The last remaining standalone cinema in Thailand had just closed its curtain

[Nantawat Kittiwarakul]

Scala, the last remaining standalone cinema in Thailand just had it farewill show on last Sunday.

This architectually exotic house had open its door from 1969 and became the landmark of the downtown Bangkok ever since.

But as you already had guessed, the business model of standalone cinema seems to have no place in today's world anymore. Being on the leased estate would make things even harder and harder each year.

And the Covid-19 pandermic was literally final nail in the coffin. After all cinemas contrywide had been ordered to close for almost 3 months, its owner had made the ultimate decision to have the final show before the permanent closedown on Sunday 5th with Cinema Paradiso as its farewell program.

I was lucky enough to be one of the last patrons of the last show, and the last day of the last standalone cinema existed in this whole contry.
A bittersweet honor, to say at least.

Today, not a single standalone cinema exist here anymore, and never will.


The marvel architecture from half a century ago.


The lobby.


The arch roof (forgot to take the panoramic view, stupid me).


This chandelier had lighted the lobby for the past 50 years.


The entrance to the auditorium. Notice the decoration.


The auditorium itself.


The audience's farewell notes.


Curtains closed, lights off, the end...

[Paul Barker]

what a fabulous cinema. so so sad that it has now closed. thank you for posting these pictures.

[Douglas Meltzer]

So beautiful and so sad.

Doug

[Janice Glesser]

Very difficult to see these beautiful venues disappear Nantawat At least you were one of the last to see it goodbye.

[Lee Mannering]

Travesty

[Nantawat Kittiwarakul]

At least this one still have a chance to have a farewell show, with the owner having a goodbey speech to the audience. Others simply closed its door and being demolished with little to no attention from the public.

There's still a little hope that the landlord would retain the building, and someone would repurpose this into something else (live performance theater, art gallery, whatever) in the near future. Jut keeping fingers crossed.

Edit: and here's the farewell event of this closure. You probably don't understand the language, but you surely understand the context of this anyway.

[Adrian Winchester]

So sorry to hear this sad news. I have no idea if there are 'listed' buildings in Thailand with a protected status, but this looks like it would be fitting.
Nantawat - I wondered what size of audience can be accommodated? is there no chance that some sort of campaign could be started to try and save it?

[Nantawat Kittiwarakul]

The building had been awarded for its marvelous architect some years ago. Can't remember the detail but quite a big ones.
If my understanding is correct the building must be at least 100 years old to be enlisted as national treasure (sort of, not sure about the exact name). With another 50 years to match the criteria I have no hope about that - at all.

If it's 10-20 years ago there might be a chance for this building to be taken by the new owner. But in today's countrywide declining economics that would be extremely unlikely to happen.

The capacity of this cinema is about 1,000 seats. Not the largest ever existed here of course (the largest house was 3k seats, but that's long gone - about 2 decades ago).

The point is that this closure means the standalone cinema is now totally extinct from this country. It's gone, forever. How depressed it is.