One by one, the lights of the country's cinema halls have been switched off. In the last 20 years, 1,261 halls have been closed across the country. In most areas, the owners of the halls are demolishing the buildings and constructing multi-storied malls. There are now many districts and even divisional towns in the country that do not have a single cinema hall. In the last 10 years, 90 percent of the workers involved in this business have left the profession. Now the number of theaters showing movies across the country is 174. The number of people employed in this industry is also decreasing drastically. One after another, cinema halls have been closed in Dhaka and surrounding areas. The latest addition to that list is Rajmoni Cinema Hall in Kakrail, known as "Filmpara." Rajmoni's journey is over. There will be a 22-storey commercial building here. The owner has no intention of having a movie theater there.
In the afternoon, security guard Sattar Kazi was sitting at the entrance gate of the hall. Sattar Kazi started his career at Rajmoni Cinema Hall at a young age. 60-year-old Sattar Kazi spent 37 years of his life at Rajmoni Cinema Hall in Kakrail. He hasn't gone anywhere else in all these years and hasn't learned any other work. There is a strong look of depression on his face because the cinema hall will be closed soon. He said, “I don't know what to do in the future." To comfort his mind, he added, "Actually, the owner has nothing to do. He has been running these halls at a loss for years. How long will he run this way?"
Rajmoni Hall was established on March 3, 1983. It started off great and ended in extreme recession. Entrepreneur Ahsan Ullah Mani said, "We could not run a business in such a busy area of Dhaka just because of the lack of good movies and audiences." He fears that all cinema halls in the country will be closed in the next few years.
Even before the eighties, Dhaka's "Filmpara" was centered on Gulistan. Then it moved to Kakrail, and the Rajmoni Hall building became the center of Filmpara. Even a few years ago, Rajmoni Cinema Hall was not just a cinema hall; it was like a small film city. Inside the building, there were recording studios, shooting spots, dubbing studios, editing panels, and various technical facilities for film production. Everything is history now.