Between 1978-1993, more than a million people attended movies at the Scala Cinema in London, whether they were coming to see arthouse or grindhouse, kung fu or groundbreaking LGBTQ+ films. Out of that era, many members of those audiences became today’s filmmakers, musicians, writers, actors, activists and artists.

This documentary, directed and written by Ali Catterall and Jane Giles, this features John Waters, Mary Harron, Graham Humphreys, Alan Jones, Kim Newman Ben Wheatley, Ralph Brown, Beeban Kidron and so many more, all united in their memories of the theater and the life-changing films and moments they enjoyed there.

Whether people came to see movies like Thundercrack or Eraserhead, the movies of Russ Meyer or John Waters, Laurel and Hardy or Sam Raimi, they knew that the Scala was where they would get to have their minds blown.

Based on Giles’ 2018 book Scala Cinema 1978-1993, this is a movie for movie lovers, plain and simple. The Scala got around so many issues because it was a members only club — the Severin set comes with a membership card of your own, as well as a poster — yet despite all of the drug use in the theaters, at least two reported deaths and showing tons of movies that couldn’t have been shown in England, Scala was closed because they showed A Clockwork Orange and Stanley Kubrick had ordered the film to not be shown in the UK. This led to a lawsuit by Warner Brothers and the theater ended.

The memories, however, could not go away. I’ve never had the opportunity to have a theater like the Scala but I wish that I had. I can live through this. This is a documentary and a set for those that live through movies, that dream of them, that want them to mean as much to others as they do to us.

All this week, we’ll go through the many extras that are in the Severin set as well as several of the movies that screened at Scala, which you can find on this Letterboxd list.

Here’s a list of the extras you get with this release: audio commentary with Jane Giles And Ali Catterall; an introduction from the UK premiere; the documentary Scala by Michael Clifford with commentary, a short Scala Cinema; featurettes on the theater and programs; Davey Jones’ cartoons; outtakes of the interviews and a trailer.

The second disc has several shorts that played at Scala, such as Divide and Rule — Never!, Dead Cat, The Mark of Lilith, Relax, Boobs A Lot, Kama Sutra Rides Again, Coping With Cupid and On Guard.

The third disc has the Kier-La Janisse documentary The Art of the Calendar; Splatterfest Exhumed, which is all about the seminal horror festival at Scala; Maniac 2: Mr. Robbie, the Buddy Giovinazzo-directed proof of concept for the sequel that never happened, as well as commentary by Giovinazzo; Horrorshow with commentary by director Paul Hart-Wilden; Josh Becker’s Cleveland Smith: Bounty Hunter, which stars Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi, as well as a commentary by Scott Spiegel; Mongolitos with commentary by director Stéphane Ambiel and a featurette on H.G. Lewis coming to Scala in 1989.

You can buy this from Severin.