Bollywood films are everywhere now and posters appear on many high streets, but this was not imaginable ten years ago.
The Bollywood films first appeared in the cinema halls for mass viewing in around 1989. I remember Khalnayak being shown very late in the night at the local Odeon Cinema in East London. These would be shown as one-off shows in late-night viewings. Other than this, the Bollywood Films could only be seen on poor quality pirate VHS videos before those days.
Many entrepreneurs realised the potential and bought out some dilapidated and unused old cinema buildings. Being true businessmen, they forgot to invest in these buildings. A lick of paint on these buildings and they were ready to take in the public's money.
I have been to a few different such cinema halls to view the Bollywood offerings and have been mainly disappointed with the experience. You are greeted with a miserable looking building in
desperate need of a face-lift, extortionate entry-prices (compared to the mainstream cinemas), rude (maybe unintentional and typical
Asian customer service!) staff, smelly halls (old seats, which they forgot to change when the buildings were purchased!) - New Curzon in North London, take note. Majority of these places have poor sound systems. The interval time brings its own typical Asian experience i.e., stale popcorn, but also available are extortionately priced samosas. Time-keeping is unfortunately not our forte. If I get to the cinema on time, the film is bound to start later than advertised or if I get there a few minutes later than the advertised time, the film would have definitely started on time that day. Why does this always happen to me at Boleyn, East Ham?
During the film, the experience is like being at home. Whistling during the film, loud comments from the audience, constantly ringing mobile phones (do we forget to switch
them off or does it never occur to our brothers and sisters that their phone ring can spoil the intense cinematic experience for some of us?), people walking in and out of their seats during the performance and the list goes on!! The toilets are usually ill-equipped and finding
a soap and hand dryer would be a luxury (my earlier comment about investment applies!). One cinema which escapes most (not all!) of these criticisms is the Ilford Cinema in Ilford, Essex.
But despite all the above, we go to these cinemas to admire and adore the stars and starlets from Bollywood, cry and laugh at the antics of our very loved villians and character actors and come out of the cinema with an uplifted feeling due to the very nature of our Bollywood films!
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