Bahrain

Bahrain marks 100 years of Cinema

Hundred years ago, in 1922, Bahrain silently set the stage for a dramatic shift in the region’s entertainment industry. The man behind that silent revolution was Mahmoud Al Saati.

He managed to give the people of Bahrain their first taste of the silver screen by screening a silent film with a small projector imported from abroad. The show took place in an impromptu movie house at a cottage on the north coast of Manama.

Bahrain’s cinema industry made its baby steps thus. Remembering those humble steps made 100 years ago in Bahrain yesterday was a group of cinema lovers at the Sheikh Ibrahim bin Mohammed Al Khalifa Centre.

The celebration in Muharraq was in the presence of Shaikha Mai bint Mohammed Al Khalifa, the Chairperson of the Centre. The event also featured an exhibition featuring the history of Cinema in the Kingdom led by photographers Hanan Hassan Al Khalifa, Asma Jassim Murad, and Camille Zakaria.

The movie “Fatima, the Unforgettable Sultana” by Mohamed And Al Rahman Al Tazi, a Moroccan director, was also screened.

Bahrain’s experiments with the silver screen got some pace with Abdulla Al Zayed and associates establishing Kingdom’s first official Cinema in 1937.

Since the facility had no air-conditioning or heating system, an open-roofed building became the theatre during winter, where one of the walls played as a screen. The first movie screened was reportedly the Egyptian movie “Wedad” starring Umm Kulthum.

Historians say most of the films screened in Bahrain during the 1930s and 40s were predominantly Egyptian and American. The Cinema scene of Bahrain gathered more pace in the 1940s with the entry of Bahrain Petroleum Company by opening a theatre in Awali for its staff.

In the 1950s and 1960s, eight new cinemas opened in Bahrain, including the Pearl Cinema, Al Hamra Cinema, Al Nasr Cinema and Awal Cinema, all of which were in Manama. The first Cinema to open in Muharraq was Al Jazira Cinema in 1955, and it is still in use today.

As per reports, the first modern-style Cinema to open in Bahrain was the Delmon Cinema at the Gosi Complex in 1996, but it has since closed. Bahrain Cinema Company opened cinema complexes at Seef Mall in 1998 and Saar in 2000. Dana Cinema opened at the Dana Mall in Manama in 2002.

Later, a 20-screen cinema complex came up in Bahrain City Centre, the largest such cineplex in the Middle East. In July 2015, Bahrain got its first IMAX theatre in Seef Mall Muharraq under Novo Cinema. Other cinema companies entered the Bahraini market in the 2010s, such as the Mexican company Cinepolis In January 2019.

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The Daily Tribune
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