The show goes on in plush suburban halls

This revelation has changed the picture dramatically. Kanakia builders set the ball rolling early this year when they inaugurated Cinemax, a 650-seater movie hall in Goregaon.

“They had bought over Samrat cinema (the earlier, bigger avataar of Cinemax) to build a commercial complex. But according to a state governmentdirective, a developer can now use a theatre for commercial construction, provided he builds a smaller movie hall with a seating capacity equivalent to about 40 per cent of the original hall,” says distributor and exhibitor Shyam Shroff of Shringar Films.

After Cinemax, the same developers converted Sona cinema in Kandivli into Cinestar, with a seating capacity of just over 200. “Today, Cinemax is giving all other suburban theatres a run for their money, because every distributor wants to release his film there,” says Mehra.

New movie halls are also coming up. Movie Time opened at Malad just a few days ago.

“We have brought in the latest technologies in the audio-visual department, along with best viewing comfort — carpeted floors, plush seats and good air-conditioning,” says Lalit Kapoor, the man behind Movie Time.

“Throw in ample parking facility, drive-in ticket windows, telephone and internet booking, and the audiences are bound to come flocking to your theatre,” says Kapoor.

“It’s apleasure to sit on fabulous cushioned chairs and watch a good film in the cool comfort of an auditorium without any disturbance from the audience,” says Maya Mittal, who watched Titanic at Movie Time.

Also, smaller theatres are construed as supreme examples of business sense today. “People now want to go to theatres where they get value for money. And smaller theatres with a uniform ticket rate can draw in an audience that’s willing to shell out as much as Rs 70 per ticket,” says Mehra.

Kapoor adds, “Today, it’s no longer viable to have 1000 or 2000 seats in a theatre, because it won’t be possible to run a movie for long with so many seats. We have eliminated the concept of front and rear stalls and charge a flat rate for all seats,” says Kapoor. Among the old theatres, Bandra Talkies, New Talkies, Darpan, Roopam and Apsara are being revived, and Aurora, Chandan and Novelty have also poured in lakhs of rupees on renovation, air-conditioning and upgrading of the sound-system and projectors.“People are now travelling from places like Colaba and Peddar Road to Cinemax and Cinestar. So theatre owners in the city have been forced to pull up their socks and improve their premises. Otherwise, they’ll be forced to shut shop,” says Shroff.