Since Eileen Wolcott bought Vashon Theatre in 2003, she has upgraded almost everything about the landmark space, giving it a fresh lease on life with new seats, a new sound system, improvements to the concessions area and even a new 35mm projector and platter system.

But now, Wolcott is about to make the biggest alteration ever to the 64-year-old theater, due to what some are calling the most sweeping change in the movie business since talkies replaced silent pictures. She plans to install a state-of-the-art digital projection system at the theater over the course of the next year or so — a changeover that will cost her an estimated $80,000 by the time she is done.

“It’s a race against time. You have to do it, or you can’t go on,” Wolcott said.

The average moviegoer may not realize it, but cinema presentation in the United States and throughout the world is in the midst of a digital revolution, with motion picture studios and distributors quickly escalating the phase-out of 35mm print as a film format and requiring theaters to make costly conversions to large, specialized digital film projectors.

The pace of the conversion is quickening. According to an April article in The Los Angeles Times, about 800 to 900 new digital projection systems are being installed in movie theaters nationwide each month.

For movie studios, the perks of the change are obvious. Each 35mm print — reels that must be shipped in heavy film cans and then unpacked and spooled through platter or reel-to-reel projectors — costs studios about $1,000 each, while digital prints cost between $100 and $200 and can travel in a package the size of a cigar box.

For theater owners, the switch-over to digital will also have some rewards. Wolcott, for instance, says she hopes to pay less to obtain films and find them easier to schedule. The switch will also mean she’ll be able to offer 3D movies for the first time and take advantage of live-beamed events such as the Metropolitan Opera’s “Live in HD Season,” a series that might well be a revenue-grabber on Vashon.

But of course, these benefits for Wolcott and other theater operators come with no small amount of worry.

Adam Sekuler, the program director of Northwest Film Forum, an art house in Seattle’s Capitol Hill, said even cinematheques that show classic films are being forced to convert to the new system.

“In the next three to five years, it’s looking like everyone will have no choice,” Sekuler said. “This is the way film studios have decided to start distributing their work. Almost nobody is making new 35mm prints.”

Sekuler said he’s concerned about how the new systems will or won’t work.

Gone will be the day, he noted, when an intrepid projectionist will be able to splice together a broken reel of film or swap out a part in a balky projector.

“With 35mm, you’re less likely to run into the kind of technical problems you have with these digital formats,” he said. “As anyone who has a home Blu-ray system knows, there is nothing tangible running through the machine that you can identify when something goes wrong. It’s information passing through a wire. I’ve heard of problems (with digital projection systems) at such large and well-funded places as the Toronto Film Festival.”

Wolcott is also worried about technical snafus.

“The new projector is a huge, big square thing, and it plays Blu-rays inside of it,” she said. “My biggest fear is that we’re on Vashon Island, and it takes time and it is expensive to get techs over here. I’m worried about day-to-day maintenance and making sure the show goes on.”

And then, of course, there is the $80,000 price tag for the new system.

For Wolcott, who can get by operating the theater on a break-even status only because her husband Gordon has kept his day job as a fire chief in West Seattle, the huge cost comes on the heels of her efforts to recover from a faltering economy that has adversely affected attendance and a devastating burglary at the theater in 2009.

Insurance covered only a fraction of the $16,000 cost to replace everything that was stolen, but luckily, some of that money was raised when a group of Islanders stepped up to present Vashon FilmAid, a festival of movies that all had a Vashon connection.

Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan, who frequently vacations on Vashon, also came to town last October to present a benefit screening of “The Godfather” at the theater. Now, in an effort to support Vashon’s small movie house again, Turan is returning to the Island this Saturday for a benefit screening of “The Godfather: Part II.”

Funds raised at the event, hosted by the nonprofit Vashon Film Society, will be earmarked for purchasing a $5,000 new screen for the theater — an important step in the conversion process.

Wolcott said she is excited to welcome Turan back to the Vashon Theatre.

“It is so fun to listen to a person like Kenneth, who is so passionate about movies, talk about what he loves so much,” she said.

Wolcott also hopes Islanders will turn out to show their own passion for Vashon’s old movie house. “If I filled 400 seats, we could just go out the next day and buy our new screen,” she said.

Wolcott, meanwhile, said she won’t junk her old-fashioned platter projector at the theater.

“We’ll always have our other projectors,” she said. “We like to play film, and film will still exist out there. I worked really hard for two years without pay to buy the current projector and platter system, and I’m attached to it.”

See a classic film and support Vashon Theatre

Islanders can support the first phase of the digital changeover of Vashon Theatre by attending a benefit screening of “The Godfather: Part II,” hosted by Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan, at 7 p.m. Saturday. The theater will open for beer and wine sales a half hour prior to the screening. Turan will introduce the film and lead a question-and-answer session afterward. Tickets cost $12 general, $11 for kids and seniors, and $10 for Vashon Film Society members.