The Strand Cinema is an independent four-screen cinema

Movie theater

A movie theater, cinema, movie house, picture theater, film theater is a venue, usually a building, for viewing motion pictures ....

 in Belfast

Belfast

Belfast is the capital of and largest city in Northern Ireland. By population, it is the 14th biggest city in the United Kingdom and second biggest on the island of Ireland . It is the seat of the devolved government and legislative Northern Ireland Assembly...

, Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...

. It is one of the two remaining independent cinemas in Belfast, alongside the Queen's Film Theatre

Queen's Film Theatre

The Queen's Film Theatre or QFT is a small independent cinema at Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland that was founded in 1968. The QFT focuses mainly on art house, indie and world cinema and plays an important role in the cultural life of Belfast, in particular through contributions to...

. It is located on the Holywood Road.

Opened in 1935, the cinema's design was influenced by its proximity to the nearby shipyard of Harland & Wolff

Harland and Wolff

Harland and Wolff Heavy Industries is a Northern Irish heavy industrial company, specialising in shipbuilding and offshore construction, located in Belfast, Northern Ireland....

, featuring curved walls and portholed foyer. The cinema underwent various unsympathetic renovations throughout the 1960s and 1970s. In 1999, the building was restored to its original Streamline Moderne

Streamline Moderne

Streamline Moderne, sometimes referred to by either name alone or as Art Moderne, was a late type of the Art Deco design style which emerged during the 1930s...

 style, and remains a landmark in east Belfast.

The Strand is one of the venues for the Belfast Film Festival

Belfast Film Festival

Founded in 1995 by author Laurence McKeown, in its early stages of development the West Belfast Film Festival was part of Féile an Phobail. In its third and fourth year, it was autonomous and under the stewardship of Michele Devlin and Laurence McKeown, the Film Festival ran as a citywide event...

, during which it screens classic films

Classical Hollywood cinema

Classical Hollywood cinema or the classical Hollywood narrative, are terms used in film history which designates both a visual and sound style for making motion pictures and a mode of production used in the American film industry between roughly the 1910s and the early 1960s.Classical style is...

. During the 2005 festival the cinema celebrated its 70th birthday by screening A Night to Remember, the 1958 film about the sinking of RMS Titanic, built by Harland & Wolff.