Pakistani celebrities are urging audiences to pay attention to alleged reports of cinemas shutting down at an alarming rate across the country.
‘Taxali Gate’ and ‘Kukri’ director Abu Aleeha addressed the situation in a lengthy Instagram post where he wrote that aside from playing Indian films, theatre owners must reduce the prices of film tickets.
“The cinema owners’ stance is stubborn: show Indian films or we will shut down cinemas. However, they refuse to halve ticket prices because they don’t want ordinary people in their air-conditioned halls.”
He went on to explain that in India, tickets for popular films like ‘Animal’ or ‘Jawan’ were reduced so that more audiences would attend cinemas to watch films. Abu Aleeha pointed out that had the same desired method been used to encourage audiences to watch Pakistani films like ‘Laal Kabootar’ or ‘Javed Iqbal’, cinemas would have seen an increase in their investment.
“Around the world, parallel cinema thrives on affordable tickets. In India, big-budget films like ‘Animal,’ ‘Chhava,’ ‘Jawan,’ and ‘Stree 2’ were shown with tickets as low as 199 rupees to maximize audience turnout. If Pakistani films like ‘Javed Iqbal,’ ‘Madari,’ ‘John,’ and ‘Laal Kabootar’ had 250-rupee tickets, they would have not only doubled their investment but also spurred the creation of dozens more similar films.”
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Actor and former musician Ahmed Ali Butt has also shared his take on the alarming rise of cinemas closing down across Pakistan. In an Instagram post, he said it was ironic that Pakistan was willing to play against India, but was not ready to stream their films in cinemas.
“We can play cricket against India but we won’t play their films! If you can watch their film online then why not in a cinema? Save your cinema!”
In another Instagram post on his stories, the ‘Punjab Nahi Jaungi’ actor stressed how important it was that Pakistani cinemas kept playing films from different parts of the world whether they were Bollywood, Hollywood or Korean films, in order to stay in business.
“Our cinema needs films Bollywood, Hollywood, Kollywood, Lollywood and so whatever,” Butt penned.
