Ipswich Film Theatre is preparing to re-open its doors to film fans having spent lockdown carrying out improvement work.

Work has been done to the air-handling system in its main auditorium as well as investing time on developing new programming which will be rolled out later this summer.

Cinema manager Dan Champion said that although the doors have been shut a lot of work has been going on behind the scenes.

He said: “When we are finally allowed to re-open – which we hope will be in early June – we want to be in a position to offer lots of choice to our audiences who will have been starved of big screen entertainment for more than a year.

“We are looking at introducing themed seasons, special Friday night music documentaries or music related films, documentary seasons, late night screenings, more classics up on the big screen, Saturday double bills as well as the very best in British, world and independent cinema.”

He said he would also like to screen as many of the award-winning films from the Oscar and BAFTA ceremonies because although many films will have been available on streaming networks not everyone has access to the numerous streaming sites but there is also something special about seeing these films with an audience on the big screen.

Mr Champion said: “I saw the new Paul Greengrass western News of the World on television recently and the first thing that popped into my head was ‘This would look fantastic on a proper cinema screen.’ So that’s what we would love to do.”

He said that although dates were not set in stone, they are looking to reopen in June on Thursday through to Sunday with the weekly programme changing on a Friday once everything had settled down.

He added: “We are also looking to revamp our membership scheme and will be looking to add a number of substantial benefits to the scheme to encourage a sense of belonging and sense of communal ownership of this fantastic cinema and Ipswich institution.”

The Ipswich Film Theatre is also continuing with IFT at Home, linking up independent films on selected streaming sites where the IFT gets a portion of the ticket money.