IT is an industry built on fantasy and offers audiences the chance to escape the ordinary, visiting times, places and even worlds out of reach and out of our reality. No wonder, then, that cinema is one of our favourite past times.

But while the pandemic means that need for escapism is perhaps more urgent than it has been in generations, the brutal reality of coronavirus is presenting the sector with problems that aren’t easy to evade.

Picture houses in Scotland were allowed to re-open their doors with social distancing from mid-July.

But while that was a welcome return to business for operators and audiences alike, the changes mean takings are far lower than before, with additional restrictions on capacity and higher overheads on cleaning.

Last week global chain Cineworld – which counts Scotland’s record-breaking cine-skyscraper in Glasgow amongst its near 800-outlets – revealed a loss of £1.3 billion for the six months to June, warning that “there can be no certainty as to the future impact of Covid-19 on the group.”

All but six of its UK sites are open but revenues plummeted year-on-year during the first half of 2020 and the group is in talks with lenders in an attempt to negotiate waivers on banking agreements for December and June.

However, the London-based operation said demand for Tenet, the latest blockbuster from Christopher Nolan, had been good, making for trading that was “encouraging considering the circumstances”.

That sci-fi offering – the first major studio release as UK lockdown eased – was heralded as the movie that would get viewers into cinemas again and took £5.33 million in the UK and Ireland during its first week on release.

That followed several delays – something Cineworld says is bad for business but which is affecting many productions.

Over the last week, several highly-anticipated films have been pushed back, with Steven Spielberg’s remake of the much-loved musical West Side Story delayed for a year.

Marvel caper Black Widow, starring Scarlett Johansson as the hard-kicking heroine, was originally slated for release in May but was also put off for 12 months. Eternals, another Marvel superhero flick which will this time star Scotland’s Richard Madden alongside Game of Thrones co-star Kit Harington and others, has been nudged back from November to February.

And Wonder Woman 1984, the follow-up to the franchise’s debut, has had no fewer that five release dates as it gets pushed back once again. The most recent is now October 2 but it could be later.

Delays also hit sequels A Quiet Place Part 2 and F9, while Disney switched the launch of its live-action remake of Mulan to its streaming service rather than hazard a theatrical release. Greyhound, directed by Tom Hanks, was also rerouted onto Apple TV Plus, while the upcoming Avatar and Star Wars offerings have also been bumped back.

These are the titles theatre chains bank on. While there are a number of others slated for the coming weeks, industry leaders are hoping No Time To Die, the oft-held-back James Bond movie, will breathe new life into the year-end from November – unless winter brings with it the second spike so many fear.

“If governments were to strengthen restrictions on social gathering, which may therefore oblige us to close our estate again or further push back movie releases,” Cineworld says, “it would have a negative impact on our financial performance and likely require the need to raise additional liquidity.”

The group’s share price fell by more than 13% on Thursday after its half-year results were published. Those numbers, according to analyst Michael Hewson of CMC Markets, “serve to highlight the scale of the mountain that needs to be scaled by the sector as a whole”.

Against this backdrop, it remains to be seen how the latest release from Scotland will fare. Schemers, the story of Dundee music promoter Dave McLean and the time he booked Iron Maiden to play Caird Hall, is described as a “love letter”

to the city and includes cameos from The View’s Kyle Falconer amongst others.

Its world premiere was held at the Edinburgh International Film Festival last year, but it hit UK cinemas on Friday.

Meanwhile, next week will mark another first for Scotland’s cinemas as the Odeon at Edinburgh’s Fort Kinnaird retail park is used to host remote jury trials in a bid to tackle the backlog caused by the pandemic. Around 750 High Court trials were waiting to be heard as of the end of last month.

Jurors will be socially distanced and feature on a video wall inside courtrooms in Edinburgh and Livingston. The cinema screen viewed by jurors will show a general view of the court, the accused, the judge or witness.

The arrangement will be in place for six months but may be extended.

More trials are scheduled for the week of October 12 at another jury centre for the High Court in Glasgow, using 11 screens at the Odeon complex in the Braehead shopping centre, Renfrewshire.