Cambodia: Cinemas attract 55,000 customers in first week of re-opening to public

• Aug 24, 2020

Cinemas are now re-open and pulling back revenue after five months of being shut down because of the Novel Coronavirus. Around 55,000 people returned to the big screens around Cambodia in the first week alone, still a fraction of previous audiences.

After five long months of closures, silver screens re-opened across the Kingdom and saw film buffs flocking to watch a movie. Most films playing were either new Asian titles or re-releases of those from before cinemas were closed.

The Coronavirus outbreak of 2020 has caused much change in everyone’s lives. That unquestionably includes the movie industry. Film studios were forced to push back all of the expected big movie hits starting in mid-March as theatres shut down worldwide.

A few of those movies found their way to digital film stores and streaming services. However, the vast majority will still be played in theatres eventually.

Big Hollywood titles such as Mulan, The King’s Man and Wonder Woman have been pushed back as far as October because of the pandemic.

One of the biggest movies to be released is Disney’s Mulan, but Disney is doing something slightly different. They are releasing it on Disney Plus (Disney’s version of Netflix.)

However, they will still release Mulan to movie theatres in certain countries, including Cambodia (release date Sept 4) because Disney Plus is not supported in them.

Karen Castaneda, general manager of Major Cineplex, said: “These releases being delayed will of course affect our business, but we do expect that when they are finally released the revenue from these movies will be the same. We need to wait to hear from the movie distributors on when we can release titles. it is all a waiting game.”

Although these Hollywood hits have been held back, many big Asian titles such as Peninsula, Necromancer and Reva Guna Guna helped pull back 55,000 people to the cinemas across the Kingdom. Furthermore, almost all customers have been happy enough to watch a movie with all of the new COVID-19 precautions in place. All of Cambodia’s theatres were allowed to resume business in an orderly manner, with the effective implementation of prevention and control measures set up by the Ministry of Health (MoH).

These measures include social distancing markers throughout the cinema where people will queue, keeping social distancing in the venues through a limited 50 percent capacity, temperature checks at entrances, sanitisation stations, the wearing of safety masks and safety screens between ticket sellers and customers.

Ny Daranornn, marketing manager for Legend Cinema, said: “Not all of our customers are aware of the safety procedures. They enter our cinema and are quite surprised at all of the measures in place. Although when they arrive they cooperate with us and wear masks and follow our guidelines. However, some customers expect to sit in groups of five and because of seats being blocked for social distancing, this is not possible.”

With cinemas at 50 percent capacity it means ticket sales are down so cinemas are now trying to claw back some of that revenue by offering special offers for food and beverages. One of the movie theatre groups is offering buy-one-get-one-free on popcorn and even offering free popcorn and drinks to medical staff when showing an identification card. Although cinemas are not bringing in as much money as before, they are finally open and bringing back custom.

With many big titles still ahead, there is light at the end of the tunnel for one of Cambodia’s biggest family-friendly nights out.

Source: https://www.khmertimeskh.com/50756241/cinemas-attract-55000-customers-in-first-week-of-re-opening-to-public/