (poor). The rating system now has five levels: Excellent, Good, Fair, Poor and Very Poor. A percentage score is then used to calculate the overall score for the film. In 1971, the society moved its screenings from the Playhouse to Dean Close School but otherwise continued unchanged until the early 1980s during which time it missed the only season in its 75-year history after the committee collapsed. In 1988 it moved to the Shaftesbury Hall Theatre and then, at the start of the 1992/3 season, back to Dean Close’s New Theatre, later renamed the Bacon Theatre. CFS is currently as successful as it has ever been. Its membership, around 450 strong, may be the largest in the country. |