It is a popular independent cinema located on Kingsland High Street, with a history stretching back over 100 years.

There is usually a Saturday late show, Bargain Mondays, Tuesday discounts for Hackney Library Card holders, and regular Parents and Babies screenings.

As a charity, the cinema undertakes cultural outreach through cut-price tickets for the children's and community screenings, schools events, and a monthly classic matinee for over-60s.

[2][3][5][6][7][8] The building was originally an auctioneer's shop, converted into the Kingsland Palace in 1909 by owner Clara Ludski, a second-generation Jewish immigrant.

Its success led to properties either side being bought up, and the architect George Coles was commissioned to design a new single-screen picturehouse.

[1] F E Bromige achieved a remarkable sense of rhythm and movement through simple means in his few cinemas, all in North London, and he has emerged as a specialist cinema architect of rare originality.The Classic sustained bomb blast damage during the Blitz in 1941 when a high explosive bomb fell across the street in Birkbeck Mews.

[11] In the early 1950s the cinema received a makeover with simplified signage and neon, in 1958 it became the Classic Cartoon Theatre, and in 1960 it became the Classic Continental showing foreign language films, and its next guise was as a Tatler Cinema Club in 1971 screening uncensored adult films with live striptease burlesque acts on stage.

The blue and pink Art Deco interior was restored in 1997, remaining faithful to Bromige's design, and the building became Grade II listed in 1999.

The bus stop outside the building was renamed as 'Rio Cinema' in 2012 after thousands of people successfully petitioned Transport for London.