Too bad for cinema enthusiasts. In Norway, movie theaters will remain closed until 1 pm on Sundays, under a regulation adopted in 1735 and aimed at ensuring that nothing would disturb the Lord's Day. A text most Norwegians were unaware of until Sunday work was debated in Parliament, and the newspaper Aftenposten unearthed it.

It all started with the proposal of three MPs from the Red Party (far-left), in early October 2023. Faced with the proliferation of municipalities claiming the status of "tourist centers," allowing them to authorize the Sunday opening of stores, the parliamentarians called for restrictions to ensure that the seventh day of the week remains "a different day." Discussions then began within the Committee on Family Affairs and Culture.

MPs from the Liberal Party, the Conservative Party, and the nationalist Progress Party took the opportunity to point out that the law regulating work on public holidays and Sundays is a little outdated since it justifies rest by the need to "guarantee religious life and general peace." Furthermore, while there are exceptions for various types of public, cultural, or sporting spaces, cinemas are not allowed to open before 1 pm on Sundays, unlike museums or football stadiums.

Right-wing crusade

This detail is all the more surprising as hardly anyone in Norway seems to know where this rule comes from. Neither the cinemas, some of which regularly request exemptions from the police nor the spectators nor the MPs were aware of it until Aftenposten revealed the origin of this regulation, "related to the Sabbath," adopted more than a century and a half before the Lumière brothers developed their cinematograph.

The right-wing MPs immediately embarked on this new crusade: "Does the police really need to use resources to stop the Disney movie that children are watching at the cinema on Sunday at noon?" questions Silje Hjemdal (Progress Party). Even the head of the Church of Norway, Olav Fykse Tveit, acknowledges that the regulation seems "a bit special and outdated."

But on the left, there's no question of giving in. "If we open our stores on Sundays, this will quickly have major consequences for other categories of workers," responded Labor MP Mona Nilsen, arguing that she's never heard of "a cinema manager being thrown into a detention cell because he started a screening a little too early." On March 5, a proposal to allow cinemas to open before 1 pm was rejected.