Ufa-Palast in Hamburg / Germany

 

The Ufa-Palast was a part of the Deutschlandhaus in the middle of the picture. The eight-story building was built in steel frame construction between 1928 and 1929 based on designs by Fritz Block and Ernst Hochfeld. 

The cinema was opened on December 21, 1929. First shown movie was Die weiße Hölle vom Piz Palü / The White Hell of Pitz Palu (Germany 1929, directed by Arnold Fanck and Georg Wilhelm Pabst). At that time it was the largest cinema in Europe with 2,665 seats. The Ufa Palace was used until 1944, when a fire caused by an aerial bomb destroyed the building.

From 1946 to 1949, the English occupying forces rebuilt the confiscated house and making structural changes. The destroyed cinema was not restored. The Deutschlandhaus was used as an office building in a modified form and was demolished in 2019.

Capitol in Parchim / Germany

This postcard is from 1953. Parchim is a small town in northern Germany. The cinema at the old market opened in 1929. At that time it was called U.T., later Capitol.

Even later it was given the name Theater der Freundschaft / Theater of Friendship. 

Look at this photo: 

Friendship in this context meant, above all, friendship with the USSR. Until the early 1990s, Parchim was the largest Soviet military airfield in the GDR.

What happened to the airport later can be seen in the documentary film Parchim International.

Today there is the Movie Star cinema in Parchim.

The building is still standing and now there is an Indian shop.

My grandparents lived in Parchim for a few years when I was little. I don't think we went to the cinema together.

City Theater in Steenwijk / Netherlands

The City Theater in Steenwijk opened in 1959. The owner was Johan Miedema Sr. His Frisian cinema exploitation company came to Steenwijk in 1945 and converted the concert hall into the Roxy Cinema. 

When Johan Miedema Sr. was given the opportunity to build a completely new theater on the Goeman Borgesiusstraat, he grabbed it with both hands. In 1958 the Roxy was closed and the new City Theater was opened in 1959 in collaboration with Ger and Jantje Vos. The City Theater  had one auditorium, but the cinema was renovated in 2000. The theater now has 3 modern cinema rooms with large screens, digital sound and plenty of legroom.

Ludie Vos, the son of Ger and Jantje Vos, tells: 'Because my father was already showing films in Lumiére (Wapen van Steenwijk), he was not happy with the arrival of a new cinema. But due to the good relationship my father had with the municipality, a proposal was reached that both parties agreed with. The requirement that the municipality made of Miedema was that my father would become manager of this cinema. Both parties agreed to this and the cinema could be built.'

The cinema is still working and belongs now to Luxor Cinemas.