You know how it is: When there’s a blockbuster opening, you better reserve tickets or else suffer the consequences of spoilers because you’d be hard-pressed to find decent seats or even movie tickets in the metro’s biggest malls’ cinemas.

I remember, when I was still working in a publishing company along Pioneer, the cinema in the nearby mall was our best-kept secret: very few people watch there. Now, people who live and work in the area of Pioneer, Reliance, Boni, EDSA Central—basically Mandaluyong residents and employees—have a spanking new cinema to go to when there’s a blockbuster or just anytime they feel like unwinding: SM Cinemas is now open in SM Light Residences along EDSA-Boni—the first condo to have its very own movie theater. Lucky residents!

The Light Mall, which opened yesterday, March 20, is the first resident mall with three fully-digitized cinemas and serves as an extension of the Light Residences homeowners’ retail, dining, and entertainment hub. Besides the cinema, the Supermarket and a lot of the stores and restaurants within the mall also opened yesterday.

SM Cinema at Light Mall is the first cinema within an SMDC Residential condominium, making it really convenient for homeowners to watch the latest movies in the comfort of their own residence. The cinemas will cater to Light tenants as well as families and young professionals who live and work around and near the area.

Each of the three digital cinemas have approximately 100 seats each, giving you a more private and personal movie experience compared to the usual mall cinemas with a minimum average seating capacity of 300 guests per theater. In this new SM Cinema, you can enjoy the latest and biggest movies on screens that project super clear images and with surround sound to ensure you get a superb movie-watching experience. Even the temperature is just right: Cold enough, even in this extreme summer heat, but not too much that you’re already uncomfortable, shivering, or unable to hold your pee.

I experienced this myself at yesterday’s screening of Insurgent, now open in Philippines cinemas. The movie adaptation of the YA novel fully demonstrated and maximized the state-of-the-art screen and sound technology and facilities of the cinema because of how action-packed and effects-heavy it is. In fact, sorry conservative Insurgent fans, the filmmakers took several liberties to intensify the action in an already rather violent story, it’s like I watched a completely different Insurgent altogether.

Without divulging spoilers (or at least not that many), allow me to say that the key plot points are still there, but sometimes executed by different characters or under different circumstances and settings. Whoever died in the book still died in the movie, whoever saved someone is mostly still the one who does the saving of the same person, and whoever is the traitor is still a traitor…just brought to life on the big screen very differently.

I guess a conservative part of me wishes the they stayed true and loyal to the book, but then again, I can’t complain because I still enjoyed the movie adaptation. I got what I came for: another two full hours of watching a larger-than-life, deep-voiced, super hot Theo James and an entertaining, thrilling, armrest-gripping movie experience (even if I’ve read the book, given all the changes, I was no longer sure what would happen next). For those two things alone, I would still watch Insurgent, whether or not I approve of their changing certain details of the story somehow. Actually, I don’t mind watching it again because I missed the first 10 to 15 minutes.

SM Light Residences is located at Madison St. corner EDSA. The Light Mall is located at the first and second floors of the podium. It is conveniently linked to the Boni-EDSA MRT station, so it’s definitely accessible!

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