I’ve recently returned from a visit to London. When I’m there I always try and check out what’s screening around town. In my frequent visits I’ve gone to see screenings at a number of theatres, a tradition going back to my high school years in the city — I spent Friday and Saturday nights at the movies, hanging out at cinemas with names like The Scala in King’s Cross, and the Plaza, the Empire, and the Odeon Leicester Square in the heart of the West End.
The city is still a goldmine for cinephiles. The three major cinemas now in Leicester Square are The Odeon Luxe Leicester Square, Cineworld Leicester Square, and Vue West End. The one I frequent most in the area these days is The Prince Charles Cinema, just down an alley from the main square, which shows new genre films, cult classics, and will project 35mm and 70mm film.
This visit I caught a Mystery Movie at the venue, which turned out to be the pot comedy, Pineapple Express.
Not far from there, in Piccadilly Circus, is the Picturehouse Central. This is the flagship cinema for a chain across the UK and includes a fantastic member’s only bar with a balcony high over the Haymarket. Tickets for movies at this location can approach £20 each, which with the exchange rate turns out to be around $37 Canadian — there’s a price to pay for this stylish cinema experience.
In the spring of 2022 I spotted Austin Butler standing right here, surrounded by fans, just after the premiere of Elvis at the cinema.
The Everyman are a chain of art house movie houses across the city. On this visit I went to the Baker Street location to see Mother Mary, where the cinema is actually located beneath the street. A bar offers cocktails and food served during the ads in advance of the screening while audience members sprawl on velvet loveseats with small tables attached. Everyman publish a fetching monthly magazine with write-ups about all the films showing. Once again, tickets were nearly £20, and the drinks weren’t much cheaper.
A few years ago at the Everyman Screen On The Green in Islington I attended a midnight screening of Shaun of the Dead, with Edgar Wright providing a pre-screening Q&A.
The Regent Street Cinema is one of the oldest in the city, just north of Oxford Circus.
In Bloomsbury, there’s a terrific documentary-focused Curzon cinema — I found No Other Land there in January 2025.
In Notting Hill the gorgeous Electric Cinema is located on Portobello Road. That’s where Zendaya showed up to surprise attendees of the opening night of The Drama in April.
Just down the road is another Picturehouse, The Gate.
This visit I stopped into a new star in the London cinema firmament. The Nickel Cinema. It’s an independent grindhouse, dedicated to the weirdest, cultiest movies projected on multiple formats, including VHS. The founder and one of the programmers gave me a tour of the nine-month-old, 37-seat cinema in Clerkenwell, a leafy, residential neighbourhood not far from the West End. The cinema includes a basement bar and has a cozy, community vibe that’s attracting audiences from around the city. I strongly recommend anyone reading this who’s planning a London visit, go check it out.
So concludes this look at cinemas in London — and I should say, this is far from a comprehensive listing: I didn’t even make it to the British Film Institute on the South Bank this time. Next visit, for sure.
If you’re a lover of London and cinema, please check what I got up to on a previous visit, and see this post detailing my visit to the London Design Museum and the Wes Anderson Archive.
