Big-screen experience irreplaceable, PVR Cinemas head says as movie halls open across India

In an interview to ThePrint, PVR Cinemas Joint Managing Director Sanjeev Kumar Bijli talks about cinemas opening up after nearly 7 months and how the movie-watching experience will change.

PVR Cinemas Joint Managing Director Sanjeev Bijli | Photo: Manisha Mondal | ThePrint

New Delhi: Blockbuster movies will incentivise customers to watch them in cinema halls because the experience of watching a movie on a big screen is irreplaceable, said PVR Cinemas’ Joint Managing Director Sanjeev Kumar Bijli.

In an interview to ThePrint, Bijli said, “In our business, new content is extremely important. The blockbuster films incentivise consumers to come and watch a movie.”

Cinema halls across the country are set to reopen on 15 October, after being shut for a period of nearly seven months due to the Covid-19 pandemic. States like Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Rajasthan, however, have decided to not open movie halls.

Film industries are one of the worst-affected sectors by the pandemic across the world. All of them, including Bollywood, practically came to a standstill in India, after a nationwide lockdown was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in March to arrest the spread of Covid-19.

In September, the Multiplex Association of India, Producers Guild of India and other associations wrote a letter to the Modi government, asking them to re-open movie halls.

They noted that the cinema exhibition industry had run into an “extremely adverse and hostile situation” due to the pandemic, adding that the industry would have lost up to Rs 9,000 crore during the six months under lockdown.

‘Losses have been massive’

Bijli, on his part, is optimistic that cinema halls will recover from the massive losses incurred. “It is only a matter of time till we bounce back,” he said.

However, he does note that the industry was the last to open up after the lockdown restrictions were lifted.

“We were the first to shut and now are the last to open and being in the business and having run it, I feel that we may have been short changed a bit. And could have opened earlier,” said Bijli.

He added that by pure mathematical standards, the situation in the past few months had been grim and the losses were massive as there were salaries, rentals as well as fixed costs to pay, with no incoming revenue.

PVR Cinemas was established in 1997 and owns a network of 845 screens, over 176 properties in 71 cities in both India and Sri Lanka.

The company had 12,000 workers (both contractual and permanent staff) prior to the lockdown, however, now the force has been reduced to 7,000 workers, explained Bijli. Many of the people who were let go were contractual workers, he noted

Those occupying managerial positions also took a 50 per cent salary cut to meet the expenses.

According to Bijli, both multiplexes and single-screen cinema suffered massive losses due to the pandemic. While he admitted that by virtue of size, number of screens, cities, employees and fixed costs, the losses could be higher for multiplexes, but single screens in their own capacity had to bear the brunt as well.

“Shutting any business will have a detrimental impact, irrespective of the size,” he said.

Changed movie experience

Excited about the business restarting, Bijli said that he was happy with the rules put in place by the home ministry to ensure protection against Covid-19.

On 30 September, the home ministry had said that cinema halls will be allowed to operate at only 50 per cent capacity. “Which is much better than many other countries in the world,” said Bijli.

Furthermore, according to the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on 6 October, face masks and thermal screening will be mandatory at all cinema halls. Only packaged food will be served inside the hall and show timings will also be staggered.

“The protocols are very doable but still strict,” the PVR chief noted.

He explained that to ensure complete safety, the cinema halls will be sanitised after each show and there will be as much contactless transaction as possible — from purchase of movie tickets to food and beverages.

“However, what will bring people back to the theatres is content,” said Bijli.

He said that cinemas were especially banking on the Ranveer Singh-starrer 83, a movie on the Indian Cricket team’s first World Cup win in 1983 that will release around Christmas, and the Akshay Kumar-starrer Sooryavanshi, which is set for a 2021 release.

There are also many regional Tamil and Bengali movies, which are ready for release. “In India, we are lucky that we have a vast variety of films and we are not dependent on any one type of language or content. Tamil, Bengali and Punjabi movies are lined up waiting for theatres to open up.”

Long-term structural changes 

Bijli talked about how the structural changes, which the pandemic has brought about, can be seen in two parts. One will be a pre-vaccine structure while the other will be post-vaccine behaviour.

In the pre-vaccine period, he explained, there will be a level of caution and apprehension, with children and elderly people not allowed into theatres.

And while there may not be a mad rush on a Friday to watch a movie, the longevity of movies in cinema halls would be more, he added.

However, Bijli believes that once the vaccine is developed and in circulation, things will go back to normal with no major changes.

“Movie-watching business has been around for years. And while technology has changed, comfort levels have changed, F&B (food and beverages) has changed and how we make movies has changed. The concept of watching a movie is pretty much still the same,” he said.

“We are very resilient. We have been through many disruptions but have always bounced back. Movie watching is something which has stayed with us for more than 100 years, despite the onslaught of OTT (over-the-top platforms) and other forms of entertainment. We will brave this as well,” Bijli added.