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SOCIETY AND TRENDS: MULTIPLEXES
LEISURE STOREYS
Cinemas, hotels, game arcades all rolled into one. Multiplexes
are the new Meccas of unending pleasure.
By Uday Mahurkar and Anna M.M. Vetticad
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Ahmedabad
It's the complete cinematic and entertainment experience being offered
by multiplexes like Fun Republic that is drawing the crowds; it's
the same at PVR Naraina-4 in Delhi (below)
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It's 9 p.m. in Pune
and a steady stream of Cielos and Fords is rumbling into the basement
of what looks like a giant block of multi-flavoured ice cream. The marquee
highlights Lagaan, Tum Bin, Dil Chahta Hai and Pearl Harbor. Teenyboppers
with gelled hair are ushered into the glass-bricked atrium before being
swished away in an escalator to the four movie halls of City Pride.
In Ahmedabad, 23-year-old Deep Shah is throwing
a birthday bash for his dozen or so friends. In a six-hour orgy of fun,
they have taken in a movie, indulged in a flurry of shopping, played video
games and, of course, had a sumptuous meal-all at Fun Republic, two-month-old,
four-storeyed entertainment complex in the city.
These are new-age devotees come to pay obeisance
at their temples of fun. The one-stop shops that promise entertainment
in sinful bouts for every age and taste ... movies to watch, meals to
eat, books to browse through, Levi's to buy and bowling to enjoy. No longer
pursuits devouring days and mileage, you can slurp them all in hours at
multiplexes. While cinema halls may have been the pivots around which
the phenomenon has sprung up, multiplexes now offer fantasy on a scale
surpassing the celluloid.
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Pune
With four cinema halls, pool table and games for children, City
Pride has redefined enterrtainment in this conservativ city. An
art gallery and a food court with a capacity of 500 are going to
be added to the multiplex presently.
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"There's nothing more you can ask for in
terms of modern entertainment," says Chintan Kashi, 27, an Ahmedabad
businessman and a regular at City Pulse, which was built in 1999 and now
competes with four others in the city. Cast in the Indian mould, City
Pulse boasts an amphitheatre for folk shows, a hall for classical music
programmes, a food court, an art gallery, a card shop, besides, of course,
three cinema halls. Of these, the hall with a 560-seat capacity, in an
area that could have accommodated 1,200, is the biggest in the country.
Says movie mogul Subhash Ghai, among 30 Bollywood celebrities to have
already visited the complex: "For filmmakers like me, this is almost
a temple."
In sharp contrast to City Pulse, is R-World
with an out and out western touch: steel-plated pillars in a 22,000-sq
ft granite-based foyer dotted with backlit vinyl posters of films. Spread
over 12 acres and designed by Mumbai-based architect and interiors man
Sanjay Puri, R-World has over two dozen games, a go-karting track, six-lane
bowling alley, cybercafe and restaurants. Says Pradip Chudasama, one of
the three brothers who set up the Rs 22-crore complex: "We were inspired
by the famous Trocedero entertainment mall in London. Today our quality
and variety approximate the mall."
The high, global standards may have something
to do with the swarming crowds. Rahul Dev, an executive with a medical
equipment importing firm, swears City Pride-Maharashtra's first multiplex
that opened in conservative Pune earlier this year-could be mistaken for
Warner Village, a multiplex in London's Leicester Square. "This is
one reason I've decided to go out with friends after five years,"
he says. The Rs 11-crore multiplex does ensure an unforgettable movie
experience: over Rs 40 lakh has been spent in importing German sound and
light projection systems for each of the four screens. Even the vacuum
cleaners that noiselessly suck popcorn off the plush indigo carpeted floors
are imported. "Multiplexes are an expensive business, but then world-class
movies deserve world-class theatres," reasons owner Prakash Chaphalkar.
City Pulse's owner Ashok Purohit, agrees: "Ambience
makes all the difference. The landscape within the complex is itself worth
the Rs 100 that one pays for seeing a movie here." At R-World, the
tickets range from Rs 130 per person for an executive class ticket on
Sundays to Rs 80 for the ordinary class on weekdays. Says Chudasama: "Our
aim is to provide five-star entertainment at affordable rates to the people
for whom such entertainment is unthinkable."
On the flip side, Rs 150 for a movie at PVR
Anupam-4-one of the two multiplexes of PVR Cinemas in Delhi, with a third
set to be launched this month and others coming up in Gurgaon, Bangalore
and Mumbai-may seem a bit steep, but as model Manpreet Brar Wallia says,
"Consumers are willing to pay a premium for convenience." High
comfort levels, ambience and good crowds make addicts of people like 24-year-old
Anshu Agarwal. "Once you see a movie at PVR, you can't go anywhere
else," she says. Safety is another consideration. Here Agarwal doesn't
have to jostle with a bunch of roadside Romeos for her turn at the ticket
counter. Little wonder then that at PVR Anupam-4, on a weekday with 90
per cent occupancy which means about 4,000 people see a movie, an average
of 1,500 people have to be turned back.
"People shouldn't just enjoy a movie but
also the experience of watching it," says Ajjay Bijli, managing director
of PVR Cinemas. The experience includes having nachos and soft drinks
in hygienic surroundings at a food stall with computerised counters and
pleasant service. It's the "complete cinema and entertainment experience"
that draws people, affirms Saurabh Saxena, manager of PVR Naraina-4.
Since last December, Chennai too has begun to
offer "complete entertainment" with its Mayajal, a multiplex
that houses six theatres with surround sound facility, a shopping complex,
video-game centre, bowling alley, beauty parlour, food court and even
a discotheque.
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