How has the household influenced the habits of cinema-goers? Cinemas / Article will be reopened

Organized by the Ministry of Culture pilot projects film performers are also involved in the safe and economically justified resumption of activities in the cultural and entertainment sectors – on June 10, two film screenings will take place at the Forum Cinemas cinema “Kino Citadele” with the participation of spectators with Covid-19 certificates. Cinema representative Inese Rajeva reports that the staff is ready to receive spectators safely. Industry will follow the attendance statistics with great interest in the coming months to see if and how the pandemic has affected cinema-goers’ habits. –

Asked to tell how the time of the pandemic affected the operation of “Kino Citadele”, Inese Rajeva first returns to March 2020, when the cinema premises were closed for several months – spectators could only return to them in July.

Last summer, the visit was slower, and the film studios postponed the premieres of several expected films.

The operation of cinemas, as Rajeva points out, of course, depends very much on such study decisions. Performance was also partly affected by the epidemiological safety measures in place in the country at that time, in particular, the number of spectators was not allowed to exceed more than half of the total capacity of the medicine. During the periods when “Kino Citadele” was closed to visitors, 98% of the employees of this cinema were idle.

While the cinemas were closed, watching movies moved only to the small – home screens.

“I think the content of movies and series has been consumed more in the last year than ever before in human history.

As a fan of cinema, I am very pleased with this, because many films, which in the past might not have had such an opportunity to reach viewers, [tomēr] have arrived, both because there has been more free time to watch and because streaming platforms have developed rapidly. [..] Have cinema-goers lost without having this “cinema experience”? We will probably find out the answer in the next three to six months, when people will gradually return to the cinemas. Let’s see what the tendencies are – do they really lack this experience or have they changed their habits, ”Sergejs Timoņins, co-founder and director of the platform” Kino Kults “and the film project” Spektrs “, says in the Latvian Radio program” Kultūras rondo “. He adds that

watching movies in cinemas will not disappear anywhere, it will rather be a question of repertoire – what we choose to watch on the big screen and what on the small.

In addition to the already accumulated world cinema repertoire, such as “Oscar” films, “A” class film festival films, we will definitely welcome domestic cinema news in cinemas.

Starting from the implementation day of the pilot project – June 10 – Kino Citadele employees will have to make sure that every visitor has a valid Covid-19 certificate. The pilot project will allow us to draw conclusions about how many employees in the cinema will be needed each day to safely organize visitor flows.

“It simply came to our notice then. The interest is, and perhaps even greater, than we see in terms of the number of tickets sold – it must be remembered that, unfortunately, only a part of those interested goes to these screenings.

Of course, we would like to see everyone, ”Inese Rajeva.

Another important remark from “Kino Citadele”, although within the framework of the pilot project the hall may be full, the cinema has decided not to gather so many spectators together – one is left free between two seats. This decision was made because it is not yet known how safe the visitors themselves will feel.

In conclusion, Rajeva outlines the situation of cinema screening in Lithuania and Estonia: “Our neighbors work. They cater to any of the visitors [vien] capacity has been reduced. “

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