Series III Mobile Cinema
A Series III 109 station wagon travelling cinema: one of the long-wheelbase Land Rovers converted to carry projection equipment, loudspeakers and a large roof-mounted screen for educational film shows in African villages, run by colonial and development information services.
History
From the 1950s the information services of Britain's colonies and, later, development agencies ran mobile cinemas to reach villages with no electricity, showing health, agriculture and news films from a vehicle that carried everything needed: a 16 mm projector, a generator, horn loudspeakers and a screen that erected on the roof. Long-wheelbase Land Rovers were the natural choice because they could reach the villages in the first place, and Rover's special projects file records the travelling cinema conversion among them. The archive photograph shows a Series III 109 station wagon with its screen raised on the roof rack, two horn speakers mounted either side and the projectionist beside the film cans, reels, projector and generator laid out on the ground. Numbers built and the exact operators are not stated in the source.
The registry's model carries the projection kit of its Series I Cintec Cineroma — roof rack, roof-mounted screen, twin horn loudspeakers, projector, film cans and generator — on a Series III 109 station wagon in stone, as the queue asks; the screen can be released as cargo.
Imagery
Registry record
- Manufacturer
- Land Rover (Series III 109 station wagon); cinema equipment fit by an unrecorded converter
- Manufactured
- Series III era, 1970s (dates not stated in the source)
- Modifier / coachbuilder
- Unrecorded (mobile cinema conversion)
- Engine type
- Rover 2.25 L four-cylinder petrol or diesel (Series III 109; not stated in the source)
- Production run
- Unknown — a small batch of long-wheelbase conversions
- Country of origin
- United Kingdom
- Status
- unknown
Catalogue data
- Record kind
- Named model
- Model line
- Series III
- Wheels
- 4
- Nominal wheelbase
- 109″
Catalogue fields describe the vehicle's structure and body as this registry records it. They are not certified factory measurements, and no performance figures are published here.
Sources & citations
Researched sources
- Land Rover special projects — travelling cinema (winwaed.com Land Rover history) ↗ — winwaed.com (accessed 2026-09-11)
Catalogue references
- https://www.winwaed.com/landy/history/special_projects.php https://www.winwaed.com/landy/history/special_projects.php ↗
Registry record updated 2026-09-11T11:18:27.087Z · status: researched