Lightbox Film Center finds a new home at the Bok Building

From Philly and the Pa. suburbs to South Jersey and Delaware, what would you like WHYY News to cover? Let us know!

The Lightbox Film Center is getting ready for its third act.

The organization that was once part of the now-closed University of the Arts will begin showing films again. Starting in November, it will hold weekly screenings at its new home in the Bok Building in South Philadelphia.

In the auditorium of the former vocational school now filled with small retail and manufacturing businesses, Lightbox will re-launch with a rare psychedelic German animated space odyssey from 1972, “The Cathedral of New Emotions,” on Nov. 13.

That will be followed by the obscure cult film “Scarecrow in a Garden of Cucumbers” (1972), a musical comedy never released to video or streaming platforms starring Andy Warhol superstar Holly Woodlawn, which will screen on Nov. 20.

Fashion photographer Bruce Weber’s 1988 documentary about the gifted talent and tragic life of jazz trumpeter Chet Baker, “Let’s Get Lost,” will screen on Dec. 11.

For all its 45-year existence, the Lightbox Film Center was always part of a host organization; first at the International House in West Philadelphia until it closed in 2019, then at the University of the Arts until it closed last June.

Executive and artistic director Jesse Pires had to do something he never wanted to do: become independent.

“I’ve spent the last few months filing all of the paperwork and legal documents to become an official nonprofit,” he said. “Now we are a standalone organization.”

Lightbox has been Philadelphia’s only regular, year-round presenter of art film. The back-end operation of the organization has changed now that Pires has fundraising on his executive plate, but he says the public-facing programming will be the same.

“This is a program that dates back to the 1970s,” he said. “It’s evolved and certainly gone through some interesting changes, but at the core there’s a mission. There are values at play. I want to maintain that and show important, unique and unusual films that normally wouldn’t screen in Philadelphia.”

Pires said the Bok building is a good match for Lightbox, whose screenings attract a niche audience interested in obscure and sometimes erudite movies. In the past it helped to be located in places that foster those kinds of audiences, like universities.

The maker spaces, bicycle shops and vintage clothes stores at Bok could find a kindred spirit in Lightbox occupying the auditorium.

“It’s magnificent. It’s huge. There’s great projection,” Pires said. “They have now also formed a nonprofit entity to help to do some upgrades on that space. I’m hoping that with Lightbox there we can bring a little energy to that initiative.”

The 600-seat auditorium is owned and operated by a nonprofit created by Bok in 2017, Friends of Bok, which has a plan to develop the space to make it suitable for a wider range of uses, including performances and film screenings. The upgrades and renovations — including an HVAC system, new seating, and building out backstage wings — are expected to cost about $2 million.

With a staff of exactly one — himself — Pires has had to step away from one of his other cinematic passions, film preservation. Lightbox had been part of several projects to restore forgotten or underappreciated films.

The last film Lightbox was able to restore, in partnership with the British Film Institute and Cinenova, was “Night Shift” (1981), an eerie film about an overnight desk clerk in a small London hotel, by writer and director Robina Rose. The new 4K restored print will have its premiere screening on Oct. 8 at the New York Film Festival.

“Hopefully the ability to restore films is also something that we can continue, eventually,” Pires said. “I’m hoping that once we get back up and running that we’ll not only be exhibiting films but restoring more films, too.”