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Lack of cinemas thwarts local movies: Producer
Banda Acehâs Garuda Theater on Jl
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Banda Acehâs Garuda Theater on Jl. Imam Bonjol, shown before the 2004 tsunami forced its closure. The building has since reopened, although not as a movie theater. (Courtesy of Ian Photoworks) (Courtesy of Ian Photoworks)
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span class="inline inline-center">Banda Aceh's Garuda Theater on Jl. Imam Bonjol, shown before the 2004 tsunami forced its closure. The building has since reopened, although not as a movie theater. (Courtesy of Ian Photoworks)
A dearth of cinemas in Indonesia is among the obstacles to the flourishing of the country's movie industry, with the number of cinemas reaching only a fraction of the ideal, a producer has said.
According to UNESCO, there should be one cinema screen per 50,000 people. Currently, Indonesia has only 1,100 cinemas, a massive drop from 1990 when 6,700 cinemas existed, as result of a monopoly on movie distribution.
"Ideally, Indonesia should have 15,000 cinemas. Now is the right time to invest, as the movie distribution monopoly has been abolished and the government has relaxed foreign ownership in the industry," movie producer Chand Parwez Servia told thejakartapost.com in Jakarta on Wednesday.
Besides providing consumers with entertainment, he continued, a greater number of cinemas could help the local movie industry to grow.
In comparison, South Korea, with a population of 50 million people, one fifth of Indonesia's, has 7,000 cinemas. Moreover, Indonesia's cinemas are largely concentrated in big cities, Chand noted.
"The central and local governments must encourage the building of cinemas in smaller cities. Right now, initial investment is not too high," he continued.
He cited the biggest cinema franchise in Indonesia, XXI Cineplex, as an example. The company charges around 3 to 4 billion rupiah to build a cinema under its franchise. 'If we want to build a non-franchised cinema, it costs only 1 or 2 billion rupiah,' Chand said.
The digitalization era, he added, has made the business even cheaper. In the past, a projector might cost a billion rupiah, but now many Chinese-made digital projectors cost less than Rp 500 million each. A celluloid film that costs 10 to 12 million rupiah can be replaced with a hard disk that costs around Rp 500,000 for multiple usage.
Chand suggested three ways for local governments to boost the number of cinemas. First, direct involvement through regional-government-owned enterprises; second, partnering with local businessmen; third, facilitating foreign investors by removing the ban on 100 percent foreign ownership. (ags)
