By Farayi Mungoshi

THE last three film premieres I got invited to, and had a chance to write about, have one thing in common.
Two of them, Camouflage by Adoration Bizure and Cook Off by Thomas Brickhill were premiered at New Ambassador Hotel where a tent was set up on the rooftop and chairs were arranged before a make-shift screen.
A far cry from your usual theatre with its glamorous posters of upcoming movies pinned against the walls, lovers walking hand-in-hand and the aroma of pop corn filling the auditorium.
But still there was that buzz and excitement in the air that is associated with all film premieres.
The last film by Nothando Nobengula, Like a Good Woman Should, which I am yet to do a review on, was also not premiered in a theatre or at a hotel like the others but at someone else’s residence.
The usual crowd of filmmakers was there, as usual, everybody got served drinks and snacks, unlike the other premieres where guests are required to buy their own drinks.
There is a hole in our industry that needs to be filled.
Other films are not even premiered at all, nor do they even get a chance for a newspaper review.
In other words, very few people know about them.
In the end, one wonders why we even make films if we are not going to show them.
As one with an upcoming feature film, yet to hit the cinemas, I needed more information because my wish is to have my film premiered at one of the prominent movie houses in town like Eastgate Sterkinekor or the Sam Levy Village Sterkinekor or even Rainbow House if it was still open.
I also wish to fill up the streets of Harare, Bulawayo and other towns with posters and billboards of the upcoming movie so that everybody knows about it, in turn if they have a few dollars to spare on the day of the premiere, they may come out and watch with us.
It does sound like a dream, given the fact that it seems like nobody is advertising films anymore and if you are not affiliated with other film-makers or you are not on WhatsApp, you will not know about them.
Could the reason be lack of money?
Or could it be that after making films, film-makers then struggle to find affordable venues where they can show their movies and make profit?
Or is it because we are not fulfilling all the stages required in film-making – for example in this case, reference would be drawn from the marketing and distribution phase which seems to have been hijacked by vendors pirating people’s movies.
Maybe if we could adopt the advertising styles of yesteryear we would have a better outcome.
As I was growing up, we used to frequent movie houses; people would queue up well before the movie started just to get a seat.
For example, Neria went for almost over three months with a full house, and Sores of Emmanuel raked in a bigger audience than James Cameron’s Avatar at Rainbow House.
Both Neria and Sores of Emmanuel were shown for months at movie houses.
It is sad to say that Nigerian movies are more readily available than our own Zimbabwean movies.
Back in the day we had Liberty Hall, Kine 1, 2, 3 and 4, Rainbow Theatre in Park Lane and another Rainbow in Robert Mugabe Road, and also 7 Arts, just to mention a few.
We also had drive-ins, there was one in Msasa Park just off Harare-Mutare Road and also one in Mabelreign.
I watched Robert De Niro’s The Mission from the back seat of my parents’ Ford Laser in the 1980s.
I often ask myself if we, as a nation, loved going to the movies more back then than we do now, then what happened to us?
What happened to that movie-going culture?
What happened to all the movie houses? Where are they today?
Kine 1, 2, 3 and 4 are now churches, so is Rainbow Theatre in Park Lane; as for Rainbow House along Robert Mugabe Road, it has since been turned into some sort of flea market.
Where are we going to show our movies?
Should we really be turning hotels and theatre venues into makeshift movie houses?
I can understand the movie house landlord’s plight. It is all about business at the end of the day. If he/she does not get his/her rental monies at the end of the month he/she would not be happy but surely something needs to be done concerning movie venues for recreational purposes.
I am not advocating churches be moved from movie houses, especially since they have proven to be better money making ventures when compared to the screening of movies.
But perhaps the time has come now that movies should be taken more seriously, given that we are barely into the second month of 2018 and already we have at least three films out, Cook Off, Overspill and Like a Good Woman Should, yet they are not being shown in any movie houses.
The reason we make films is so that we can show them to entertain and educate our people.
America is what it is today mainly because of film and television. Everybody wants to go there.
In this new dispensation, Zimbabwe is under the spotlight; the whole world is watching us and I must say one way of showing the world what we are all about is by making film and television productions that can compete internationally (of which we’ve already begun); but what use is it if the film-makers remain broke at the end of the day and without a movie house to screen their products?
Maybe I am missing something…