Kathmandu, Sept. 20 -- The last movie screened at the QFX Cinemas in Kathmandu on 17 March before the Covid-19 crisiswas the Hollywood thriller Bloodshot starring Vin Diesel. Multiplexes have been empty since, pushing Nepal's biggest theatre chain to the verge of bankruptcy.

When real life starts to resemble reel life as depicted in movies like the 2011 thriller Contagion, there are also doubts about whether cinema can serve as a form of escapism.

For Nakim Uddin and his team at QFX Cinemas, the pandemic has turned a thriving business into a horror show much more frightening than any movie script. In the last two decades since QFX was established, the chain of multiplexes introduced unheard of comfort to Nepal's cinema-goers.

After rev...