Premiere Cinemas closure: Romford Film Festival will 'live on'

Romford Film Festival and its horror version the Romford Horror Festival have confirmed that they will continue to run - in spite of Premiere Cinemas announcing its closure on Monday (August 20).

Both festivals previously held awards ceremonies and film screenings at the cinema in the Mercury Mall shopping centre.

They will now need to find a new home after the cinema was repossessed by its landlord, and have said they will tell film fans "more about how that will happen after September".

The cinema was repossessed by its landlord on Friday (August 16) (Image: Mercury Shopping Centre)

In a post on Facebook, Romford Film Festival said: "We created both festivals as a way of preserving the life of the cinema we played in, we wanted to do something that made Premiere Cinemas and The Mercury a place you needed to be.

The festival attracted global interest (Image: Sandra Rowse)

"While Premiere Cinemas may be no more, Romford’s Film Festivals will live on and we will tell you more about how that will happen after September. For now however we are just stepping out of the story."

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The festival added that it wanted to "pay our respect" to the staff who yesterday "discovered they no longer had jobs".

The post said: "They worked incredibly hard to ensure the cinema was a great place to be.

"We send our love to the entire team that worked at the cinema and want to assure them, we’ll meet again.

"Thank you Premiere Cinemas team Romford.

"We love you!"

Romford Film Festival 2024 saw 184 films screened at Premiere Cinemas over five days, many showcasing local talent from east London and Essex.

The Romford Horror Festival this year saw thousands of scary movie fans descend on the town, for more than 80 hours of screenings over four days.