Initially, Saudi Arabia did not refute the idea of movie theaters and did allow independent improvised cinemas which functioned outside government interference.[34] Similar to many of the other Arab countries, cinema was introduced into Saudi Arabia by westerners, who were working for oil and gas companies in Saudi Arabia, such as Aramco, at the time.[35] This led to the building of projector screens in residential buildings in the 1930s.[35] The cinemas went on to screen Egyptian films of the golden era and in 1959, almost 70% of the films made in Egypt that year, were exported in 16mm film to Saudi Arabia.[3] However, these films were censored and were only supposed to be screened privately.[4] Later on, this move was blocked for concerns that cinema would interfere with religious public and private life, therefore leading in a total cinema blackout during the 1990s and early 2000s. the exception being the IMAX system instated by Khalid in the city of Khobar which only displayed scientific and religious oriented content.