Ara Damansara

Entrance to the halls

The long awaited cinema is now here in Citta Mall. In fact, it has been in operations for sometime now and if you are surprised, you are forgiven as there was hardly any publicity on the opening.

For the millions they have invested, it defies logic why they didn’t have a marketing campaign. The marketing could be as simple as what her competitor did: free movies for the first few days. For a brand that is hardly known and located at a mall that draws little crowd, haven’t they studied Marketing 101?

Criticism aside, MBO is rather unique. The decor is interesting with a theme of lego blocks. There is a wall that appears to be mosaic until you walk closer. It’s actually made up of thousands of small lego blocks, meticulously assembled. On the ceiling are giant versions looking down at us. The entrance to the cinema halls is also unique. It looks like you are walking into a children playland.

A business can only survive when there are customers and it is no different for an expensive joint like a cinema. For those who venture there, you notice there are hardly any patrons let alone a queue. It may not be a bad thing especially if you are the last minute type. For sure, you can easily get a seat and no queuing!

The other surprise is the tickets do not come cheap. In fact, they are damn expensive! A seat that promise to impress you with a 4D experience will also burn a hole in your pocket with a hefty ticket price of RM26. Even a normal seat costs some 50% more.

Now would you part with your money for the experience? Perhaps. There may be a niche market they are targeting at: those loving young couples, the impromptu type, kids of Rich Dad and those who just had too much money to burn.

And they get the privilege of having the hall almost entirely to themselves.

For me, I would rather join the crowd as watching a movie like Alone in a deserted hall is just too much for me to bear.