Projectionists at the Nagarjun theater
Balaju, Kathmandu 2002 or 2004

Projectionists at the old Nagarjun theater. I believe that my getting to the projection booth required climbing up a metal ladder from a roof area.

I have since been told that this theater closed sometime in 2006.

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Another projectionist in the same booth on a different day.
Unfortunately, I misplaced wherever I wrote down the projectionists names.

Excerpt from a postcard written on September 28th, 2000:

“So it’s 11:45am, I have nothing I have to do in Betrawati today, so I say “I think I’ll go catch the last half of that movie with Barsha and Santosh”. Binod decides to join me (or escort me—I don’t think Sajani wants me going many places by myself because of the Maoist situation) so we walk the remaining 2km, I buy two 20-rupee rickets (about 30 cents each), and in we go.

It’s already about forty-five minutes into the film so it must be half over, I think. We take our seats and the next few scenes are very much like a ’60s beach movie—Monkee-esqe hijinks and a few musical dance numbers. The name of the movie is Dharmaputra and it stars a man named Raj Hamal who seems to be in every Nepali movie. As far as I can tell, Raj Hamal’s trademark is the bleeding eye—any poster you see with him in a fighting pose, he has the “Raj Hamal Bleeding Eye” going in full effect.

So, I’m in this darkened theater, Raj Hamal has been beaten up by three thugs and lays unconscious. But what’s this? Now the three thugs are going to beat up the very woman that hired them? She screams. Raj Hamal is still out. A few more screams and then Raj Hamal awakens and jumps up, fists at the ready. Every child in the place erupts with cheering and clapping, and for a moment there in the dark, it’s a Saturday afternoon in the 1940s and I’m watching a serial with all the kids from the neighborhood.”

Below: Looking out a broken window from the second floor of the Nagarjun theater.