The big red armchairs which creak a little, the whispers before the trailers … This environment which once seemed familiar to us, many savored it as for the first time on Wednesday, May 19, date of the second stage of deconfinement which included especially the reopening of terraces and cultural venues, including cinemas. At the Méga Castillet in Perpignan, at the back of one of the rooms, there is Nelly, a great cinephile who rushed into the dark rooms as soon as they reopened. “I breathe”, she breathes. “I was told the other day that I was going to lock myself up, well no I’m escaping! The cinema is kind of my life.”
“I don’t know if I missed the cinema but in any case I missed the cinema”, explains Nelly, citing French actress Annie Girardot at the Césars in 1996. “Anyway, I already came a week ago to put my nose under the glass, and one of the managers came down to tell me that they were going to reopen. It was planned, I already told my family ‘today don’t look for me, I’m at the movies’. “ The Perpignanaise is already at his second film of the day, and she intends to follow up with a third. “I will definitely be back tomorrow, and then the following days.” Suddenly, Nelly gives a little cry of surprise: “The session is about to begin! I’m not going to talk to you now, if you don’t mind …”
No food in the rooms
In the same room as Nelly, Aurélien, seated in the third row, is delighted to find all these sensations. “Even the introductory music of Jean Mineur had missed me, we will keep the ticket for History”, he has fun .. For this very special day, even non-moviegoers are in heaven. “I never go to the cinema, and yet I’m happy to go back there”, explains Noé, 19, who came to attend the screening of the Japanese cartoon “Demon Slayer”. “It is when we can no longer that we realize that it is actually good”, he explains.
– Bastien Munch
But cinemas have necessarily reopened with a very strict health protocol, like the one in May 2020, at the end of the first deconfinement. Masks are obviously compulsory in the rooms, which can only accommodate Maximum 35% of their capacity. The popcorn and drinks are also banned, which worries Andréa. “Cinema is popcorn, it’s not just watching movies”, she says. “A cinema without popcorn is not a real cinema. Otherwise you can stay at home watching Netflix, it’s the same.”
More enthusiasm than a year ago
The programming in any case is richer than during the first deconfinement in May 2020. Several films (“Farewell to idiots”, “Drunk”, “DNA”, “Rag boy”) are offered again, after having been showing sometimes only a few days before the reconfinement in November. “The first to enter this morning, they didn’t applaud but it wasn’t far”, smiles Frédéric Moya, director of the Mega Castillet in Perpignan. “It’s different compared to last year, because we come out of a much longer period of restrictions, almost seven months in all. I think the craze is more important, there is less fear. . ”
A very satisfying first day for Frédéric Moya since the Mega Castillet recorded twice as many admissions as when it reopened in May 2020.
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