LA CIOTAT, France (CN) — In La Ciotat, a town 20 miles from Marseille, sunrays scatter across the calm Mediterranean Sea. The sharp glows catch on sailboat masts and bounce off shiny yachts in the harbor. Narrow alleyways snake through town and towels hang from blue-shuttered windows, blowing in the breeze, catching slivers of rays.
La Ciotat, like many cities in the south of France, is renowned for the light — the special golden hue that canopies over the landscape. But its claim to fame takes place in the dark.
In a pitch-black staircase of the world’s oldest running cinema, Michel Cornille — the man behind the curtain, president of the association Les Lumières d’Eden that runs the Cinéma Eden-Théâtre — fumbles across creaking wooden floors, feeling 19th century moldings for guidance. Film credits are rolling and the cylindrical tunnel of light radiating from the projector casts a glow across the balcony. Cornille leans against the railing, gazing into the auditorium, eyes widened, smiling.
The lights turn on and illuminate a crimson room with 206 red seats, embellished pillars and a wraparound balcony against the walls.
“We’re living in the [time] of images, and we have to remember that everything started here, in this small cinema,” he said. “It’s extraordinary.”
The Cinéma Eden-Théâtre opened its doors in 1895 as a theater. But around then, Auguste and Louis Lumière — the brothers who invented the cinematograph, one of the first apparatuses used to play motion pictures — arrived in La Ciotat. Their father, Antoine, was a painter and photographer, and a friend had urged him to come to the town for its light. The Lumière brothers screened some of their first films in the crimson room.
Nicole Defais, a native of La Ciotat, watches movies at the Cinéma Eden-Théâtre two to three times a month. On Wednesday afternoon, she was walking out of its doors with some brochures in hand. The history of the venue has left a lasting impression that continuously draws her in. Later that day, Cornille greeted her by name when she came back to attend a screening.
“I really like the human warmth, the heritage … . It’s the oldest cinema in the world,” Defais explained. “It’s the doyenne of cinemas, and we’re big, big fans.”
But the theater's survival wasn’t always self-evident. Throughout the 20th century, the Eden faced numerous threats to its existence, from the World Wars to a murder and decades of abandonment. In the early 2000s, it was almost leveled and turned into a parking lot. Others advocated for making it into a restaurant.
Members of Les Lumières d’Eden, city representatives and cinephiles fought to restore the venue to exactly how it was at its founding, down to the shade of the red paint on its walls.
“The Eden almost died multiple times,” Cornille explained. “It should have died in 1945, during the war, when a bomb exploded in the sea right [in front of the cinema] and it destroyed the entire façade of the Eden.”
Then, in the early 1980s, the cinema’s operator was murdered by a thief. It was shut down and abandoned for decades. The yellow jewel-toned façade turned gray, and it was lost against the other buildings lining the boardwalk. Its memory faded, too.
“It went completely unnoticed,” Cornille explained. “People at the time didn’t know that it was the oldest cinema in the world, because people would just pass it and say, ‘Oh, it’s an old theater.’”
Marseille-Provence provided funding to restore the Eden, which reopened in 2013, the year that Marseille was chosen the European Capital of Culture. Now, it welcomes 36,000 viewers a year and screens five films per day.
This week, three friends—Maeva, Jeane and Cindy—chatted outside of the theater with their kids. They were waiting to see "Rose, petite fée des fleurs," a children’s movie.
“[I like] its charm,” Maeva said, thinking about what draws her there. “It’s the oldest cinema in the world.”
The Lumière brothers left a cinematic legacy in La Ciotat, and there are numerous film festivals throughout the year. But other venues haven’t been able to survive. In December, the Lumière Theatre closed its doors after 110 years despite efforts to keep it alive. Though it will be turned into a cultural space, one local collective warned that La Ciotat could lose its status as the “cradle of cinema” if its new building doesn’t include a theater.
But Cornille isn’t worried. His blue eyes sparkle as he tells the story of the Eden and the feeling within its walls, a feeling that can’t be manufactured by multiplex theaters or smartphones.
“This cinema has a very particular atmosphere,” he said. “[A film] has to be shared, and to be shared in a place that inspires sharing … that’s the Eden.”
Cornille likens the Eden’s survival to the concept of film itself. Film brings people — whether it be a grandmother or Marilyn Monroe — back to life.
“Cinema is immortality, Eden is immortality. It never died,” he said. “It lived multiple lives, but it’s still here.”
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