The client wanted to refresh their cinema website with a more modern, stylish experience while keeping every booking and account function working exactly as customers expected. That meant integrating cleanly with an existing third-party ticketing platform (VISTA) for real-time showtimes and seat availability, modernizing the backend around a microservices approach, and doing it without disrupting the legacy systems the business already depended on.
A senior Tuix developer joined the client's team as an embedded engineer for a full year, working end to end across the rebuild: frontend, backend, and the integration work connecting both to the client's existing ticketing infrastructure. Rather than delivering a spec from the outside, the engagement meant sitting inside the client's own priorities and constraints, so decisions like preserving single sign-on across services or migrating to a serverless architecture were made in service of what the client's team could realistically maintain going forward, not just what looked good at launch.
Frontend on the Edge
The frontend is a React-based application built with Next.js, optimized for speed, SEO, and responsiveness. It's deployed via Vercel, enabling fast global delivery, automatic builds, and a smooth developer experience with built-in CI/CD. Users can browse showtimes, book tickets, manage profiles, and view confirmation details, all from a clean, high-performance UI.
Serverless by Design, Seamless in Delivery
The platform is built on a fully serverless, event-driven architecture using AWS Lambda and API Gateway. Each key function, authentication, bookings, communications, and PDF generation, is handled by a dedicated Lambda microservice, ensuring low maintenance and easy scaling.Centralized Request Handling
An AWS API Gateway routes all frontend requests to the appropriate Lambda services, providing a unified entry point with built-in throttling, monitoring, and security.
External API Integration
The backend connects with a leading cinema booking platform via API to fetch real-time movie listings, seat availability, and pricing. Booking confirmations and user activity sync back to the external provider for full alignment.
Backend
Runtime & language: AWS Lambda with TypeScript. Architecture: microservices with dedicated functions for users, bookings, emails, PDFs. APIs: REST-based communication with the external cinema ticketing platform.
Auth & Security
Authentication: AWS Cognito with SSO. Security gateway: AWS API Gateway handles all inbound requests. Permissions: scoped access by service and endpoint.
Frontend
Framework: React + Next.js. Styling: Tailwind CSS. Hosting: Vercel.
Cloud Infrastructure
Compute: AWS Lambda. Identity management: AWS Cognito. API routing: AWS API Gateway.
Next.js and Vercel gave the project a modern, SSR frontend with fast load times, strong SEO, and effortless deployment, while AWS Lambda's serverless model let the client pay only for execution time instead of maintaining idle servers. Microservices kept each function independent and easy to evolve, Cognito handled identity and SSO securely, API Gateway centralized routing and security, and REST integration kept the third-party cinema API connection simple and reliable. These weren't arbitrary choices: as the embedded developer, the priority was picking a stack the client's own team could pick up and keep running long after the engagement, not one that only made sense with an outside vendor attached to it.
SSO with AWS Cognito
Users can log in once and access all platform services securely, with token-based authentication handled entirely via Cognito.Real-Time Booking Flow
Users browse movies, select seats, and confirm purchases via a responsive UI. The backend handles booking validation and syncs reservations with the cinema provider's API.PDF Ticket Generation
After booking, users receive a downloadable PDF ticket generated by a dedicated Lambda function. These PDFs include all relevant movie, seat, and QR code information.Email Notifications
Booking confirmations, reminders, and promotional emails are sent via an email microservice, triggered by successful transactions or marketing campaigns.
Connecting a modern identity provider (Cognito) to legacy backend systems required custom sync logic and careful testing to avoid data mismatches, keeping real-time sync with the third-party cinema API reliable meant handling latency, rate limits, and intermittent errors, and translating a fresh visual design into a responsive, performant UI meant balancing appeal with accessibility and SEO throughout. Having one embedded developer own the whole stack end to end made these tradeoffs easier to navigate, not harder: every decision, frontend to backend, was made with full context on what the client's systems and team could carry forward, with nothing lost in translation between separate teams.
