Page 46 - link magazine

VIEWPOINT: Jamie Hill

Will Swindon soon not be able to move for movies?

In a couple of years you won’t Ocelot magazine editor and film columnist Jamie Hill looks into whether the proliferation of cinemas in Swindon
be able to move for multi-screen is good for the town or not. Is four multiplexes too many? Will they play all the same things at the same time as is
cinemas in the town. the case right now, or might they give Swindon cinema aficionados the variety they so desperately want?
Popping down the shops to get a
paper? Oops there’s a new cinema Now another cinema is to be built Greenbridge has been winning the I loved that cinema and used to
in your way. as part of the Morai North Star battle for bums on seats with Shaw queue round the block in the late
Trying to traverse the Magic development next to the Oasis. Ridge sometimes ghostly in com- eighties and early nineties. There
Roundabout? Oh no, you’ve become Four multiple screen centres in parison. Many is the time I’ve gone was no choice then and it was
stuck behind a brand new multiplex different locations, that’s a good to Greenbridge to find the screening great.
showing the latest instalment of thing, right? full before traipsing across to West I’m hoping that with more compe-
Fast and Furious. The population of Swindon cur- Swindon to find Shaw Ridge has tition, the cinemas will change their
Okay, I might be exaggerating but rently stands at just over 210,000 room to spare. offering to give audiences a more
there does seem to be a prolifera- with up 20,000 houses due to be But times, they are a-changing. diverse range of entertainment and
tion of film venues. built over the next few years. If you Will Shaw Ridge be the first casu- not just more of the same.
We’ve had Shaw Ridge’s Cineworld add to that another 100,000 people alty in this war? Or will Cineworld Just having a quick glance at the
and Greenbridge’s Empire jostling within a ten mile radius, there’s do a revamp to back up its Regent current listings you can see that
for control of our film fixations definitely the market. But will these Circus offer as the cinema du jour? the variety is simply not there. At
for years. But recently Cineworld cinemas all in competition with There’s a huge population to the the time of writing in mid-July the
opened their multiplex at the new each other be able to attract the west of the town to upset if Shaw choice is pretty spare with all three
very nice Regent Circus develop- spending public? Ridge were to close. cinemas playing the latest instal-
ment. In the last few years the Empire at I miss the Odeon on Regent Street. ment of the Terminator franchise,

46 swindonlink.com n August 2015

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