Goodbye 70mm!

I returned from Mumbai last week for a few days. Driving home to Secunderabad, I was on my usual route: Shamshabad-Masab Tank-Banjara Hills-Punjagutta-Begumpet-SP Road-Paradise...

I'm sure you know that familiar feeling of returning to your hometown. When everything falls back into place, the familiar sights and sounds (smells too these days!!), the roads, the landmarks, the office complexes, shopping malls. I'm also sure you know that unsettling feeling when there's something missing and you can't point it out until later. And then, the realisation dawns on you - "Oh!! That's not there anymore!!"

I travel quite a bit. Although I'm based in Mumbai now, I keep returning to Hyderabad once every week for shows or recordings or other work. I'm quite used to that pattern of the city as it emerges ahead when I'm driving. Last week, I felt something was missing on the way. My heart sunk when I realised they had demolished Anand Theater, a prominent landmark on SP Road.

ANAND THEATRE

It hurt to see another huge landmark of my growing up days, now lie in a pile of smashed concrete. I didn't event realise the expanse of the Anand Theater compound until I saw it without the building in between. Of course, the real estate value of such a prime piece of land would be astronomical. History books have always paved the way for accounting ledgers as the world moves on.

The visual took me back to another day of mourning, back in 2007 when they started demolishing Sangeet Theater! I was one of the mourners, at the gates, that very day. Lots of people from all over the city (mostly Secunderabad) had assembled there to bid a tearful farewell to Sangeet.

We all had one common bond. We were all movie-buffs. Cinema lovers of all ages who'd congregate every week, staring wide-eyed at the magic unfolding on that huge canvas stretched out at one end of a massive dark hall. We'd whistle, laugh, cry, scream and clap together as familiar Hollywood faces would walk onto the screen and juice out our emotions.

Sangeet primarily played English cinema. Those were the days of expensive videos cassettes (VCRs). No internet. No torrents. No access to cinema, except movie-halls. 

Sangeet Theater, with its impressive semi-circular facade attached to a tall vertical structure, was like a factory. 

SANGEET THEATRE

When I look back, I still can't figure out how the parking attendants managed to fit in hundreds of Cycles, Mopeds, Scooters, Bullets, Yamahas, Splendours, Suzuki Samurais, Fiats, Ambassadors and Maruti 800s!! If you relate to all these vehicles, you know what I'm talking about. 

In my college days, the rates were 5 rupees for a two-wheeler parking and 10 rupees for a car. And the rates weren't on a per-hour basis! Often we'd see cruise-ships float in... Contessa Classics, Premier Padminis and the occasional Mercedes. Sangeet was a weekly pilgrimage for all.

Somehow, everyone entered through that one double-gate and went out the same way, jammed to the teeth, but like clockwork. We'd park and rush to a tiny little grilled window. In a dim-lit tiny room behind that window, sat a man with three booklets. Stall (10rs), Upper Stall (20rs) and Balcony (30rs). 

Stall was a few rows right below the screen. Behind that was Upper Stall. A staircase leading to the first floor, making us feel elite, was the huge Balcony.

The ticket seller would take our cash, rip out cheap paper tickets (yellow/pink/blue/green), mark the seating chart on his table, write our seat numbers and give those little ticket slips to us. Couples would request the corner seats... families would ask for the top rows and college-groups would ask for the bottom row of the balcony, so we could stretch out our legs and rest them on the railing, just above the Upper Stall.

Couches and recliners?? Haha!!

And when that dreaded board - "Sold Out" would be seen hanging over a closed window, we'd scan the assembled crowd, trying to spot some people moving stealthily all over the place. The black-ticket walas!! We'd go up to them, negotiate a deal and buy a ticket for up to three times its price, more depending on demand!!

Often, the group would be scattered across the hall. But hey! "We got the tickets, didn't we?!! Let's meet in the interval ok?" 

Tickets in hand... we'd head to grab some Cola, Gold-Spot or Chai. Couples would disappear into a little bakery in the compound, whispering sweet-nothings over cola and egg-puffs. Smokers would head to the essential pan-dabba, by the wall, inside the gate, where they'd quickly puff up a Wills Navy Cut, Gold-Flake or Charminar.

Five times a day the bell would ring, starting at 9:00am. Showtimes usually 9am, 12noon, 3pm, 6pm and 9pm, depending on the movie played. Like disciplined factory workers, we'd queue up and enter the hallowed chambers, ready to be entertained!

Interval...!!

Menu:

Chai / Coffee
Cola / Gold Spot
Limca / Citra

Chips Packet
Popcorn
Veg Sandwich
Veg Puff / Egg Puff
Alu Samosa / Chhota Samosa
Mirchi Bhajji

Ice Cream (Chocobar, Mango Duet, Vanilla/ Strawberry Cup)

They'd quickly wrap the eats in square-cut pieces of newspaper, hand us the drinks ... and balancing 17 items between two hands, two elbows and 32 teeth, we'd make our way back to the seat. (God help you if your girlfriend wanted something else after the acrobatics). The bell would ring again, signalling the second half. Rush Rush Rush!!!!

Chomping and sipping away through the second half of the film, we'd go through the run of emotions again! The lovebirds holding hands tight over a narrow wooden armrest when Tom Cruise said "You Complete Me" in Jerry Maguire, groups of guys whistling away at Sharon Stone uncrossing her legs in Basic Instinct, and families bonding together over the Sound of Music. Those were the days!!

Sangeet Theater was demolished in 2008.

Razed to the ground. Taking with it, memories of so many lives intertwined with every reel that ever ran through its projectors.

 Sangeet was witness to first dates, bunked college days, awkward couples on their first movie outing after an arranged marriage, boys hoping to some day date the girl smiling a few seats away, women checking out charming army officers on their day off, kids ecstatic at finally being able to watch The Lion King, middle-aged couples spending a quiet evening with each other at a romantic film... ... ... 

These weren't mere movie-halls. They were the foundations of the cinema lover I am.. along with thousands of other people. They were our classrooms, our textbooks and our exam centres. We'd celebrate cinema there every Friday... and almost every other day of the week.

The story above repeated itself every single day, for decades, across single-screen theaters around the country. Each one has its own story, it's own chunk of history, in its own language!

Anand Theater was Sangeet's Hindi-speaking cousin in Secunderabad. It did play a lot of English as well, but my most memorable film there was Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge. I'd watched it almost 25 times there... often carrying a mandolin with me, just to show off!!

Two landmarks of Secunderabad that I grew up around, have now vanished, along with so many others around the city... dismissed to being chapters on websites reminiscing the days that were.

 Hyderabad had Skyline and Sterling, now converted to residential complexes, the grand old Maheshwari-Parmeshwari theaters (now Big Bazaar), Nataraj (now a furniture store). Some still celebrate glorious openings of regional cinema. Other single-screens are being converted to multiplexes.

But that era is fading away. That glorious age when stars became superstars based on single-screen success!

Today's stardom is like today's fast food... quickly prepared, tastes amazing at the first bite, but isn't the real deal (or meal..!).


Somehow, that samosa doesn't taste the same in a Multiplex!