The #RunningCostsCrisis has taken its toll on the Centre for the Moving Image.

An arts and cinema charity operating across Scotland has announced it has entered administration amid the threat of rising costs. 

The trustees of Centre for the Moving Image (CMI), the parent charity which runs Filmhouse Cinema and Café Bar in Edinburgh, Edinburgh International Film Festival and Belmont Filmhouse in Aberdeen, have appointed administrators. 

Tom MacLennan and Chad Griffin of FRP Advisory have been appointed jointly to deal with the charity’s finances, as the charity faces the perfect storm of sharply rising costs, in particular energy costs, alongside reduced trade due to the ongoing impacts of the pandemic and the cost of living crisis.

The charity said the combination and scale of these challenges is unprecedented and means that there was no option but to take immediate action.

Filmhouse Cinema and Café Bar in Edinburgh, Edinburgh International Film Festival and Belmont Filmhouse will all cease trading immediately and FRP Advisory have been appointed Administrators to all entities in the group. 

The administrators will work with Creative Scotland, City of Edinburgh Council and Aberdeen City Council in assessing what options there are for the future of the individual elements of the charity’s work and supporting staff through the process.

The board of the CMI said in a statement: “We have been proud to have led the CMI through incredibly challenging times, and in particular during the worst days of the pandemic. 

“Unfortunately, the combination of sharply increasing energy and other costs, together with both the lasting impacts of the pandemic and the rapidly emerging cost of living crisis affecting cinema attendances, means that we have had no other option but to appoint administrators at this time.

“We would like to put on record our immense gratitude to the entire staff team whose passion for film as an artform and for the audiences and communities we work with and serve has remained undented by the challenges of recent years. 

“We’re fully aware that this will be an exceptionally stressful time for them.”

The charity said its energy Costs are rising by approximately £200k over the next 12 months, while payroll costs are projected to go up by more than 10 per cent.  

The board also said public funding has been standstill or reducing for over eight years and had been reducing in real terms value throughout that period, with the more recent steep rise in inflationary costs reducing the real terms value even further.