As Cineworld prepares to shut down 128
UK cinemas, the decision to delay the release of No Time to Die demonstrates an enraging loss of courage
Our movie industry was just about keeping its morale steady. It was enforcing perfectly workable rules on sanitising and physical distancing and not subject to those closures taking theatre and live entertainment to the cliff edge. The pilot light of big-screen cinema culture was flickering. But it was still alight.
But this is a serious blow. If it is really true that Cineworld will close 128 cinemas, putting 5,500 jobs at risk (and it is not simply a scare-story negotiating ploy leaked to the press alongside the company’s official letter to the culture secretary Oliver Dowden demanding action) then this is potentially devastating. For the first time, everyone in the industry is beginning to entertain the queasy thought: what if our cinema industry is like vaudeville? Or silent movies? Or evensong – that once widespread middle-Britain churchgoing habit wiped out by TV? Is cinemagoing finished? A loss-leader adjunct to the home entertainment industry that’s long been vulnerable to infection?