24/11/2005

21 Millenium Cinemas group film theatres have been shut this week. The administration of the Freeport mall centre in Alcochete used padlocks to block the doors and forbid the 30 employees from getting in. According to Paulo Branco, president of the exhibition group, the measure is a "completely illegal occupation of our space".

The problems between Millenium Cinemas and Freeport started 5 months ago when the exhibition group stopped paying the rent of the space. According to released information, Branco's debts rose to 22M€, but the internationally acclaimed producer, distributor and exhibitor accuses Freeport for the failure of the investment. "They have fooled us", he claimed, underlying that several stores and parts of the leisure area of the mall centre have not been opened as promised, and pointing out the bad promotion campaigns by Freeport as a justification for the poor admissions. In fact, the country's biggest film complex attracted only 250,000 moviegoers this year, a highly deceptive number compared to the 700,000 expected.

This shut-out – a month before the previously announced date – might be the tip of the iceberg. Four other Millenium theatres in Santarém had closed earlier this year, and the national press referred days ago to the unconfirmed sale of the AMC complex in Gaia (20 theatres). As in the rest of Europe, the decreasing number of admissions is a worrying trend in Portugal. The ICAM has just announced a reduction of 15% of the moviegoers, compared to the same 10 months period of 2004. After the disappointing results of films such as Spielberg's The War of the Worlds last summer, distributors are now focusing their efforts on the two announced blockbusters for the end of the year; Peter Jackson's King Kong (released by Lusomundo on the 15 of December) and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by Mike Newell, which opens today in 85 theatres (distributed by Columbia TriStar Warner).