Just a short walk from London’s Chancery Lane underground station, a new boutique movie theatre is taking shape. The Nickel Cinema (the Nickel) is the brainchild of Dominic Hicks, a British filmmaker with twenty years’ experience in the industry. At the Nickel, the emphasis is on screening cult films, which will come as welcome relief to London’s film community given the recent troubles faced by the Prince Charles Cinema (PCC) in Leicester Square, known as the beating heart of the capital’s rep scene. [Update: the PCC has recently received welcome news that it will be included on the list of Assets of Community Value managed by Westminster council, as their lease negotiation continues.]

Hicks’ inspiration came not from cinemas in Britain, however, but abroad. “People, when they go on holiday, check out the cathedrals and the galleries,” he said. “I would always start with the independent cinemas, I suppose, and start my journey there.” Travelling for work, to shoot commercials and corporate videos, allowed him to sample some of the great indie movie theatres around the world, including the New Beverly in Los Angeles, Spectacle Theater in Brooklyn, and the Cine Doré in Madrid.

Right from the beginning, Hicks knew he wanted to offer a more alternative cinematic experience for Londoners. “It struck me that there were some theatres, particularly Spectacle in Brooklyn, that were dedicated to showing lesser-seen, more subterranean type films. And I thought there was an opportunity there to do something quite different from the other options that we have in this city. So it was a bit of a calling, honestly.”

Today we are sitting in the result of that calling. Situated on Clerkenwell Road, the Nickel immediately feels like a beacon for independent movies the moment you walk in. The space was a former bookstore, and before that a printing works. Now the shelves are lined with film-related physical media: books, DVDs, soundtrack albums and even 16mm prints. In the adjacent room, there is a 38-seater cinema. Downstairs, a spacious area is being transformed into a bar. 

“All through the day, and in the evenings, when the screenings are on, we’ll have a retail space, and the plan is actually to do video rentals as well,” Hicks explained, “We’ve got a lot of out-of-print and very-difficult-to-find physical media there, from all around the world, things that you have to import.” Already, the Nickel is forging partnerships with cult and classic film companies like Arrow Films and Radiance Films to stock actual discs, making it the perfect place to stock up on film merch after watching a feature there. 

While 38 seats sounds snug, that was a deliberate choice on Hicks’ part. A bigger auditorium, he argued, would mean there’s a temptation to programme more mainstream fare to draw in bigger crowds. “But we really want to keep true to the fact that we’ll take serious chances with less commercial, lesser-known things that don’t have a fanbase yet, that are a true shot in the dark.”

With a soft launch planned for June 2025, the logistics of setting up your own cinema have been challenging. “I was completely oblivious as to the practicalities of that,” said Hicks, who initially established a crowdfunding campaign. “I had a target of GBP £10,000, which Jane Giles, the [former London-based multipurpose venue] Scala programmer, kindly informed me was about ten times too low for what I was trying to do. And of course, she was right, but I didn’t feel like I was justified in asking for any more really. I just wanted a boost towards doing it.”

Even then, Hicks struggled to find the right venue. “I feel London is incredibly difficult… there’s a feeling that you’re doing something wrong or subversive by creating an art space. It’s almost like they want you to build a Pilates studio or another posh coffee place. To do something like this almost feels like you’re breaking some kind of code. There’s so much private equity on the high street… to do a proper little DIY, fully independent thing that is really about art and culture, feels transgressive.” 

Fortunately, Hicks is not alone in this endeavour and he’s enjoyed the help of friends and volunteers. Above us, hanging from the ceiling, is a brand new 4K projector, which was installed with the help of actor Richard Glover, whose credits includes Ben Wheatley’s “A Field In England” and “Sightseers.” “Funnily enough,” Hicks commented, “most of the people who’ve been helping me build this place work in film. Designers and set builders.”

A Long Term Venue
While he always dreamt of finding a permanent home for the Nickel, Hicks began the project in October 2023 as a pop-up. His first screenings were in The Bear pub in Camberwell, south London. “I just brought my portable 16mm projector down there, and sort of stress-tested my projection skills, which were quite paltry,” said Hicks, who reveals that he was taught how to project on 16mm by Ümit Mesut, a projectionist and owner of Ümit & Son, a long-established store in Clapton, east London, selling film paraphernalia. 

Fast-forward eighteen months and The Nickel Cinema brand has grown considerably. “The good will that’s come our way since we started this project, I didn’t anticipate it at all,” Hicks said. “People are quite hungry for something like this.” As Nickel’s HQ has gradually come together, Hicks has continued to screen films at various venues, including Soho post-production institution, De Lane Lea, concentrating on “themed double features”, something he hopes to continue once the Nickel is up and running.

On Valentine’s Day, for example, Hicks’ ‘Killer Sweethearts’ double bill included “Blonde Death” and “Gun Crazy.” Others are even more obscure: ‘Dirty Talk’ featured two “obscene telephone call movies”, “Fleshtone,” with Spandau Ballet star Martin Kemp, and 1971’s “The Telephone Book.” And what self-respecting cult movie outfit would be complete without an LSD double feature? ‘Bad Acid’ screened “Blue Sunshine” and “I Drink Your Blood.” To add to the fun, during the intermission, Hicks screened a montage he cut together of vintage commercials and other materials to fit the theme of the night.

When David Lynch died earlier in the year, like many others, The Nickel Cinema paid tribute with screenings of some of his greatest movies (each ticket came with a free cigarette, something Lynch would likely approve of). “At the end of the screening, people would come outside, and we would all smoke together and talk about the film and talk about Lynch,” said Hicks, who clearly wants to foster a community that goes beyond social media and sees people come together in person to discuss cinema. 

“I think people are anxious to talk about film. I’ve never been able to talk about football because I’ve never really gotten under the skin of it. So my go to pub chat is film and it’s infinite, isn’t it? You can argue about it in that fun, playful way, and you can come away with a list of recommendations that you would never get through an algorithm. People have a true passion for it.”

While the venue is too small to house 35mm projection equipment, Hicks will screen films on a variety of formats, including digital and VHS. He’s also determined to show movies on 16mm, thanks to his growing collection of prints, sourced from eBay and other sites. “Unfortunately, it’s just not that easy to get hold of prints, especially for the lesser-known cult oddities,” he said. “They’re just not in circulation that readily. But we thought it was really important to keep projecting film as much as we can. I think it’s due the same sort of comeback as vinyl has enjoyed.”

A Creative Hub
With the plan initially to screen a movie a night with the occasional double feature, Hicks’ broader concept is to turn The Nickel Cinema into a thriving arts space. “The plan is to extend it into symposiums, presentations, and the basement space downstairs would be a great place for workshops,” he said. “So in the long run, we’d actually like to host 16mm shooting workshops, acting workshops, writing workshops with industry professionals… and then we can ultimately screen the films that people produce here as well.” 

It’s clear that Hicks is aiming to forge a grass-roots cinema venue, one that echoes in spirit the various movie societies, like Category H Film Club [at the Rio Cinema, Dalston, east London] and Video Bazaar, that are already up and running in London. “I would love to be able to give them another potential venue.” 

As for the films themselves, Hicks is keen to welcome all filmgoers into his temple. “We’re not snobs,” he promised. “We want to show stuff that people enjoy. I love something like [William Friedkin’s 1977 thriller] “Sorcerer”, just as much as I love some true, oddball film, shot on video, seen by a few hundred people.” As if to prove the point, Hicks recently screened a 16mm print of “The Conversation” to mark the passing of Gene Hackman. “I think mixing the high art and low art and the mainstream and the subterranean, and putting them all in the blending pot, is where the fun is.” 

Still, Hicks is keen to “foster a fanbase” around cult movies “and provide reasons for people to care about some films that may have actually been forgotten about”. He cites “Mermaid Legend,” a gonzo eco-revenge cult oddity from 1984 that the Nickel screened, aiding its reemergence. “Now there’s a beautiful Blu-ray coming out,” he said. “This is how films get remastered and reissued. This is how they resurface in public culture.”

And this is why a place like The Nickel Cinema is so vital.