Prometheus premieres at Atrium
Organising elaborate red carpet ceremonies is a stepping stone in celebrating film in Pakistan.
KARACHI:
The summer of 2012 has arrived in full swing and the list of major blockbusters slated for release during the season make it even more exciting. One of the most awaited of them all was legendary director Sir Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, yet another science fiction thriller from the man who reinvented the genre with the epic Blade Runner.
The film was premiered all over the world on June 7and opened for the public yesterday (June 8) with a number of advance bookings at local cinemas. In Pakistan, the film was premiered at the Atrium Cinemas and keeping up their tradition of celebrating all major releases, Mandviwalla Entertainment organised a red carpet ceremony before the film started at 11pm.
However, this time around, the red carpet wasn’t such a glittery affair with very few celebrities and only a handful of industry professionals gracing it. Actor Faisal Qureshi, host and radio jockey Mani and photographer Tapu Javeri to name a few gathered amongst many new and unnoticeable faces to witness a bunch of human beings venture into outer space to find answers to the most mindboggling question that mankind has ever confronted: who really made us and why? The film, which features Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce and Michael Fassbender, has some definite connections with the horrifying Alien which was released in 1979
In line with the theme of the film, the Atrium Cinema walkway was set up like a dark alley at the end of which you could see a huge replica of a humanoid — something we later on saw in the film as well. As you walked through the hallway, young boys clad in black flashed a bright, white light on you in an attempt to create an aura of mystery that comes in during an interaction with a supernatural power.
This build-up to the actual event highlights the new trend of organising elaborate red carpet ceremonies for major films releases. Such events not only help the whole industry gather and mingle at one place but also give due importance to something as unattended as cinema. Even if a handful of films are being released in Pakistan, celebrating major foreign releases is a way of keeping the cinema culture alive and giving film its due importance. Such gatherings are common for the launches of clothing outlets or books but this phenomenon of celebrating films is a stepping stone in Pakistani cinema and will play a pivotal role in giving confidence to future film-makers that their films can be celebrated in a similar, or even more grandiose, manner.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 9th, 2012.
The summer of 2012 has arrived in full swing and the list of major blockbusters slated for release during the season make it even more exciting. One of the most awaited of them all was legendary director Sir Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, yet another science fiction thriller from the man who reinvented the genre with the epic Blade Runner.
The film was premiered all over the world on June 7and opened for the public yesterday (June 8) with a number of advance bookings at local cinemas. In Pakistan, the film was premiered at the Atrium Cinemas and keeping up their tradition of celebrating all major releases, Mandviwalla Entertainment organised a red carpet ceremony before the film started at 11pm.
However, this time around, the red carpet wasn’t such a glittery affair with very few celebrities and only a handful of industry professionals gracing it. Actor Faisal Qureshi, host and radio jockey Mani and photographer Tapu Javeri to name a few gathered amongst many new and unnoticeable faces to witness a bunch of human beings venture into outer space to find answers to the most mindboggling question that mankind has ever confronted: who really made us and why? The film, which features Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce and Michael Fassbender, has some definite connections with the horrifying Alien which was released in 1979
In line with the theme of the film, the Atrium Cinema walkway was set up like a dark alley at the end of which you could see a huge replica of a humanoid — something we later on saw in the film as well. As you walked through the hallway, young boys clad in black flashed a bright, white light on you in an attempt to create an aura of mystery that comes in during an interaction with a supernatural power.
This build-up to the actual event highlights the new trend of organising elaborate red carpet ceremonies for major films releases. Such events not only help the whole industry gather and mingle at one place but also give due importance to something as unattended as cinema. Even if a handful of films are being released in Pakistan, celebrating major foreign releases is a way of keeping the cinema culture alive and giving film its due importance. Such gatherings are common for the launches of clothing outlets or books but this phenomenon of celebrating films is a stepping stone in Pakistani cinema and will play a pivotal role in giving confidence to future film-makers that their films can be celebrated in a similar, or even more grandiose, manner.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 9th, 2012.