Playing videos placed out of web-root in CodeIgniter - codeigniter

Question

I have created a script to play videos (mp4) placed outside of webroot in CodeIgniter. I used a different controller to get request and respond video file using readfile. On client side I am using jquery, magnific popup and mediaelement.js to play videos.
The problem is playing different video and closing popup is actually making CI script slow to load. I am posting my controller code:
class Load extends CI_Controller {
public function index()
{
$url = base_url(uri_string());
$baseurl = base_url('load/index');
$path = str_replace($baseurl,'',$url);
$file_name = basename($path);
$file_path = str_replace($file_name,'',$path);
$file_name = urldecode($file_name);
$file_type = '';
$real_path = '';
$this->db->where('file_path', $file_path);
$this->db->where('file_name', $file_name);
$query = $this->db->get('media');
// if user exists
if($query->num_rows() == 1)
{
$result = $query->result();
$file_type = $result[0]->file_type;
}
$this->db->where('path', $file_path);
$query = $this->db->get('pathalias');
// if user exists
if($query->num_rows() == 1)
{
$result = $query->result();
$real_path = $result[0]->alias;
}
$path = $real_path.'/'.$file_name;
header('Content-Type: '.$file_type);
readfile($path);
}
}