From 17 March 2025

The Volta Cinema Kino Volta

Martin Turk / Slovenia, Italy / 2024 / 85 min / Italian, Slovene, English

In 1909, in Trieste, the main port of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, four bold entrepreneurs met with a young English teacher, James Joyce. He proposed that they invest in the first permanent cinema in Ireland: Kino Volta. Martin Turk’s film is not a historical documentary about the birth of cinema but a nostalgic and playful evocation of the spirit of those who were part of the story.

Photos

All photos

What's On

Kinobalon

Hola Frida Hola Frida

André Kadi, Karine Vézina

Thursday, 01. 01. 2026 / 15:30 / Main Hall

This playful and colourful film takes us into the world of the girl who would one day become the famous painter Frida Kahlo. Curious, imaginative and full of life, Frida turns every trial into an adventure.

Fiume o morte! Fiume o morte!

Igor Bezinović

Thursday, 01. 01. 2026 / 16:15 / Small Hall

On 12 September 1919, a troop of some three hundred soldiers under the leadership of the flamboyant war-loving Italian poet Gabriele D’Annunzio swooped into the Northern-Adriatic port town of Fiume, now Rijeka, wanting to annex the city to Italy. Over the course of the next 16 months, during what is regarded as one of the most bizarre militant sieges of all time his official photography team captured over 10,000 images. A century later, Igor Bezinović orchestrates a direct-action history lesson focused on the siege and its modern-day implications.

Hamnet Hamnet

Chloé Zhao

Thursday, 01. 01. 2026 / 17:30 / Main Hall

Chloé Zhao (Nomadland) imagines how a tragedy from Shakespeare’s real life might have inspired the creation of his timeless masterpiece Hamlet. Starring the exceptional Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal, the film is a moving story about love, loss, and the healing power of art.