The writer served as executive editor of The Express Tribune from 2009 to 2014
From March next year commercial movie theatres will start operating in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi government hopes that opening movie theaters will act as a catalyst for economic growth and diversification, creating new employment opportunities and providing Saudis with a greater range of entertainment options.
“This marks a watershed moment in the development of the cultural economy in the Kingdom,” said the Kingdom’s Minister of Culture and Information, Awwad Alawwad, as he spoke in detail about the commercial-cum-entertainment venture. The Saudi Ministry of Culture has also announced that it plans to have 300 cinemas with more than 2,000 screens by 2030.
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It was not immediately clear which movie genres will be shown, and whether men and women will be allowed to sit together. The Kingdom has already hosted mixed music concerts this year. Saudi Arabia watchers in the West and the US believe the Kingdom is likely to turn to regional cinema operators as movies need to be subtitled in Arabic and censored to remove scenes of nudity and of a sexual nature.
Novo Cinemas, based in the UAE, is already said to be considering the opportunity. Another UAE-based operator, VOX Cinemas, said in a statement it was looking forward to “working with the government to introduce VOX Cinemas’ world-class offering to Saudi Arabia in the months and years ahead.” Vue International, which operates in Europe and Taiwan, described the chance to open theatres in Saudi Arabia as a “significant opportunity.”
Under Vision 2030, Saudi Arabia plans to pump billions of dollars into entertainment projects and rev up its tourism sector. The government hopes that opening cinemas will contribute more than $24 billion to the economy and create thousands of jobs.
Saudi Arabia has already announced plans to build resorts on about 100 miles of the Red Sea’s sandy coastline and wants to open a Six Flags theme park by 2022. As his country experiences the early pangs of a cultural and economic transformation, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MBS) has vowed to destroy “extremist ideologies” in a bid to return to “a more moderate Islam.”
Speaking at the Future Investment Initiative conference in Riyadh recently, the crown prince said the moves will put the Kingdom in lockstep with many other nations as it seeks to transform its economy over the coming decades. He continued, “Saudi Arabia was not like this before ’79. The Kingdom and the entire region went through a revival after ’79... All we’re doing is going back to what we were: a moderate Islam that is open to all religions and to the world and to all traditions and people.”
MBS’s reference to 1979 was doubtless a mention to the tumultuous year for Saudi Arabia when Sunni fundamentalists had started challenging the authority of the Saudi monarchy. The monarchy responded by shoring up ties with the religious establishment and restoring many of its hardline stances. For instance, it shut down the few movie theatres in the Kingdom.
As luck would have it, this entertainment industry revival is happening in Saudi Arabia right when Pakistan’s movie industry is being resuscitated with some highly entertaining films having made significantly successful performance at the box office here and abroad.
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Of course, production-wise Pakistani movies are still too far below the creative, artistic and technological standards being adhered to by the US and European moviemakers. Adventure movies made on high-tech platforms like Star Wars with little bit censoring would become highly popular in Saudi Arabia to the exclusion of movies from countries like Pakistan and India. Still the high degree of cultural affinity that exists between our two countries and our moviemakers’ natural inclination to avoid nudity and scenes of sexual nature do provide the needed space to explore the possibility of marketing our movies in Saudi Arabia.
We could screen some selected movies like Na Maloom Afraad 1 and 2, Actor-in-Law, Bol, Khuda kay Liye and Verna, which are not only entertainers with social messages but also free of nudity and sex scenes, by way of forward publicity in KSA, especially for those who are in a position to take decisions on such matters.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 23rd, 2017.
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