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In the coastal region, there used to be a significant number of cinema-goers, leading to the presence of over 35 single-screen theaters alongside multiplexes. Over time, theaters began to close, and now only 12 remain.
Currently, the lack of good movies and the ease of watching new releases at home on OTT platforms have led to the decline of single-screen theaters.
Recently, the Vinayak Theater in Kundapur and Santosh Theater in Sullia have closed their doors. A few more theaters are also on the verge of closing under the pretext of repairs. A few years ago, there were around ten theaters within a 6-8 km radius of Mangaluru, including Amruth in Pandeshwar, Platinum in Falnir, New Chitra on Car Street, Srinivas, Central near State Bank, and Jyothi Talkies at Ambedkar Circle. All these have closed for various reasons.
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As single-screen theaters shut down one by one, there are now no single-screen theaters left in Sullia, Bantwal, and Puttur. In Belthangady, only Bharat remains, and in Moodbidri, Amarashree is under repair.
Currently, Mangaluru has Suchitra, Prabhat, Ramakanti, Roopavani; Udupi has Kalpana, Alankar, and Diana; Karkala has Radhika, Planet; Byndoor has Shankar; Surathkal has Nataraj; and Kasaragod has Krishna. However, these theaters are also struggling due to the lack of new movies.
Dearth of Coastalwood Movies
There was a time when 12 Tulu movies were released annually in the coastal region. This has changed, and only three Tulu movies, Mr. Madimaye, Gabbar Singh, and Balipe, have been released in the past five months. With even Tulu cinema failing to produce hits recently, theaters have no new movies to screen.
More Theaters Closing
Theaters such as Johnson in Kadaba, Preetam in Uppinangady, Sangeeta, Navarang, Mayur, Arun in Puttur, Jupiter in Bellare, Prakash in Sullia, Kavitha and Rajahamsa in Vitla, Sandhya in Ujire, Vinayak and Vijayalakshmi in Bantwal, Maruti in Kalladka, Panemangalore Talkies, Nakshatra in B.C. Road, Nelyadi, Vijay Talkies in Moodbidri, Manjunath Talkies in Kaikamba, Sanman and Jaihind Talkies in Karkala, Ashoka Talkies in Kinnigoli, Bhavani Shankar in Mulki, Navarang in Surathkal, Gurudev in Padubidri, Venkatesh Talkies in Kaup, Jayabharath Talkies in Brahmavar, Nanda Talkies in Saastana, and theaters in Siddapura, Basroor, Hebri, Koteshwara, Gangolli, Uppunda, Sri Krishna in Tokkottu, Shanti in Ullala, Geetanjali in Kundapura and Udupi, Poornima in Kundapura, Hillside in Manjeshwar, Ranjit in Uppala, Gopalakrishna in Kumble, and Geeta and Rupesh in Kasaragod have already closed.
From 1,400 to 200!
Karnataka once had over 1,400 single-screen theaters. Of these, 450 survived, and around 250 have closed in recent years for various reasons. Currently, only about 200 single-screen theaters remain.
“Earlier, there were no TVs or mobiles at home, so people used to come to theaters to watch movies. But now, with mobile phones and OTT platforms connecting to TVs at home, people can watch movies easily at home. Additionally, star actors release movies only once in 3-4 years, and new actors’ movies don’t run for long. Given this situation, people no longer come to single-screen theaters to watch movies. The 46-year-old Santosh Theater in Sullia had to be closed due to the lack of movies,” said Santosh, the proprietor of Santosh Cinema Theater in Sullia.
Translated from Kannada Article by Dinesh Ira