Saturday, January 12, 2008

Movie Experience at 27/-

It's been one week of my leave, spent meticulously on sleep and food. But now it seemed that sleep was leaving me. Nights were especially difficult, I had to wait long before sleep came to me. The situation was deteriorating with every passing day, I had to do something to get sleep back in bed with me. I couldn't imagine the night without her. I needed to impress her, show her how far I can go to woo her back to my bed. And then I got the idea of going for a movie. At first it wouldn't be clear how could going to a movie get me my sleep back, but then it ain't a normal movie experience.
The nearest movie theater from my house is Payal Talkies only 13-15 km's away. There is another theater about 10 km away but as the rumors go it doesn't have an entry gate. The movie being shown at that time was 'Welcome'. So after a final resolution I decided to go for the afternoon show expecting a bit low turn up since the movie was going house full. It was Christmas, traffic was low so I finally managed to reach the place in about 25 minutes or so. As soon as I entered the premises of the theater, there was the line, multiple lines in fact. I was well before the show around 1 hour before hoping that the lines would be empty and I could be ahead in the line. Cursing everyone around I also joined the line. The counters were not opened as of now. I asked the guy in front of me when do they open, he said half an hour before the show, so half an hour wait. Then I noticed another line of ladies, their counter was open and they were given tickets. I was like what the ^&?#, and there were guys drooling over that line some for fun, some in the chance of getting their tickets from the ladies. Then half an hour before the show, the counter opened and suddenly instead of a straight line, the crow changed the formation into top of arrow kind. I remained in line, hoping that my chance would definitely come, slowly and slowly the line progressed. Finally, I was near the counter about 6-7 guys behind, when the line stopped moving and slowly it started dispersing. I was surprised as to what was happening, asked the guy in front of me who said that the counter is closed and they are not giving tickets anymore. The ladies line was still active and they were still getting their tickets. It was for the second time I was like what the &$#@. I was in a state of anger incapable of reasoning as to what to do next. Is that it? that's the end, this is what I came for so far. Crap! Then I noticed the guy, whom you usually see in such situations. The rate currently was "27 ka 50", 50 bucks still sounded cheap having shelled out 100,125,180 bucks for a movie in hyderabad. Still like an ideal indian I started bargaining, I quoted for 40 which he readily agreed to my surprise thereby making me give that wretched feeling that I should have said even lower. They guy told me to wait for a 2 minutes, he will get the tickets in the mean time. I wondered from where? but he was back in 1 min only with the ticket all crumbled, I gave him 40 bucks and went inside to enjoy the show.
Now these theaters are pretty different from the PVR, ImaX stuff. There's a huge screen or rather massive screen with the seating divided into ground and balcony. 15 bucks for the ground seats and 27 for the balcony. So I found my way upto the balcony. You don't have a seat number written on the ticket, find any empty place and just sit. Now the fun starts, having dutifully taken my seat I was taking a look around. People were coming in huge numbers, mostly young guys hardly any females. At that moment, a guy comes in with his gf (I presume) holding their hands together. All that was visible was their silhouette against the giant white screen. The whole theater got excited, and started yelling "Haath Chhod", "Haath Chhod". The guy released the hand immediately and the two started walking more closely. The movie started, one could hardly hear anything the introductory song being played. Everyone was yelling, cheering, whistling. It was deafening. Slowly the people cooled down, but there was this deafening noise everytime Katrina came onto screen, or Nana made some witty comment. There was a scene where Akshay moves his hand on Katrina's belly (Gosh!), the whole theater got excited again and there was uniform shout "Haath hata", "Haath hata". It was the second time that the mob had objections to the position of the guy's hand, it seems that the general people are really concerned about the guy's hand are (atleast in the company of a girl). Finally the movie ended and then there was the roar again from the mob.
Having watched the movie, I realized that no matter what movie you watch here you are going to enjoy every bit of it. After all it's the environment which really makes the time worthwhile.

ps : for those who are concerned whether I was able to get sleep in bed with me, yeah I was successful and we had a great night together.

pps : this isn't the first time I had gone to see the movie in that talkies, but had been one in a long time.