It’s 12:01 a.m. on July 16, 2021. Outside Film.Ca Cinemas, there are dozens of excited moviegoers waiting to come inside and do something that hasn’t happened in almost a year.
Not a minute later than allowed in Step 3, CEO Jeff Knoll unlocks the front door and uses a door stop to keep it open - he doesn’t want these doors closed another second longer - and the audience comes inside.
To commemorate the start of Step 3 in the province, Film.Ca Cinemas opened for midnight screenings of new, popular movies last night (or, depending how you look at it, earlier this morning) becoming the first indoor cinema to open not just Oakville but in all of Halton Region after more than eight months of closure.
Friends Taylor Moyle, Alex Souza and Eddie Wong were excitedly waiting underneath the theatre’s iconic marquee to come inside and be the theatre’s first customers to watch a movie since November last year.
What brought them out so late? They’re here for Marvel’s Black Widow. They’ve could’ve paid to see it on Disney+ last week, but they say it wouldn’t have felt right.
"We’re here for Marvel - just seeing it on the big screen. It’s so much better," said Souza. Wong adds, "Nothing beats the movies."
The excitement was palpable amid the crowd. Fans were on hand for one of the showtimes across all five screens at Film.Ca - showtimes were each staggered for viewers’ choice of Black Widow, F9 (Fast & Furious 9) and A Quiet Place Part II.
And serving popcorn to them? General manager Jason Speers and manager Adam Kuphos. Both of them have worked at the cinema for years before the pandemic started, and are two of the few staff that have been kept on throughout the closure, albeit with different daily duties through the cinema’s several business pivots over the last year and a half.
But last night they were back doing what they love and do best. The two of them served the entire crowd in less than 20 minutes, working with expert precision. If you didn’t know they hadn’t done this since last year, you’d think it was just another busy night at the theatre.
"It’s really nice doing this again," said Speers. "It’s been a long time - I kind of wondered if we ever going to come home. We kept thinking we could open again, thinking we were there and then it kept getting pulled away again, so being open feels really good."
Kuphos, meanwhile, rightly acknowledged that reopening brought about “a little bit of anxiety," knowing there was a lot to do to get ready. "But I’m excited to see some familiar faces and to see this place come to life again," he said.
"The best part for me is getting to spend a few minutes talking to a stranger about what they thought about a movie that they just saw. That kind of interaction really excites me and I’m really happy to have it back."
Coming back isn’t without effort, though. Speers outlined some of the several health protocols and procedures in place with gusto: separate air conditioner ventilation systems for each screen, more than 6 feet of distancing between seated audience members, cleaning between shows and sanitizer stations.
"Around the world, there has never been a case of COVID-19 traced back to a movie theatre," according to Speers.
While that’s hard to definitively prove, it is true there is no known report from anywhere in the world of a confirmed case coming from a cinema, and we know for certain that there have been zero cases among the nearly eight million cinema visitors in Canada since the start of the pandemic last year. Speers insists, "We are safe."
More importantly, Speers talks about the good both cinemas and specifically Film.Ca brings to the Oakville community. "Community cinemas, especially independents, really help their surrounding areas by provide a hub where people meet and where they can get together. We see it all the time, where they [people] run into each other even if they haven’t seen each other in a long time."
"We provide assistance to the community, running programs for people like underprivileged kids, seniors, dog guides - we can welcome them and do these programs you can’t do anywhere else. No matter who you are, this is where people can meet and where people come to have fun."
Next to the happy guests, perhaps most excited for the reopening is CEO Knoll. "I think that the best part of being open again is to actually do what we love doing. We actually enjoy being busy, entertaining our guests by playing films," he said.
"We can give them some relief that they need to take in times like this. For us, the most important thing is just getting back to the movies, giving people something to do and giving them an opportunity to get out and have some fun."
Showtimes, tickets and more information is available on the Film.Ca Cinemas website. They are now open daily once again seven days a week.