Opera halls have always been a little distant to those who are unfamiliar with either opera or the venue.

Cinemas are now moving to bring people closer to opera as video footage is made available by the world’s top opera companies, armed with state-of-the-art video and audio technologies to convey an equal level of emotion to the audience.

Megabox, the country’s second-largest cinema chain, will screen Verdi’s opera “Un Ballo in Maschera” from June 29 and “La Traviata” from July 6 at its COEX, Central and Mokdong branches in Seoul and at its KINTEX and Baekseok branches in Gyeonggi Province.

“Un Ballo in Maschera” features conductor Fabio Luisi and singers Sondra Radvanovsky, Kathleen Kim, Stephanie Blythe, Marcelo Alvarez and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. “La Traviata” was conducted by Julian Kovatchev and the grand set was designed by Argentine director Hugo de Ana.

“Un Ballo in Maschera” is part of the cinema’s presentation of “The Met: Live in HD 2012-13” series, which selects some of the best operas staged at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. This year, Donizetti’s “L’Elisir d’Amore,” Verdi’s “Otello,” Ades’ “The Tempest” and Mozart’s “La Clemenza di Tito” have so far been screened. Donizetti’s “Maria Stuarda,” Verdi’s “Rigoletto” and Zandnai’s “Francesca da Rimini” will be released in the latter half of the year.

“‘The Met: Live in HD’ has become popular not only among opera lovers but novices as well as those who wish to watch the show with their families. It has become a frontrunner in showing our cinema’s expanding spectrum and business diversification,” said Lee Yong-bok, a spokesman for the cinema.

“La Traviata” is part of the Verona Festival in 2011, marketed as “one of the festivals you should enjoy before you die,” by its distributor, Unitel Classica. Megabox has previously streamed Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra New Year’s Concert 2013 live at eight of its branches on New Year’s Day. The live streaming of the annual concert held at the Austrian capital city marked 90 percent occupancy at theaters in faraway Seoul.

The film presentation of operas have added features: exclusive backstage interviews of star singers in which they talk about their interpretation of the roles, as well as lectures by noted singers on each act and the introduction of the characters and the composer’s intentions. It even allows for an intermission, just as in opera houses. The high-quality images allow even the minutest details to be picked up by the audiences.

“This is my first time watching opera at a cinema. I was a little worried that it may kill the mood but it was satisfactory overall. I especially liked the fact that the subtitles were placed right on the lower side of the screen, which means that I do not have to stretch my neck upwards near the ceiling like I do at an opera hall,” said Kim Young-hee upon watching the Met’s “La Clemenza di Tito” by Mozart at Megabox Central on Wednesday.

Still, the audio system could be improved ― when singers sang a little louder or hit high notes, the sound was overly piercing.

“We are still in the adaption stage of opera films and there’s not much we have done to specialize audio for operas. We admit that there might be some shortcomings. We will work on that in the future,” a spokeswoman for the cinema said.

By Bae Ji-sook (baejisook@heraldcorp.com)