For starts, I apologise for reviewing Adlabs - Pacific Mall under Adlabs - Noida. Sorry. The Pacific Mall would have to have been requested and this meant time. I wanted to make this post available along with the one on Pacific Mall.
It would be obvious that a lot of my concerns were infact with the Pacific Mall and its management as they were majorly responsible for my busted evening on July the 28th, 2008. But there is more to that story that I deliberately left out there to highlight it here.
As my picture taken in front of the promos next to the’BOX OFFICE’ suggest, there was an instance of illumination that night. I am standing with a’Black Forest’ Kulfi in my hand. Not bad. There was also a’Rum n Raisin’ Kulfi listed with the vendor, but as per his confession, it has never been available and is not sure if it ever will be. Shayad Rum ka quota nahin hai. I can fully understand this as I would also finish off the rumm myself, rather than putting it in the mould for kulfi. So much for the kulfi. Kulfi ne chill kiya, but Adlabs ne toh kill kiya.
As we waited for the power to resume existence, we were told that the existing shows were still running on the UPS. But beyond this there was no more information that the guy at the counter could give. We waited patiently, but kept checking with him if there was any update. All our queries met with a left-right shake of the head. What if there was a fire in the electric supply? Would the staff have had any information then? Soon, some attendants came out and stood at the gates of the cinema. We took it as a positive sign. Little did we know that they had come out to give back the lighters, matchboxes, cigarette packs to the people who were now streaming out. There was no light at this moment and only the 4-5 bulbs lit in the Food Court offered some relief. I guess, this must be like that Akbar-Birbal story, where the brahmin that stands in the cold river Ganga, gets warmth from the lamp lit in the castle, metres away. I personally saw some people stumbling and losing foothold but none of the attendants had the presence of mind to either switch on some flashlight(they might not have one, but then how do they check the tickets for seat nos. in the dark auditorium) nor did they switch on some mobile phones to give an indication of the way out. I saw one gentleman band his head against the glass for he thought that was the way through.
Then there was this interesting point when the UPS failed in less than half an hour’s time. Post that everything was’pitch black’(not Vin Diesel’s movie) The movie that I had come to see, ’The Dark(K)night’ was so apt to the dark night that enveloped the crowd.
The other point of conflict was the contention of the staff to run the earlier films that had been running to their logical and actual’THE END’, inspite of the fact that everyone from the arlier shows had left. Obviously, provided there was power(electricity) to support this. This meant that all the show would have to be accordingly delayed. This would have been a sensible thing if the people from the incompleted shows were still around. But, did they now plan to run these shows with empty seats and force the people for the subsequent shows to wait unneccessarily.
When they started to delay the issuance of fresh tickets and asked everyone to wait till the end of the earlier shows, even if they wanted refunds for the shows that had never started, realisation dawned on me that the actual plan was to delay things to the point where everyone would leave frustrated but without money and they could get to keep the money from the tickets sold but not have the show at all. They planned to scrap the late night show.
The mall had recovered power but the Adlabs did not have the backup still.
I think that the staff was not being fair to their customers and were deliberately delaying things to avoid charges and the show.
Cons:
The staff is not well informed.
They are not courteous enough to help(no light),
They deliberately try to fleece the customer and try to evade the show.
There was availability of seats in all their shows all the time. No house fulls. Wonder how long they will survive.(Seat availability is a sure plus, if the show actually gets underway)
*Pros:
*- Seats are always available.
The worst that could happen was that later we came to know that there was a 10.45 pm show at the Adlabs - Noida. Had we known in time we could have caught that. Boo-hoo-hoo. There could have been a happy end to this story.
*Learnings:
* - Listen to ur heart but listen to ur subconcious mind too.(i felt uncomfortable but still went for the movie)
Go to places you know. Try new things but have contingency plans in place. (We could have still made it to the 11.30pm show at PVR Priya)
If the staff says that they don’t have any information, **BELIEVE them and RUN.
*- Don’t lose heart and try again in the daytime and plan.
Inspite of my review, I reccomend the cinema for I have firm belief that there is scope and potential in the place. We have IMAX only at Adlabs in Pacific Mall, Ghaziabad and Great India Place, Noida. Other experiences could be better. Actually, it would have to be really bad to even compete with this experience. Maybe, when my wounds heal(to my ego), I might return. Till then - "RUN"