[Reader-list] 2nd posting, mamta, theatres

[mamta mantri]

Well, apologies for the delay in second posting,
traveled to a couple of places in Madhya Pradesh and
Uttar Pradesh,,, will write about that later.
Anyways, I thought it would be better to take the
interviews of the Managers of the respective theatres,
to begin with. So I visited Mr. Suresh Gaglani, aged
65 years, manager at Super cinema. I will remember him
as the most co-operative person throughout. 

Nevertheless, when I reached Super, the film shown was
‘dehati babu’, which was running houseful since
Friday. There were two long queues of men who were
eager to see the film. When asked the reason for the
line, I came to know that the tickets had no seat
numbers on them. This was really surprising to me,
because we are not used to such a thing. Anyways, the
crowd was getting desperate and began to whistle and
shout,, very eager to get in to the best available
seats. They ran the moment the authorities let them
in. it was as if they were all trained like pets to
run to their destined location, definitely not without
using all abusive language. The crowd got
uncontrollable that the security guard (yes, they do
have one) had to use his lathi to control them. Inside
the auditorium, was the song ‘Dus’ and people had
settled happily, with mutual consent, for the film.

Mr. Suresh calls this theatre as “India-Pakistan
Border”, interestingly because on one side, i.e. from
Grant road Railway Station to Super cinema, Hindus,
mainly Gujratis, dominate. And from here onwards to JJ
flyover, is the Muslim dominated area. All theatres
thereon are owned by Muslims.

The theatre does good business during all festivals,
especially 10 days of Ganpati festival and the grand
Ramzan Eid. Apparently the Ramzan month is dreaded by
the entire film industry, because apparently, it is
only the Muslim masses (all classes here) who watch
films the most, as compared to the other communities.
In other words, cinema works because of Muslim
audience only (not just these places, but elsewhere
too). So Eid and the consecutive weeks are the best
times. At these times, the exhibitor becomes the king,
in the sense he decides the film and its rates. Other
times, it is the distributor who calls the shots.

What makes a hit film? He begins by quoting the story
line, which comprises of comedy, acting, emotions,
action, romance, good music(remember SAAJAN), all
these elements are a must in equal quantities.
However, when probed deeper, as to who decides whether
a film is hit or not,, he has a different thing to
say. He said that it is the distributor and the
producer who will decide if the film is a hit (he
cited the example of old films, “GOPI” and “MERA NAAM
JOKER”, where the latter flopped because of FEEDING).
The audience takes what is served to them after
reviews and ticket-black. He talks of categories like
“Fake” (that audience which does not have to pay for
the tickets) and “Real” (that 10% of audience which
genuinely buys tickets-both black and otherwise)
public. These tactics can make and mar a film
considerably.    

Then, I met Mr. Soli Arya, 67 years, owner and partner
of New Royal, who informed me about these: 

The area is known as “Play House”, the name coming
from a small building near Alfred cinema, where indoor
games like chess, billiards, cards etc were played, it
was a club like place, very elitist, and associated
with British. 

He narrated another incident when he met the police
commissioner long time ago who said, “All of you are
people of the dark. The darkness in your halls retains
the criminals of the city, allowing the crime rate to
reduce. Our department can relax for that much of
time.” Soli said, “Crime rate increased with decline
and closure of cinemas. Theatres are the only places
which engage not only good people, but bad people as
well.”  
    
The manager at Shalimar cinema, Mr. Salim, was cold to
me. However, certain statements made so much of sense.
Other things apart, when asked about the man-woman
ratio in terms of audience, he said that women do come
here, alone as well.  However, in any case, 99% of
cinema halls have men as the majority of audience.

According to him, none of the cinema halls will close
down, Taj cinema nearby, is broken to make a
multiplex, but the owners will nave to include cinema
halls sooner or later. These halls will be profitable,
because people will watch cinema as long as time
itself. 

When probed with so many questions, he commented, “TUM
KYA NASHTE MEIN KAJU, BADAM, PISHTA KHATI HO, KITNA
DIMAG CHALTAHAI?”(Do you have cashews and almonds for
your breakfast? Your brain is so sharp!!! I will take
it as a compliment. 

“How much are you going to get for this?” he asked?
“SAARI MEHNAT TO HUM KAR RAHE HAI, AUR HUMHE KYA
MILEGA?” (We are giving all the information, and what
will we get?)

thanks
mamta

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com