Shanghai to build China's largest huge screen cinema in Baoshan
Baoshan District will build China’s largest huge-screen cinema at a former container dock on the bank of the Yangtze River, officials said on Tuesday.
The ball-shape Changtan Huge-screen Cinema with a diameter of about 35 meters will become the third largest in the world following the LG IMAX Theatre Sydney and an IMAX cinema in Singapore upon its completion in 2019, the district government said. Its screen will be 22.4 meters wide and 12 meters tall.
The cinema to serve 380 audiences will become a cultural landmark of the Changtan, or Shanghai Long Island, which is being transformed into a new high-end residential area and tourist attraction from the former container site.
The cinema will be covered by glass and aluminum to make it look like a large pearl being composed of numerous smaller ones, said Billy Yu, the chief designer for the project. The ball will be surrounded by a commercial complex in the shape of two Yangtze River dolphins.
"The water of the Yangtze will be poured into the complex to make the whole project like two river dolphins playing with a pearl in river," he told a press conference.
The cinema will become the third major cultural venue apart from two concert halls which have been planned in the area to cover the shortage of major cultural venues in the northern district, the district government said.
One of the concert halls has been nicknamed “Crystal,” due to its shape and transparent appearance. It will have 772 seats at ground level and 258 overhead and will be able to accommodate a major symphony orchestra of more than 100 musicians.
Underground constructions have started on the cinema, the complex and part of the future Changtan project, said Gao Jianqiang, an official with the Shanghai International Port Group taking charge of the project.
Formerly operated by the port group, the Changtan dock was once a bustling center for maritime trade, but is being developed for housing and leisure like many other container ports around the world.
Scheduled for an initial completion in 2018, the revamped riverside site, which stretches for 1.8 kilometer along the Yangtze, will feature 4,200 apartments, three parks, assorted shopping malls, restaurants and coffee shops, hotels and kindergartens, according to the group.
The Changtan area will also be featured by a 180-meter-tall sightseeing tower where visitors can watch the whole project and the Mouth of Yangtze River on the top.