Bombay’s landmark Minerva cinema & the Sholay history
thanks to Aajkaarjun
LINK
One of the biggest hits in history of Bollywood, Sholay (in English as Embers, Flames, Flames of the Sun), was recognized as the Best Film of 50 years at the 50th Filmfare awards.
It was India’s first 70 mm, stereophonic sound film and was released on Friday, August 15, 1975, with as many as 250 prints, including at the Minerva Theatre in Bombay (now Mumbai). Sholay, directed by Ramesh Sippy and produced by G P Sippy, altered the course of Indian cinema. This was the first film in the history of Indian cinema to celebrate silver jubilee (25 weeks) at over a hundred theatres across India. To date, more than 1,100 prints of Sholay are in circulation-the highest number for any Hindi film.
Sholay is the highest grossing movie of all time in India with collections of Rs. 2,134,500,000/- or US $ 50 million. Even today, it remains the box office gold, a reference point for both the Indian film-going audience & the film industry.
It is widely acknowledged by movie critics to be one of the best movies ever created by Bollywood and to be the most watched and popular. It was declared “Film of the Millenium” by BBC India and internet polls in 1999.
A great ensemble cast, spectacular cinematography, superb performances from each actor, powerful dialogues & music boosted this superlative film.
Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Dharmendra, Sanjeev Kumar, Amjad Khan, Hema Malini, Jaya Bachchan, Asrani, Helen, Mac Mohan, Sachin, Jagdeep, Satyen Kappoo, A K Hangal, etc.
When released the film was initially declared to be a commercial disaster. However, the collections slowly picked up and became a huge hit. As a testament to its popularity, the movie ran uninterruptedly for five and half year (286 weeks) at the Minerva in Mumbai. (Though Aditya Chopra’s Dilwale Dulhania Le Jaayenge has crossed its 300 weeks mark at Maratha Mandir (Mumbai), the film was not released in this theatre at its release time.) For 75 weeks the current booking of Minerva remained shut as the prestigious cinema hall used to get full in advance booking itself! Sholay fetched Rs. 50 lakhs as distributor’s share from the Minerva, Mumbai which could be estimated at approximately Rs. 5 to 7 crores today.
Week 0001 – Week Ending Aug 21, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 46,66,224/-
Week 0002 – Week Ending Aug 28, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 34,98,605/-
Week 0003 – Week Ending Sep 04, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 25,57,450/-
Week 0004 – Week Ending Sep 11, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 21,27,120/-
Week 0005 – Week Ending Sep 18, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 17,76,520/-
Week 0006 – Week Ending Sep 25, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 13,84,464/-
Week 0007 – Week Ending Oct 02, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 11,74,001/-
Week 0008 – Week Ending Oct 09, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 10,78,480/-
Week 0009 – Week Ending Oct 16, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 9,24,365/-
Week 0010 – Week Ending Oct 23, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 9,72,574/-
Week 0011 – Week Ending Oct 30, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 8,74,492/-
Week 0012 – Week Ending Nov 06, 1975: Box Office Collection: Rs. 8,09,285/-
Week 0060 – Week Ending Oct 07, 1976: Box Office Collection: Rs. 53,920/-
Week 0150 – Week Ending Jun 29, 1978: Box Office Collection: Rs. 28,601/-
Week 1500 – Week Ending May 13, 2004: Box Office Collection: Rs. 38,359/-
SATYAMSHOT 
September 28, 2009 at 1:57 PM
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September 28, 2009 at 2:05 PM
I have fond memories of seeing movies in Minerva, Maratha Mandir, Eros, Sterling etc when I used to visit my cousins in Bombay. Some other single screens that come to mind are Bahar (I Think in Andheri), Amber Oscar in Grant Road, Galaxy Gaiety…I remember running in to Sharat Saxena when I went to see Jungle Book in Sterling…an eternity ago.
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September 28, 2009 at 2:18 PM
Yes, definitely watching Sholay in Minerva was an experience one cannot easily forget! Theatres with stereophonic sound were rare in those days and it was the norm to watch Sholay in a nearby theatre first and then go and watch it in Minerva , esp to hear the sound of the coin!
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September 28, 2009 at 3:27 PM
You have my eternal envy!
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September 28, 2009 at 3:59 PM
‘it was the norm to watch Sholay in a nearby theatre first and then go and watch it in Minerva’ – well said Latha; may be you could have appended it with ‘with the family’. We ended up seeing it at Minerva after about three years.
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September 28, 2009 at 5:09 PM
I remenber going to watch Razia Sultaan in Sheila , beacuse they were the only theatre in Delhi to show it in 70m.m. and Six track streophonic sound.
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June 7, 2010 at 1:11 PM
i have a fond memory i use to stay at pedder road my favourate was minerva theater i still remember sholay’s timing was sharp 11.15 am atminerva and may be more than 20 times i must have seen it with 70mm stereo phonic sound.
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June 7, 2010 at 1:27 PM
you are very lucky!
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October 16, 2010 at 12:04 PM
ihave seen sholay in kashmir in 1980.it was released at khayam theatre 70 mm and 6 track stereo sound.earlier also at this very cinema sholay celebrated silver jubilee but it was 35 mm print.watching sholay with 70mm and stereo sound was marvellous experience
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October 16, 2010 at 1:04 PM
you’re a lucky guy!
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August 8, 2012 at 1:32 AM
I’ve heard the coin story from my dad so many times as well. Apparently people in the hall also used to go pin-drop quiet when that moment came, as almost everyone in the hall was a third-fourth repeat audience at the very least and so knew the whole movie scene-after-scene. And everytime the riff played when Dharmendra overturns the coin and realizes the truth, everyone used to get goosebumps and get angry despite having seen the film so many times before,
My dad is proud to have seen Sholay 5 times at Minerva, three times out of those waiting 5 hours in a line to get tickets. The only time he got tickets for the movie for the current were the first two times he saw it in the first five weeks of its run. Can you believe that!
I envy everyone who’ve lived through and experience the Sholay-Minerva phenomenon.
Btw, dad ended up seeing Sholay 9 times in the cinemas in all 🙂
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September 28, 2009 at 2:34 PM
Off topic: Mahaan poster (Didn’t see you posting this)
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September 28, 2009 at 3:18 PM
I somehow don’t like this one very much.. the art doesn’t seem as true to the film.. but thanks for bringing it to my attention.
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September 28, 2009 at 4:38 PM
‘When released the film was initially declared to be a commercial disaster. However, the collections slowly picked up and became a huge hit.’ If I remember right, the film was projected as a flop in the first weekend itself and the verdict reversed within a week. Since the first week was completely sold out prior to the opening friday, the statement – ‘ the collections slowly picked up and became a huge hit’ – doesn’t make sense to me. I believe the journalists/trade analysts were too quick to declare the movie as a flop and then quickly changed their verdicts. The reason they could have projected the film as a flop could be the huge cost of the movie and the poor black market performance of the movie, the latter being my own observation at that time.
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September 28, 2009 at 5:06 PM
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September 28, 2009 at 8:01 PM
There was a time, right after our 10th standard exams, a dear friend and I decided we were going to watch movies EVERY SINGLE day for a month, in honor of the fact that we had just passed a great milestone of our lives. And we DID. What this meant was that we HAD to find a new movie to go to each day and thanks to the Mumbai film industry we were able to do this successfully. To this day we have fond memories of those exploits. As part of that journey we also visited theaters in all corners of Mumbai, the suburbs(Andheri and northwards) to uptown(Bandra and surrounding areas) to downtown(Churchgate and surrounding areas). The list of theaters we visited is actually astonishing by todays standards. More than 80% of those are all GONE, either replaced by a multiplex or a shopping complex. Mumbai then was also a easily travelled city. Hop into a local train and you were in Andheri in a matter of 22 minutes. We would decide 1/2 hour before and say ok we wanted to catch a movie at Amber-Oscar-Minor or Navrang. Chandan at Juhu was a bit more. New Talkies in Bandra was a 40 minute plan effort. Gaiety-Galaxy-Gemini the same. Barkha in Vile Parle was a bus ride. Satyam-Shivam-Sachinam(god knows why they never named that last one Sundaram is anyone’s guess) a combo of train upto Dadar and then 171 or 169 from Dadar station by a bus ride. And any English flick was a train ride ALL THE WAY to Churchgate before you either walked to Regal, Strand, Eros or Sterling. Liberty was a hop at Marine Lines and then over!
Ah the times when we saw those 30 movies on a trot. Someday I will sit down and chronicle those and do a short 2 line writeup on my feelings for each one. I think it will make for some interesting reading.
Again thanks Satyam, Aajkaarjun and gang for sending me down this lane of nostalgia! Much appreciated.
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September 28, 2009 at 9:18 PM
thanks in turn Aarkayne.. this is an extraordinary comment and perfectly in keeping with the nostalgia and really ‘other-worldness’ evoked by these pictures, specially in the context of Bombay where this heritage is so ‘orphaned’ at this point.
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September 28, 2009 at 9:36 PM
Aarkayne, I hope you do make that post. It would be a pleasure to read, as much a pleasure as this comment…
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September 28, 2009 at 11:05 PM
Let me add my voice to the chorus here aarkayne. In fact, you’re now obligated to write that post!
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September 28, 2009 at 11:09 PM
Aarkayne we’ll start signing a petition if you don’t do so!
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September 28, 2009 at 11:46 PM
I will. Let me get my thoughts around it. Gosh i hope I can remember them all. It will take some jostling. There will be holes, but since the period will be known I think you guys should be able to help me.
Here’s a teaser for you guys. Hopefully i am able to consolidate it in a single post.
This was quite a while back mind you, the very first movie, right after our exams we rushed to was KUDRAT(yeah, that long back!!!). Funnily and very providentially it was also a Friday and exams got over at 4p. So though it was not quite the First-Day-First-Show thingie(which also incidentally is an obsession now), we went for the 6p show at the Ajanta theater in Borivli. Needless to say tickets were sold out. So we bought tickets in black from not even a regular scalper, but an enterprising amateur who saw an opportunity at selling his, I am guessing, regularly gotten tickets, at a small profit to hordes of hoarse throated teenagers that seemed to have descended on the theater. I remember balcony tickets cost Rs.6/- and I paid Rs.12/-. I felt a king to be indulging thus. Alas the movie watching experience was not as royal! There were behind us some ladies that had apparently come straight from work and boy were they chatty!!! Especially in those courtroom scenes where Priya Rajvansh with her weak vocal chords tries to match the histrionics of Rajesh Khanna.
My buddy and I still, reminisce over that experience whenever we meet up over a glass of single malt 😉
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September 28, 2009 at 11:31 PM
Bring it on Aarkayne bhai 🙂
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September 28, 2009 at 8:23 PM
wow aarkayne. This brings back lots of memories. I used to visit my two uncles in Bombay, one used to live in Ville Parle west and the other in Grant Road. All the theatres you mentioned including Amber Oscar Minor (in Andheri I think with Minor being a smaller one and used to screen small budget movies), Chandan, Bahar (does this ring a bell?), Gaiety Galaxy (Bandra I think) and Satyam are very familiar to me. I forgot the name of the twin theatres near Grant Road which are also no longer there. And yes Regal, Strand, Sterling used to screen english movies. I remember catching movies like An absent minded professor, Jungle Book etc at these theatres.
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September 28, 2009 at 9:18 PM
you guys have really struck up a rich discussion here.
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December 1, 2009 at 3:16 PM
Ganga and Jamuna
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September 28, 2009 at 11:28 PM
well i recently saw a movie in regal and it was an awesome experience.. it was english movie late show .. but makes u remember the old days..
talking of old days one memory which i shall not forget is my first exposure to steven speilberg. For the first time in my life my elder brother informed me about a movie abt dinosaurs and action and i got intrigued.. we asked our family to see it but for some reasons they couldnt have made it.
that day my father took a bold step i was barely 6 or 7 and bro 11, or 12 and send us alone in ricksaw to see the movie that in the old very old city of Ahmedabad the second best theater which had Digital dolby sound ( it was unique in those days here ) and i still remember and cherish that expierience.
i was afraid to have to seen it alone without parents and that to when dinos came on screen i got more scared and joined my brothers hand but slowly i got familiar started njoying laughing got intrigued in what i say to be my first exposure to hollywood. i still remember those popcorn corner (yup by now i understand everyone knows from my reviews how important popcorn are for my cinematic experience 🙂 )
me and my bro still talk abt that faithful day when we had travelled 45-50 minutes from our home alone in rick in the old city (thats important to understand) and watching the movie.. i assure i wont have that courage to send my kids alone like this… but hey thats life and it was childhood adventure of sort.
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September 28, 2009 at 11:30 PM
* i m talking about lost world mostly ..
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September 28, 2009 at 11:29 PM
* regal mumbai Colaba
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September 28, 2009 at 11:50 PM
Aarkayne.. thanks again for that story on Kudrat.. just love this sort of reminiscence.. if this makes it easier you don’t have to consolidate everything in one post.. just write whatever comes to mind and then follow it up with sequels as and when you get the chance.. make a whole series out of it.. I seem some a real memoir potential here!
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September 28, 2009 at 11:52 PM
related older comment:
“In the West ‘foreign cinema’ meant something in the 50s and 60s (the heyday of the foreign cinema moment). In our own age we have film festivals like mushrooms and again an economy of consumption. As such films just don’t mean very much. I forget the critic who said wistfully he couldn’t remember the last time people booed at a film because no one cared enough to do so. Cinema in many ways has been the preeminent art form since its inception. But it eventually lost out to TV in many respects. And of course became just entertainment as opposed to the ‘experience’ it was for earlier audiences. Incidentally you should check out (if you haven’t already) Ardashir Vakil’s Beach Boy. The book is humdrum but the first chapter is superb. It is entirely set around the paraphernalia that takes place in the balcony of a Bombay movie theater where Haathi mera Saathi is playing. People have told me about how traffic used to be a problem when Kabhi Kabhie released. It’s not that there cannot be the same issues today but it is an index of how much cinema defined things that people made those associations and remember them. No one is likely to say that the traffic got stopped because KKHH released even if it were literally true. I will say this. I still retain a certain fondness for the SRK moment of the 90s because for the diaspora in a place like the US the experience aspect of it was somewhat present in this period. It eventually dissipated but it was there for a while.
As I keep talking about an older Bombay cinema that to my mind expired at some point in the early 80s I am referring to exactly the sort of thing you’ve been talking about. The differences are many but the chief one is precisely ‘experience’ as opposed to ‘consumption’. I am not naive about these things. I realize why the changes have come about. But whatever those reasons might be (technological, sociological and so forth) I just prefer that ‘experience’ phase of cinema. And it’s not that one has to have lived through it (though I wish I had with some of these histories). That cinema is still accessible even if the world of that cinema is obviously not so.”
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September 29, 2009 at 12:12 AM
interesting tales aarkayne.. looking forward to others
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September 29, 2009 at 2:20 AM
My only experience of having watched a movie in Bombay was in 1991. I had gone to visit a friend in Bombay, and we decided to go catch a movie. I cant even remember which cinema it was, this mustve been a theatre somewhere near Tardeo, where my friend lived. We didnt even know which movie was playing, but we landed up and to our surprise found that theater to be playing a couple of shows of Amar Akbar Anthony! This was 1991, mind you. Being ardent Amitabh fans, we just had to see this. I thought that this may be a good empty show, but to my surprise, by the time it started, it had gone housefull. I had only seen this movie on video as a kid back in the early 80s. By the time the movie got to the scene where the 3 brothers are giving blood to Nirupa Roy and Mohd Rafi crooning “Aason ki koi kahani nahi, khoon khoon hota hai, paani nahi”, I had tears rolling down my eyes….
To this day, I can vividly recall the good fortune and effect of seeing AAA on the big screen. And I have been lucky to see most of the relevant 70s bigB films on the big screen, years after their original releases, in India through such off-shows.
I also feel, that despite all that the multiplexes have to offer, the old age charm of these single screens, especially the truely older ones from around independence or even before is precious. You just cant beat the experience of a Raj Mandir, or any such older halls in India.
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September 29, 2009 at 2:27 AM
The moving testimonials of so many commenters speak volumes about what cinema can mean and has meant, and in themselves make of this and the related threads a kind of archive…
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September 29, 2009 at 3:17 AM
absolutely and more so i feel q bhai in a country like india where we dont have any thing else for entertainment… and childhood memories is mostly of filmstars.. i remember there was a time when i was die hard fan of Big B.. i use to say “bachan ka picture bachan ka”.. i remember seeing his lal badshahin cinema hall in ahmedabad… vintage experience.. one of my rare Big B outing in his so called legendary prime years..
also i remember a Natraj theater which now no longer exist famous for english movie.
The movie i seen there was the greatest action movie of mine in theater.. i didnt knew the chikna hero.. but i heard it was good action.. nobody was coming with me so i took my mom .. who had a terrible experience becoz of action .. it was dubbed in hindi.. it had this cool bke sequences .. car chases .. mountain climbing etc.. i didnt even understand name at that period of time..
years later i came to know it was TOM CRUISE IN AS ETHAN HUNT THE IMF SPY IN JOHN WOO’S MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 2
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September 29, 2009 at 6:06 AM
Another story about Minerva that I recollect though not connected with Sholay was that it was the only theatre in Bombay that screened Shankarabharanam(Telegu) that too only matinee shows on Sunday. Shankarabharanam had become that movie which no South Indian in Bomay ought to miss, so as kids we tagged along with our parents for the event without understanding any bit of the movie!
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September 29, 2009 at 6:36 AM
ah, but of course! SHANKARABHARNAM on morning shows at the Minerva! How can i forget! My dad used to freelance as a translator at several ad agencies(Lintas, Clarion, Rediffussion what have you) and as was typical at these agencies, writers would meet in the evenings, after their regular day jobs were done, for any translation work that may exist. And during freer times talk would center around many things, literature, music and cinema. Needless to say a Telugu writer colleague of my dad’s had recommended in the most pursuasive of terms how S was rocking Andhra Pradesh and maybe even a lot of the southern states and how the music was simply sublime. So then one Sunday, dad with mom and us kids in tow, landed up at Minerva at 9am in the morning!!!! Dad had come with no less than his mono tape recorder to record all the songs as they played in the cinema!!!! LOL. I think he still owns that tape. The # of times we played that tape, I think i still remember all the songs of the movie thanks to it. By the way there were no subtitles, and yet we were quite moved by the movie experience. The screen presence of Somayajalu was simply outstanding. poor guy could never live down this role in his later cinematic career i think! In later years when I realised this movie was directed by K.Vishwanath, my respect for him increased manifold!
Incidentally we trooped out the theater and lo behold, were treated to the unmistakable crowds waiting to get in to watch SHOLAY! My only experience of what SHOLAY meant fo Minerva when I watched SHANKARABHARNAM!!!
THanks Latha for reminding me.
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September 29, 2009 at 6:10 AM
In a sense, I think the advent of the multiplexes has made movie going sort of mundane. Watching movies in Minerva, Sterling, Regal, Eros in those days always meant days of planning and excitement , the joy of travelling to these theatres and then a trip to either Gateway of India or Marine Drive and dinner – a complete treat.
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September 29, 2009 at 8:09 AM
What an astonishing thread this is turning out to be! Thanks Latha and Nykavi for your additions. And of course Aarkayne keeps putting up his golden memories!
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September 29, 2009 at 8:15 AM
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September 29, 2009 at 8:45 AM
This is indeed a wonderful thread. Would love to add a bit, perhaps a little later. Meanwhile, would like to share this article: http://www.thehindu.com/fline/fl2608/stories/20090424260806600.htm
I was searching for the picture of the fountain in the Liberty Cinema, which has always fascinated me and came across this article. I have always felt that Bombay’s art deco buildings never got their due, but never imagined it was so significant. Anyway, will add a bit more to this a little later.
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September 29, 2009 at 8:54 AM
thanks much for adding this wonderful piece.. anything else would be welcome as well..
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September 29, 2009 at 1:04 PM
thanks man
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September 29, 2009 at 11:24 PM
Another experience would be of watching Star Trek at the Sterling cinema in Fort. As a kid it was a real treat to watch the titles jump out of the screen into you! If i remember correctly, Star Wars ran in Sterling for a long long time. Perhaps Aarkayne can add to this.
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September 29, 2009 at 11:54 PM
You know the ‘town’ of my childhood was quite something, espceciall if you were a suburbanite. So here goes another anecdote about watching STAR WARS first and then RETURN OF THE JEDI several years later.
As a kid I was always fascinated by science fiction, having read Jules Verne and HG Wells in school. My father would bring home each week the SUNDAY magazine published out of Calcutta by the Ananda Bazar Patrika folks. Till such time its editors were M/s MJ Akbar and Vir Sanghvi this was an eminently readable publication. In any case, in the year 1977 I believe, SUNDAY was serialising excerpts from the book written based on the movie STAR WARS which was a sensation in the US. Needless to say I devoured every single written word that the magazine carried in I believe 2 or 3 consecutive issues. Inexplicably in the print form, the robots R2-D2 & C3-PO were referred to as See-Threepio and Artoo-Dittoo !!! For the longest time I did not know what their actual names were!
In any case equipped with this aforehand knowledge, when STAR WARS did arrive in Mumbai I pestered my Dad to take me to the theater. Yes Sterling it was where it played, and right around the corner from the Excelsior(where I had watched an early morning show of JULIUS CEASAR many years prior because my father wanted me to ‘observe’ how the famous speech Friends, Romans and Countrymen was to be effectively delivered, which is another story ;-)). The atmoshphere was electric and my own anticipation was unbearable. I had in my mind known the heroes and the villains of the film. The wise Obi Wan Kenobi, the majestic and evil Darth Vader, the impatient Luke Skywalker and the committed Princess Leia were all waiting for me to see them!! I came away exhilarated, in no small measure because of the environs. For the longest time however I could not make out why the heck was Han Solo with his inexplicable sneer and mocking look so popular! My opinion of Harrison Ford changed many years later after Spielberg took me on a wild, wild trip with indiana jones!!
Thanks Latha inspiring me to narrate this 😉
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September 30, 2009 at 12:01 AM
You are welcome, Aarkayne and you are much more articulate than I could ever be.
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September 30, 2009 at 6:31 AM
You are way too kind.
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September 29, 2009 at 11:56 PM
and yes the thrill off watching ‘Once upon a time, in a galaxy far far away…..’ glide back into the etherspace was quite something !
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September 30, 2009 at 12:16 AM
Aarkayne, you are constantly taking this thread to new heights..
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September 30, 2009 at 6:32 AM
its been a while since i’ve had so much fun blogging! thanks to all you guys.
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September 30, 2009 at 2:46 AM
Some of the mumbai Cinemas
Sterling
Regal
New Empire
Eros
Metro
Strand
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September 30, 2009 at 7:03 AM
have been to regal and eros walking distance from my place.. sterling havnt yet visited but lookig foraward
Meanwhile aaj ka arjun metro no longer exist its not multiplexcalled fame metro or metro adlabs
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October 27, 2010 at 8:59 AM
What a fantastic thread and I just chanced upon it! Im hoping you guys still check it once in a while because Im looking for some memories from you all. I have recently shifted to bombay and am searching (in vain) for information on the south bombay, and the single screen theatres in an effort to compose a 100 year history of bombay studios and theatres (1900-2000). An ambitious project, Im hoping the people who remember these now demolished or lost structures can help me out with locations and time periods. Hope somebody ends up reading this! By the way in you guys just recollecting your experiences I picked up a lot of info so thanks! Cheers…
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October 27, 2010 at 9:32 AM
check out all the Bombay theaters listed here;
I haven’t updated this list in a while and the last 7-8 theater posts are not represented here but I don’t think any of those featured a Bombay one. Aarkayne has some wonderful reminiscences on many of those Bombay theaters.
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February 3, 2011 at 4:01 AM
Forget watching sholay in minerva, only getting tickets is advance was a very big thing. After waiting 6- 7 hours in queue , u dont get tickets. That was sholay magic
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July 13, 2011 at 5:18 AM
I first saw the fill in 70mm in the 39th week way back in 1976.
What I saw and witnessed is only History.
Hats off to Ramesh Sippy, Mr. Perfectionist.
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August 14, 2011 at 2:04 PM
hi,
i am not a local mumbai person but as a child i used to watch all the movie magic- hits/flops from a short distance away ie pune.
i remember some of the big cinemas had titles after their names eg
minerva pride of maharshtra
metro air cond
deramland theatre magnificent
liberty delux
maratha mandir pride of india (never published along with name) maybe some more dont remember .Also an interesting fact regarding the record of longest running
movie is that sholay would still have been running to date but only for the fact taht ramesh sippy made the other magnun oops/opus shaan after 5 years and since he did not want any sort of competition to that movie even from his own sholay he choose to have it removed from its daily one show @ minerva ans have shaan released at the same theatre to facilitate its opening maybe thinking that the record did not matter or was his for the taking in his pocket or that shaan would do as ood as sholay. He was wrong in his thinking and maybe had to pay the price for that. I remember shaan was released in almost every prestigious cinema in town even the regals cinemas in mumbai and pune which normally ran only westen movies had shaan running in them such was the hype created for it only because of the success of sholay. i firmly believe that if this this folly of getting carried away with the presumed succes of shaan had not got into the minds of ramesh and gp sippy sholay would still have been running in mumbai minerva till this day.
Additionally some hit movies also had to suffer this embaressment of not being able to have an continuous run in a single cinema, i remember the super hit LOVE STORY had to endure this fate , being originally relesed @ metro, then transferred to dreamland and then finally to maratha mandir where it celebrated its silver jubilee (the order may be wrong). suffering from distribution problems in mumbai of all the cities in the world.
and also the super hit NASEEB was released @ minerva as a matinee presumably to allow shaan to celebrate its silver jublee and then after that it continued as a regular until it celebrated 50 weeks . maybe t here are more such instance in the histories of hit movies.
ok maybe this note is getting long and boring so bye
Additionally
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August 14, 2011 at 8:28 PM
thanks for this note.. always enjoying hearing the personal on this score..
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March 30, 2012 at 6:17 AM
Bro pls do write something more about old releases like kumar gaurav s Romance movie , i remember i saw the burning tran in novelty cinema also Do hawaldar and Phansi in novelty but my favourate remains minerva pride of maharashtra.
one thing i want to correct your note by saying Novelty was named as Theather magnificiant.
Ghar released in Novelty cinema followed by shalimar
Qurbani in Apsara
Ali baba 40 chor in minerva
Habari in Minerva
Amar akbar anthony , Khobsoorat, bemisal, devta in Operahouse
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August 15, 2011 at 1:00 AM
R.D.Burman Live 1976 – Performing Sholay Theme
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September 14, 2011 at 3:29 PM
What a post, and great comments from everyone, Amazing read guys, Thanks for bringing back memories, I have shared my own on some other posts. Satyam, You need to post some more nostalgic stuff here. Not saying that your new posts are boring, just that It does not have a nostalgic element to it, The Convos are going all over the place. Certain Mr. Adams keeps hijacking them (j/k Alex, not all can read french u know).
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September 14, 2011 at 3:30 PM
yes I should put up some more..
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September 14, 2011 at 3:51 PM
I also Enjoyed your Dishoom Dishoom Post, some excellent videos and fight sequences there. The cat fight take the cake though..lol. You should do a post for the Style back in the 70s, The suits, Jackets etc. Hands down AB sr wins for the best leather jackes in 70’s and 80’s and I personally think the best suits were worn by Rajesh Khanna in Dhanwaan, (maybe my taste change since then, have not seen it since I was a kid, So if it was OTT , I was just a kid haha) But the close one after that was suits from Sharaabi (I even got the light blue one tailored – yes I was a spoilt brat – lol). I think it would be an interesting post. What say?
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September 14, 2011 at 4:22 PM
good idea for sure.. I’ll just have to find the time to look for the videos..
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September 14, 2011 at 4:37 PM
I think some photos would do fine too. I know it is tough to find pictures from back then, Videos maybe easily available. But yeah it would be a great post. If I may dare to ask you, who do you think had the best style back then? or a certain movie that had the best style quotient. I think Qurbani had the best fashion of its times. Sorry to clog this one up until you post the real one. LOL.
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September 19, 2011 at 1:01 AM
Some facts about the 70mm/widescreen/cinemascope format of films is that sholay unfortunately was not the first film in this genre the first one was way back yusuf bhais “leader” and then in 1972 the classic “pakeezah”. But after the success of sholay this format was readily accepted by most of the bollywod producers, rajshri prods took to it like a duck takes to water almost all of their presentations after 1975 were 70mm, and mr garam dharam I think holds the record for appearing in most number of films of this type.
Interestingly the people of Mumbai were very lucky as the one and only print in 70mm for a very long period of time was the one @ Minerva cinema, even in pune when I watched it after its 25 weeks it was still 35 mm version. However when we saw the songs in chaya geet/chitrahar they were always in 70mm, don’t know how the technology was incorporated to do this.
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September 19, 2011 at 1:46 AM
http://www.totalfilm.com/features/10-click-expert-bollywood/timeline-of-bollywood-films
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August 6, 2012 at 5:09 AM
i had seen sholay in 1978 when i had been to Bombay for 1st time in my life…. want to know if still the theater exists. also had seen Trishul in Odeon & Kasme vaade in Sahakar{chembur}. couldnt see Don as we got only 3 tckts and we were 8 ppl. finally saw Don 3 yrs later in Gadag- a town near Hubli in Karnataka, where we lived for 6 yrs.
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August 7, 2012 at 11:54 PM
if you saw it in the Minerva cinema which was at that time a landmark cinema of mumbai rather maharashtra as it always dispalyed the title — pride of maharashtra — after its name. then there is a good chance that it still exists. if it was a small cinema where movies usually run for a week or 2-4 weeks max then most probably (sadly for you) it may be existant. now there is more demand for the multiplexes so most of these smaller theaters and the older ones too Strand for example have been pulled down for commercial reasons.
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December 30, 2012 at 7:10 AM
Some old memories of single screen cinemas……Amar Akbar Anthony at Opera House, Muqaddar Ka Sikandar, Laawaris & Namak Halaal at Alankar, Don (Amitabh) at Ganga, Sharabi & Qurbani at Apsara, Shahanshah at Maratha Mandir………enjoyed this movies !!!
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September 28, 2013 at 3:45 AM
i hv fond memories of watching sholay in minerva, the ten commandments at liberty, and hv watched a lot of movies in metro, strand stealing,eros,regal,new excelsior, and in lamintion road were apsara,novelty,maratha mandir,shalimar,super,swastik,naaz,imperial,opera house, roxy ganga jamuna , diana and the theatres near the red light area where the tickets rates were very less.
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April 22, 2015 at 2:16 AM
I am very fortunate to watch ‘Sholay’ at Minerva ,really it is very prestigeous to get tickets at Minerva. In 1978 Sholay was replaced by ‘ Azaad ‘ at main shows. I have seen Sholay 3 times at Minerva. Apart from Minerva i watched Muquaddar ka Sikander , Tarana, Charas at Alankar, Kartavya at Metro , Trishul at Apsara ,Krodhi at Novelty, Mr. Natwarlal at Ganga ,Badaltey Rishte at Derby , Alibaba & 40 Chor at minerva , Sangam at Shalimar, khoobsoorat at Opera House .Really Shoodays life in late 80’s is absolutely gem of my life.
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September 3, 2018 at 11:41 PM
Sholay in Plaza Cinema munbai
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September 4, 2018 at 12:24 AM
Shetty, fantastic to see you here after forever! How have you been?
thanks for the image..
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December 8, 2018 at 1:52 AM
All good Satyam 🙂 Will try to be regular here
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September 4, 2018 at 12:05 AM
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July 21, 2019 at 8:05 PM
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July 22, 2019 at 6:47 PM
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July 22, 2019 at 7:29 PM
https://www.filmfare.com/features/the-sexy-70s_-7932-21.html
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