Skylar Thorne Kelly, co-founder and projectionist at Kinonik, with a print from the group’s film collection, at its Portland space. Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald

Andy Graham loves the experience of watching a movie on film, of hearing the clickety-click of the projector, of seeing it the way the filmmakers had intended.

“There’s a depth and richness to a projected film print that just doesn’t exist in the blackness of digital projection,” said Graham. “It’s fascinating to see how people respond to the film experience differently, the look and even the sound of it.”

Graham is one of the founders of a Portland nonprofit film preservation group called Kinonik, which started in 2016 and has amassed a collection of some 1,800 film prints. Many were donated or given away by colleges, libraries, theaters and other groups, as digital projection of movies has become the standard. The group shares the film experience regularly at its 50-seat screening venue and work space on Cassidy Point, near the city’s waterfront. The group also shows films at other venues around the city from time to time.

From left, David Nutty, a board member; Skylar Thorne Kelly, co-founder and projectionist; and Andy Graham, co-founder, standing in front of some of Kinonik’s 1,800 film prints. Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald

The group’s collection ranges from silent and foreign films to CinemaScope epics and lesser-known films of the last 40 or 50 years. Some of the films scheduled to be shown by Kinonik at its Cassidy Point space in the next couple of months include: “Forbidden Games” (1952), director Rene Clement’s story of a young French girl orphaned in a German attack during World War II: “The Philadelphia Story” (1940), a classic Hollywood romantic comedy starring Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn and James Stewart; “Dr. Strangelove” (1964), Stanley Kubrick’s Cold War black comedy; and “Knife in the Water” (1962), a Polish psychological thriller and director Roman Polanski’s feature debut.

By sharing the collection and its wide-ranging view of film history, the volunteers who run Kinonik hope to not only keep the films in good condition, but to help new generations understand what the communal experience of seeing film prints, in a group with others, can feel like.

“I can watch something alone, but I don’t react as powerfully as I do with other people. And out of that big reaction comes the most vibrant conversations,” said Skylar Thorne Kelly, a co-founder of the group. “The effect of the artwork ripples out into the world more powerfully, as a result.”

Kinonik shows its film collection in a space near Portland’s waterfront on Cassidy Point and at other local venues. Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald

FILM AND PERSONAL HISTORY

Kelly, 40, began his fascination with film and the film industry as a child. His film buff father showed him several films by legendary Japanese director Akira Kurosawa by the time he was 10 years old, including “The Hidden Fortress” (1958) and “Sanjuro” (1962).

Kelly moved to Portland around 2011 and soon was making large-scale paintings for interior design clients, with his girlfriend at the time. He’d often walk by Movies on Exchange Street, Portland’s beloved art and indie cinema that closed in 2009, and lament that the city no longer had a stand-alone theater showing movies that weren’t blockbusters or otherwise cineplex-worthy.

While he was looking for a bigger space to make paintings in, Kelly’s Realtor steered him toward the vacant Movies on Exchange Street space. It was a little beyond his budget, but he started talking with the building’s owner, well-known Portland landlord Joe Soley, about the idea of renting the space and using it both as a painting studio and a movie theater, with movie income perhaps helping subsidize the rent. Kelly reached out to Jon Courtney at Space on Congress Street, an arts and performance venue that shows films, for advice and contacts.

Skylar Thorne Kelly at Kinonik, reviews a film print. Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald

Courtney put Kelly in touch with Graham, 73, who shared a similar passion for old movies and film prints. Graham had first come to Maine from New Jersey in the 1970s to study at the University of Southern Maine. He  got involved with a group called the Film Study Center, where people got together on Friday nights to watch and discuss films. The Movies on Exchange Street opened a few years later and Graham would work there sometimes as projectionist. He also would run his own large-format digital printing company, Portland Color, which he sold in 2011.

Over the years Graham became friends with USM professor Juris Ubans, who taught painting and film. Ubans collected some 200 films over the years, but as more movies were shot with digital cinematography and projected digitally, his collection sat in his basement, Graham said. Around the same time Kelly was thinking of ways to revive Movies on Exchange Street,  Graham was thinking about starting a group to “resurrect the experience of watching film on film.”

“When I had first come to Portland, being a part (of the Film Study Center) and watching films in the group was such a seminal experience for me, and I wanted young people to have that experience,” said Graham.

It didn’t take long for Graham and Thorne to join forces, and Kinonik was formed in 2016. The group showed some films at the Movies on Exchange Street space but eventually started using different venues around the city. For the name, group members took the German word kino, which means cinema or film, and created a palindrome out of it. Ubans had pointed out that when displayed on a glass door, the name would be the same coming or going. (Ubans died in December 2021, at the age of 83. )

Andy Graham, a co-founder of Kinonik, talks about the group in its Cassidy Point space. Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald

The group moved into its current work and storage space on Cassidy Point in 2022. It’s in a large, industrial-looking building built specifically for art studios and art-adjacent businesses. The group has some 70 members and shows one or two films a week on its 11-foot-wide screen, most weeks, as well as at other venues. Admission is $10 for the general public, $8 for members.

Kinonik’s collection has grown over the years to about 1,800, as many colleges, theaters, individuals and other organizations have been donating them, rather than just throwing them away. But in the last couple of years, it’s been a little harder to acquire new films, Graham says, as colleges and other groups start to realize there is a desire and demand among the public to see old film prints.

Recent showings from Kinonik have included “Rope” (1948), an Alfred Hitchcock suspense film based on the Loeb and Leopold murder case of the 1920s;  “55 Days at Peking” (1963), an epic about the Boxer Rebellion in China in 1900, starring Charlton Heston; “Nothing But a Man” (1964), an indie drama starring Ivan Dixon as a Black railroad worker trying to maintain his dignity in a small Alabama town, and “La Strada” (1954), by the Italian director Federico Fellini, considered one of the most influential films of all time.

Some other titles shown by Kinonik in the past year include “Pandora’s Box” (1929), “12 Angry Men”  (1957), “Rear Window” (1954), “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” (1962), “The Lodger” (1927), “The Seventh Seal” (1957) and “Shanghai Express” (1932).

When Kinonik gets a film, it gets looked over for condition and quality issues. Then a record of its condition and  a description is entered into the group’s film list, and is stored in a preservation-quality film reel container. When it comes to deciding which films to show and when, there’s lots of conversations — the kind of conversations film buffs love to have.

“We all give our pitch and debate the merits of the film, we talk about how we can carry intellectual motifs through a series of films,” said Kelly. “Sometimes it just comes to down to things we are really curious to watch with a group of people.”