- You can see the entire "Wisdom Gone Wild" panel discussion at onedetroitpbs.org.

Let's turn now to the Milford Independent Cinema in Western Oakland County.

The nonprofit movie house was in danger of closing at the end of January.

It was short the money it needed to operate, but donations came through and the theater has resumed its programming.

"One Detroit's" Bill Kubota visited the cinema last year and has this report on its history and operations.

(intriguing music) - [Bill] The Village of Milford over by the western edge of Oakland County.

Population 6,500.

At the old movie house, a classic on the big screen.

- Tonight for our film Appreciation Night, which is a free admission show, we're showing "Airplane!"

from 1980, pretty much one of the kind of wackiest comedies out there.

- Smoking or non-smoking.

- Smoking please.

- Have a nice trip.

- [Bill] Were you round when it first came out?

- So I was.

With this being released in 1980, I would've been in five.

- Surely you can't be serious.

- I am serious.

And don't call me Shirley.

- They will be the first time I've watched it in the theater and countless dozens of times I've watched it elsewhere.

- [Bill] Elsewhere?

That'd be cable television, peppered with commercials, some scenes tastefully removed for general audiences.

In Milford, "Airplane!"

intact as it was in theater's generations ago.

- Hey, Jay, what the hell is that?

- Maybe, why that's the Russian New Year.

You know, we have a big creative look, sir.

- [Bill] The movies here: a mix of the classics and the contemporary.

- Wow, this was from when we had "Becoming Led Zeppelin."

That was a really good movie.

Oh, "Minecraft."

That was probably our number one movie so far this year.

- [Bill] The Milford Independent Cinema is a non-profit endeavor.

A movie theater saved by the community, now operated by the Huron Valley Film Organization.

- The medium popcorn is gonna be $5.

- [Bill] A couple of paid staff and a lot of others pitching in.

- Everybody else is volunteers, so everyone getting your popcorn, your pop, cleaning up, you know, after the show, our whole board, we're all volunteers.

It's definitely a community effort.

- [Bill] When the COVID shutdown hit and people stayed home, the Milford Cinema closed.

It had been on Summit Street, northeast of downtown for more than 50 years.

moving here from its original Main Street location decades earlier called the Star Theater a century ago.

- Let's get this game going.

Sound good?

- [Speaker] Woo woo.

- [Bill] Another Monday evening, no movie.

It's Movie Trivia Night.

- James Cameron's "Aliens" features three cast members who would appear together in what vampire film directed by Kathryn Bigelow?

Two minutes.

Part of our mission is to bring film and film knowledge to the community.

We have some fun, we play for a couple hours, we sell some popcorn, and that helps to keep our doors open as well and everybody has a good time.

All those are now in.

- [Bill] Among the board of directors, Rich Trice, school teacher, Bryan Gutierrez, real estate agent, and Ryan Wiltse, award-winning beer maker at the River's Edge Brewing Company.

- When we moved here, I was just shocked there was a small theater in town and just super geeked about it.

Love movies, I've always loved movies.

During COVID when it went out of business, it's just a tragedy losing like this little gem in town.

- We saw immediately there was a massive outpouring in the community of sadness about losing this cinema.

- It was definitely a big loss for our community.

- [Bill] A plan came together at Wiltse's place.

- Actually just over a beer at River's Edge Brewery talking to some people's kind of like, "Man, I wonder if we could form a non-profit and see what we could do here."

- He followed that up with, you know, "Hey, I'm thinking about getting some local business owners and community leaders to get together.

Do you want in?"

And I think I emphatically said "Yes!"

before he even finished the question.

- The desire is there.

the challenge of pulling it off is tough.

We got very lucky in that we have a strong support from the community as well as the owners of the building were very much interested in keeping this going as a cinema and so our overhead was less significant than some of the other theaters that have tried to be saved.

- When we reopened the theater, we wanted to expand the vision, expand the business plan to include more.

It wasn't going to be enough just to show films.

- [Bill] Hosting local events is part of the formula.

- We want it to be, and it is, a cultural and a social hub.

We are competing against the big multiplexes, and in general we're doing really well, but we still rely on the donor support to kind of help us even out like those spikes and dips throughout the year.

That really, really helps us a lot.

- [Bill] Statistically, moviegoers have not returned in numbers seen before the pandemic, although recent reports show Gen Z, those born between 1997 and 2012 are showing up more often at theaters these days.

That despite competition from online subscription services.

- Yes, you can stream it.

Yes, you can watch it on a television or a small device.

But when you can be amongst other moviegoers who are experiencing it at the same time as you are and laughing at the same time or screaming at the same time, you know, while you're relaxed in an environment eating your popcorn together, that's such a special way to watch a movie.

- [Bill] On film Appreciation Night, some stay late to discuss the movie.

This time, that high flying classic.

- Looking at it today, do you think they could make this movie as is today?

- [Bill] They get a bit of film theory and a breakdown of some of the sound design.

- Anybody notice anything about the sound of the plane?

It's a four-jet engine plane, but every time you see an outside shot, it's a turbo prop sound that you hear.

- We think we provide a very interesting and exciting voice in the community, and we're proud of what it is that we're doing here.

- Awesome, well, thank you for joining us, and we hope we'll see you again.

- If we weren't here, people would really miss what we have.

I think for as long as it can be a nonprofit space, it will be, and we're gonna continue to fight to stay open and continue to fundraise and ask people for help.

- Keep on our website milfordcinema.org for our upcoming shows and more fan events that we've got going on throughout the summer.