The Labia Theatre Turns 75: A Conversation with Ludi Kraus – Episode 2

Welcome to Talking Movies. A beloved Cape Town landmark has been a hub for arts and culture for 75 years now, and to celebrate its anniversary, I sat down with Ludi Kraus at the Labia Theatre to find out more about the cinema, its evolution, and some of the stories that make up its curious history.

We try to show only the best of circuit and introduce some independence, some foreign language, some art films. So basically, the Labia to survive has become a venue, I’d like to say, of upmarket and quality films rather than strictly art house. So we concentrate on the quality of a film, whether it can sell tickets or not, and that’s really the decision.

We also now have a lot of younger audiences coming to the Labia, which has taken nearly 35 years, but such a pleasure to finally get young, discerning students, filmgoers, coming to see upmarket quality films, which means I’m now in the privileged position. I can programme for our older generation, and I can hope to try and programme for the younger generation. I’ve been involved in cinema and film since the age of 16.

Weren’t you in Namibia?

That’s correct. My father out of the blue one day decided to build a cinema in Windhoek. It was called the Alhambra. I still don’t know how he got to do it because we weren’t really a filmgoing family. My father would take me on a Saturday afternoon occasionally to see a film, Tom Thumb or Serengeti or something, but that was about the extent of our cinema going. But anyway, we started the cinema. I became involved at the age of 16.

I was still going to school in Windhoek. Even when I was in the army, I would come home on holidays and work, and even when I was at varsity, I would fly to Johannesburg to book the films. So I’ve been directly or indirectly involved for way over 50 years. It’s great if one can pursue a passion. I did some years of law as well, which is something I fell into, not something I really enjoyed. I’m not sure if one can really enjoy law, but at least film is a passion, and I’ve been very privileged that I can pursue my passion as my business.

What keeps you passionate about arthouse cinema in the age of blockbusters and streaming services?

I think it’s very important in a generation that has become or maybe is now slightly going away from films based on Marvel comics that Marvel comics should not define the only films that are popular in the cinema. You can’t rely on Marvel forever. The day will come when people are tired of Marvel and you’ve got nothing in its place.

I saw it happening during the apartheid years when we were all forced to watch films in our areas. I remember going to the so-called coloured areas at certain times. I used to get some films and I would stand at the back of the cinema and watch the trailers.

It was karate, karate, karate, The Man with the Golden Hair, The Man with the White Hair, The Man with the Knuckle, The Man with the This. You didn’t know where one trailer started and where the other one ended. I kept saying to them, what are you going to do when people suddenly decide they’ve seen enough karate films? And there wasn’t much else.

So I keep saying to the distributors, prepare for the day when Marvel films like the last one or two are not going to be that popular anymore. It is very important not to underestimate your audience but to keep challenging your audience. You have to educate.

One has to keep small independent and upmarket films alive because they at the end of the day are going to keep cinema going and not these big blockbusters. Unfortunately, with the market being as it is, the distributors are still concentrating on the blockbusters and are neglecting the small films. I think particularly now also that streaming has become a way of life, it is important that the films that show in the cinema must be above average.

You must have films that are better than what is being streamed because why should people pay money to go to a cinema to see a film inferior to what they can see in the comfort of their home?

It’s true. I mean, they talk about superhero fatigue and I’ve noticed that the giants of the entertainment world like Disney are actually changing their release schedule because they’ve realized that there’s just too much, there’s a saturation point. And the same goes for Star Wars films, superhero films. If you have them all one after the other, it gets overwhelming for the viewer. You don’t have enough time to actually anticipate it. And I think that’s what they did so well with Barbie and Oppenheimer, which were two films that I think performed quite well here.

Absolutely. They were the two most popular in the world that year and they were our two most popular films as well. But it’s interesting. I mean, at the end of the day, they were both good films and they were different to your Star Wars and to your Marvel and so they were unique in their way. And it’s good to know that there is still an audience out there for different films. And I think the prices being as they are on circuit, that people just cannot afford to go as often as they would like to. And it’s no good showing one blockbuster after the other because people don’t have the money to attend one blockbuster after the other.

Thanks for listening. For more movie reviews, features and interviews, visit splingmovies.com. And remember, don’t wing it, SPL!NG it.