Amid night curfew, cinemas cancel evening shows in Delhi

On Tuesday, evening

shows

of

films

such as Godzilla Vs Kong, Nomadland, Roohi and more, which are currently running in cinemas in Delhi were cancelled due to a night curfew being imposed in the city. With rising COVID-19 cases, on Tuesday, the Delhi government decided to impose a night curfew from 10pm to 5am till April 30.

'All shows post 6-6:30 pm were cancelled'The decision came as a sudden blow to cinemas in the capital, who had to immediately cancel all evening and night shows. A staffer at a multiplex told us, "Though the curfew is from 10pm, we have cancelled all shows post 7.30pm. Some cinemas have the last show at 4pm while others have it between 5.30pm-6pm." And what about those who already booked their tickets? "We will refund the ticket amount," he said.
A cinema owner said, "Though evening and night shows in Delhi have been cancelled, show schedules in Gurgaon and Noida remain unchanged. We started receiving calls post the curfew announcement, and some moviegoers even cancelled their 4pm-5pm tickets. There were also cancellations from moviegoers from Delhi in these cities. After Delhi's night curfew, we are expecting footfalls to decline in all three cities."

Kunal Sawhney, Senior VP, Operations and F&B,

Carnival Cinemas

said, "There was a good hike in footfall in past few weeks. Night curfew in Delhi will affect around 25-30% of our business as the last show will now be at 6pm instead of 11pm or so. Mostly families come for night shows and since ticket prices are different from the rest of the day, they spend a little more on F&B as well. A curfew also impacts the psyche of people in general."

Staff members of cinema ticket booking websites said that since their role is of an aggregator, it's the cinemas that'll take a decision on the shows and they will follow the standard cancellation procedure.

Oscar-nominated films are scheduled to release in April
Currently, a few Oscar-nominated films such as Nomadland and Judas And The Black Messiah are running in cinemas, and at multiple venues, the only shows of these films were cancelled. Another cinema owner says, "We were not expecting a night curfew in Delhi as there were no discussions around it, so evening shows were scheduled for Oscar-nominated films, which were immediately cancelled after the curfew announcement. This month, a number of Oscar-nominated films are scheduled to be released, and we were hoping that cinegoers who didn't visit cinemas last year will now come. Even in the absence of

Bollywood

films, these films would have got some footfalls."

Other Oscar-nominated films such as Minari and The

Father

are scheduled to be released this month, however, now due to a shutdown in Maharashtra and the night curfew in Delhi, cinemas are yet to decide whether these will be released with limited shows in NCR or not.