UK's no-frills cinema shows the way

LONDON: Here's a hot tip for Bollywood, as it struggles with years of declining ticket sales at home: Slash prices to the small change of 50 paise per ticket and fill cinema halls to overflowing. And in Britain and western Europe, sell your blockbusters to the world's first no-frills, low-price cinema, which opened on Friday and get a headstart on Hollywood's biggest players — Columbia Tristar, Warners, Universal Paramount, Fox and Disney.These may not be tips for Hindi filmdom's world dominance but Bollywood's finest may do worse than listen because they come exclusively from a man who pioneered no-frills air travel and now wants the world to throng his new, no-frills cinema halls. Multi-millionaire Stelios Haji-Ionannou, who describes himself as a "serial entrepreneur", knows all about adding up the small change. He's cut out the popcorn, coke and ice cream and offers film tickets for 20 pence each, just a fraction of the normal price in Britain. He told this paper that his new, no-frills cinema hall, in the small, soul-less British town of Milton Keynes near London, was a great concept for the big Indian family. Tickets are cheap, audiences are encouraged to bring their own samosas, onion bhajis or even peanuts Indian-style, "provided they don't make a mess". Bollywood's biggest producers can be confident they will pack cinema halls to overflowing, he said. It is a great concept for Bollywood to partner, the 35-year-old son of a Greek shipping magnate suggested, even as he complained that the Hindi film industry could be missing a trick by playing the Hollywood game of resisting low-price, no-frills cinema ticketing. Hollywood's biggest names have refused to give Easycinema its first-rung blockbusters in the first week of their release. "We've approached Bollywood distributors such as Eros, but they've been very slow to respond. So, we don't have any Bollywood films but we'd just love to have them, not only for diversity but because we think people would be interested to see them, especially if you sell them for 20p". And a parting piece of common-sense advice from the no-frills nabob is for Bollywood to bring down ticket prices in India to "fill up cinema halls... the ticket prices must surely be high relative to the purchasing power of the public. Bring them down". "The objective is for people to go to the movies, to make it more affordable," said Haji-Ionannou. He slammed the "tacit collusion" between snack-vendors and Hollywood and Bollywood to create "a common stance (which says) we don't tolerate discounting... this is anti-competitive". The new Easycinema, has no box office because tickets are booked on the internet or on the phone. Seven years ago, his Easyjet cut out the drinks, peanuts and hot airline meals and offered dirt-cheap, no-frills air travel.