Nearly half a million accounts were sold since the start of online screening of Iranian movies on April 12 over a period of one month.
Five movies, namely "Exodus" by Ebrahim Hatamikia, "Tala" by Parviz Shahbazi, "Under the Supervision" by Majid Salehi, "New Moon Hotel" by Takefumi Tsutsui and "Blade and Termeh" by Kiumars Pourahmad, were shown online by two local video streaming service providers, Filimo and Namava, as the coronavirus closed movie theaters and people were confined to a home quarantine.
With an average 2.5 viewers for each of the 150,000-rial (88 cents) account, the turnover of this new form of entertainment has been estimated at 750 billion rials ($4.41 million) with a viewership of 1.25 million.
Seventy percent of the revenues of online box office will directly go to the owner of the movie to compensate part of the huge losses they have sustained as a result of the virus outbreak.
Investors of 50 other films have also applied for online screening, the Persian daily Shargh reported.
1st Drive-In Cinema After Revolution
Earnings from the first-week screening of Ebrahim Hatamikia’s Persian-language movie “Exodus” at Tehran’s Milad Tower parking lot’s drive-in cinema hit 708.7 million rials ($4,165) by May 7.
For the first time after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the country’s only drive-in theater opened on May 1 with the first-run screening of Exodus.
A total of 160 cars with two people in it bought the movie’s 400,000-rial ($2.35) tickets, filling the site at each showing.
Owj Arts and Media Organization, the organizer of project, continued the screening of the movie through May 11, thanks to the positive reception of moviegoers, Mehr News Agency reported.
Workers sprayed disinfectants on cars that lined up each night here after buying tickets online for what is called the "Cinema Machine" in Farsi. They tuned into the film's audio via an FM station on their car radios.
"It was very fascinating; this is the first time this is happening, at least for people my age," Behrouz Pournezam, 36, who watched the film along with his wife was quoted as saying by AP.
"We are here mostly for the excitement to be honest; the movie itself didn´t matter that much. I didn´t care what movie it is or by whom or which genre."
The film by director Ebrahim Hatamikia focuses on cotton farmers whose fields die from saltwater pumped by local dams. The farmers drive their tractors to Tehran to protest the government.
Moviegoer Atefeh Soheili was glad just to enjoy entertainment outside of her home.
"Now I´m sitting here with clean hands and if I want to eat something or relax, I don´t need to worry about distancing from other people," she said.
A drive-in theater is a form of cinema structure consisting of a large outdoor movie screen, a projection booth, a concession stand and a large parking area for automobiles. Within this enclosed area, customers can view movies from the privacy and comfort of their cars.
With the widespread closures of cinemas as part of measures to stem the spread of coronavirus, drive-in movie theaters, where social distancing is guaranteed, have been enjoying newfound popularity around the world.
Hatamikia’s Exodus experienced the first online screening on April 12 amid the pandemic with the ticket priced at 120,000 rials (70 cents). According to the local video streaming service provider Filimo, the film was available for online streaming for six hours after purchase. It had been previously planned to be available for 24 hours, but Filimo reduced the time to prevent, but to no avail, illegal copying and release of the film.
