Intro
As an arts organisation, we believe we have a responsibility to be a great place to work.
Filmhouse exists to champion the art of film, and to provide a safe and inclusive space for our community to meet, socialise, learn, and enjoy themselves. That ethos extends to everyone who works for and with us, and has been a central, guiding principle for us since reopening the venue in 2025, after a closure of nearly three years.
As a charity with a social and cultural mission to provide opportunities to engage and learn, we must reflect our mission and values first in how we treat our people. Paying staff a real Living Wage that they can live on is the fundamental starting pointing for this, and one that we strive to build on with the contracts we offer, how employees are treated during their time with us, and all other aspects of their employment. We’re a brand-new operation with a brand-new team, where we want to get to as an employer won’t happen overnight. But our commitment and the work we’re doing to get there is very real.
We are also acutely aware that the arts are often a financially precarious place to find a career. As a venue exhibiting cinema, we play a vital role in supporting the careers of filmmakers whose work we screen, and many of the other people involved in the the making and releasing of films. And as a cinema, we directly employ people who are vital to the cinema sector; if it is to have a future, then work and careers in venues like ours needs to be viable. We aim to help create a secure and healthy working environment in the cultural sector, and the real Living Wage is a vital building block to make that happen.
Who we are
Committed to screening the full diversity of cinema from across the globe, we exist to celebrate film and to provide a safe and inclusive space for our community to meet, socialise, learn, and enjoy themselves.
Based on Lothian Road on a site originally built as a church in 1831, Filmhouse first opened as a one screen cinema in 1979. Eventually expanding to become a three screen venue, the venue was the home for independent and often radical film programming, as well as being the host venue for the Edinburgh International Film Festival.
In October of 2022, the collapse of Filmhouse’s parent company, CMI, forced the cinema’s closure putting scores of staff out of work. However, thanks to a grassroots campaign led by former staff and supported by dedicated Filmhouse audiences, with support from the UK Government, Creative and Screen Scotland, the Nancie Massie Charitable Trust and Edinburgh City Council, we were able to reopen our doors as a fully independent cinema in June 2025. Now a four-screen cinema for the first time ever, alongside housing a 100-seat cafe and bar, we opened just in time to host Edinburgh International Film Festival in 2025.
It’s wonderful to have Edinburgh’s film lovers back within our walls. While we are inspired by our cinema’s past, we are nevertheless a completely new venue and organisation, looking to the future and here to serve audiences in Edinburgh, Scotland and beyond.
We are also a registered charity offering a year-round educational programme to schools and young people in Edinburgh, which is central to our social mission. All are welcome to come together to make new connections through a shared love of film.
Our team are central to creating the best possible film experience. From our box office team who greet you in our new-look foyer, to our bar and kitchen staff who serve you top-notch food and drinks with a smile, to our front of house team who welcome you into our cinemas, and our projection team who make sure everything looks perfect up on the silver screen, it takes a village to make this experience the best it can be for everyone who walks through our doors.
Our people make Filmhouse what it is, and we believe that by looking after them, it allows us to focus on doing what we love most – sharing and celebrating brilliant films from across the globe with audiences in Edinburgh, Scotland and beyond.