Closing Chapters

Place: Metropolis Cinema
Mood: Contemplative
Song: Yesterdays * Billie Holiday

Yesterdays
Days I knew as happy sweet
Sequestered days
Olden days
Golden days

On the 28th of August 2008, I was supposed to turn 25. A quarter-of-a-century old. I was closing a chapter and presumably unveiling a new one.

But on the 28th of August 2008, I was also closing a primordial chapter.

Metropolis, the cinema that I have been devoting myself to since its opening, was shutting down its doors, because of management issues. This 2-year-old 110-seat theater which has proved to have its own public in the face of multiplexes in Beirut, was shutting its doors because some people were just afraid its success might overlap theirs. And these people were certainly not the multiplexes that have a life of their own and who do not need us for competition.


So on this 28th of August 2008, I spent my days cleaning up the office and removing every single trace that could prove that Metropolis was here. The posters were stripped of the walls and condemned to spend some months in plastic bags. The multiple floor plans were thrown away. The archive has been slammed in repulsive white boxes. Metropolis no longer exists in Al Madina Theater.

But that does not mean that it is not bound to continue. We have a new event set and a new location in which it will hopefully take place.

So at 7:45 PM, 5 minutes before I would turn 25, I turned the lights off, took the last boxes and shut the doors behind me.
I was ready to start a new chapter on all levels. Hopefully a chapter that will not wind down very soon.

One of the very last photos of Metropolis in Al Madina Theater, in July 2008, with my colleague Sarra