A Theater Habit


Last day I booked three tickets for the largely hyped Hollywood space drama film “Gravity” at an INOX Cinema (formerly FAME Cinemas) through an online portal. Not only was the 3D excellent, but the film also was worth the price. I rated it 10/10 here! And guess what, the 3D goggles cost me nothing. Everything was brilliant, until the film hit an abrupt interval…

The 90 minute science-fiction film has to be seen in a single stretch for two reasons: one, it is made so & two, the enjoyment factor. The screenplay requires you to focus on the story in a single setting. Introducing an abrupt, yes you heard right, an abrupt interval just so the patrons go and burn a hole in their wallets purchasing heavily priced popcorn and tiny samosas is the modern-day malevolent technique these theater owners adopt. At least they could find a pre-planned apt seek position for the interval! And what’s worse, the so-called interval goes for 20 minutes playing ridiculous commercials of beauty products and stuffs. Imagine the latest Idea cellular 121 advert on big screen! Disgusting! It took me around ten minutes to get into the flow of the film after it resumed. Few minutes later, credit roll diminished my whole experience. I had planned to watch it once more, but now I think I will wait for the rentals!

The level of exasperation cannot be expressed in words, although my friends could write a book about that. I would understand if during a movie like “3 Idiots,” you give me an interval; the Indian makers also include the word starting with an “i” for being friendly, but when short movies are screened, theaters should act accordingly. They need to generate revenue, all right but what about the ultimate purpose of theaters? It gets obliterated completely. But the people behind this business know that aficionados will return to catch the next week’s big release.

A solution can be made, but it will only materialize if like-minded people start building theaters. Or is there any way that we can coax these theater owners to shun the “i” word? Is there?


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