After the disappointment of seeing the Mexican Formula One Grand Prix canceled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Mexico City government has turned its F1 track into a drive-in cinema.
On a rainy Sunday, dozens of people drove up to Turn Four of the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City, which has been temporarily converted into the Autocinema Mixhuca.
The cinema allows movie goers to maintain social distancing while enjoying exclusively Mexican films.Juan Manuel Bedwell, a veteran accountant, left home isolation to go back to a drive-in cinema for the first time in four decades, to watch the 2013 Mexican film тАЬThe Last Call,тАЭ a comedy based on тАЬCaligula,тАЭ a play by Frenchman Albert Camus.But instead of taking his girlfriend, this time Bedwell was accompanied by three children and three grandchildren.
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The pandemic тАЬis something we didnтАЩt expect, but we need to get out because if we stay locked up inside weтАЩll get more depressed every day,тАЭ Bedwell told AFP.
The new cinema has been organized by the capitalтАЩs culture secretariat and has a capacity for 415 vehicles.
It will open every Sunday and Wednesday until August 19.
Drive-in cinemas first arrived in Mexico in the 1950s but gradually lost their popularity and disappeared.
тАЬDue to the pandemic and the need for a тАШnew normal,тАЩ they have great potential,тАЭ said Argel Gomez, Big Festivals director at the Mexico City culture secretariat.
ItтАЩs not the first transformation of the race track, which has long hosted the countryтАЩs biggest music festivals. During the pandemic, it is also serving as the site of a temporary hospital for coronavirus patients.
Mexico is the fourth worst hit country in the world by the coronavirus outbreak with more than 43,000 deaths, and sixth in number of cases with over 390,000 infections among its 127 million population.
For Ernesto Contreras, a director and former president of MexicoтАЩs cinematography academy, the drive-through movie theater is тАЬa reason to celebrateтАЭ and he believes it will be a boon to MexicoтАЩs cinema industry.
тАЬTo the extent that we open these new possibilities, even though itтАЩs in the midst of a new alternative, we gain space for our cinema,тАЭ he said.
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