YouTube videos, shared on the big screen

With the advent of YouTube and other video-sharing sites, there’s no doubt film-making has become an art of the masses. But while such user-created movies are typically viewed within the confines of the internet, a group of Dutch cinephiles are hoping to do them better justice by bringing them to the big screen. Upload Cinema is a film club that aims to take the best web films and show them on the full-sized screen at the De Uitkijk theater in Amsterdam. On the first Monday of each month a different program of internet shorts is screened, generally chosen based on a particular theme or topic. For its October launch, for example, Upload Cinema’s theme was “Homemade Remakes.” Since then, monthly topics have included “The Perfect Speech,” “Video Gastronomique” and “The Best Web Videos of 2008,” which is January’s feature. The films included in each showing are chosen from among those members submit. Only members can view the films, and membership is limited to those who have been invited or who have entered a film that got accepted into a screening. Upload Cinema is sponsored by Amsterdam advertising agency Draftfcb. We’ve already covered numerous examples of online phenomena entering the offline world, and Upload Cinema is another shining example. Want to undertake a similar effort of your own? First, see our sister site’s OFF=ON briefing for more on the online-to-offline trend. Then, contact Upload Cinema, which says it has prepared a soup-to-nuts kit to help launch similar cinemas in other towns. Lights, camera… action! 😉 (Related: Pop-up drive-in movies — A being space for cinephiles.) Spotted by: Robert de Koning