TMT: a Theatre… a Movie… and a Time
If someone told me the day after I graduated high school I’d be writing something about anything related to film, or books, or even family years in the future, I’d have laughed that so-called prophet off the planet. The last thing on my mind that Saturday was writing. In fact, composing an essay, let alone a term paper, was my most hated activity all the way through to the end of the twelfth grade. Why couldn’t everything just come down to short-answer, or better, true or false remedies? I reckoned life would surely suck less under those conditions. Shows how much I know. How does that old Yiddish proverb go?
“Man plans, God laughs.”
Well, if anything, whatever I write (however out of nowhere) becomes an archive of sorts. So, given that, I thought I’d note from time-to-time a set of three particulars that form many of my favorite memories. Full disclosure, I credit my good friend and blogger over at Colonel Mortimer Will Have His Revenge for the inspiration. Reading his look back at the films and theaters in his life triggered all of this — hey, original I’m not. And since I’m getting older every day, I better start to get these written down fast before they become just dust in the wind.
Since I wrote about it last year on my old blog, I’ll start this off with something familiar.
Theatre
The Rosecrans Drive-in (alternate drive-in site):
Movie
Time
June 17, 1972: I can call this to mind because it was the day after I graduated from South Gate High School. Having spent the entire previous night awake at Grad Night, I woke up late that afternoon and had to scramble to make my movie date (with the same girl I took to that all-night party at Disneyland). We sat in my old 1963 Ford Falcon station wagon and we actually watched the movie (and that’s saying something for the film since I was a hormonal 17 at the time). While I did chose the drive-in as a venue because it was cheap and I had a girlfriend at the time, I picked the movie because I heard how good it was from my movie-going family members. The night I took in the great 1972 film adaptation of the Mario Puzo novel, The Godfather, by Francis Ford Coppola remains easily one of my strongest memories.
The entire series can be found here.
Trackbacks & Pingbacks
- TMT: Midnight at The Chinese | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: The Empire Strikes at the Crack of Dawn | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: The Empire Strikes at the Crack of Dawn | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: In Space No One Can See The Popcorn Fly | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: 1969 – A Summer Odyssey | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “You gotta be f*cking kidding.” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Before Unicorn Dreams | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “We’re on an express elevator to hell; going down!” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: That’s Some Baby Cart | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Alone with the Japanese Syndicate | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: It Wasn’t That Hard | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: First Date in the Empire of the Sun | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “What’s wrong with your eyes?” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: There Are No Clean Getaways | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: On Was The Hunt | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Learning to Love “A Royale with cheese” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: The Night He Returned | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Ferocious Wasn’t the Half of It | It Rains… You Get Wet
- At the Intersection of Post & Kearney | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: My First Bond | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: The Long Kiss Goodnight | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “Told you I’m never going back…” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “It was nothing like that, penis-breath!” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Lawrence of Century City | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: House of Hur | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “Hey you wanna go for a ride?” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: “Let’s see what this baby can do.” | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Try it he did | It Rains… You Get Wet
- TMT: Being Clear. Crystal. | It Rains… You Get Wet
- The Best Picture Project: The Godfather (1972) | It Rains… You Get Wet
Reason #1,600,431 that Unknowable Futures rock – Michael now writes things we all get to read.
You are always so kind to moi. Thanks very much, Rachel.
My friend
The sheer presentation of Drive-ins is enough to make me nostalgic for those by gone days.
I’m waxing nostalgic here with you my friend, but I remember my father taking me to our local drive-in and seeing Warlords Of Atlantis. It was such a great thrill.
It was an equally great thrill spreading the blankets on top of the station wagon, fending off mosquitoes, and eating food under the stars.
Honestly, is there a better feeling than something like that from your childhood?
Few kids today will ever experience something like that. I miss it all.
Cheers L13
SFF
The drive-in as a venue, in their time, filled up so many memories. And the summer season went time and tide with it, did it not? There are still a few left, and I’ve promised to take my kids for them to experience it some. I’m with you on this all, SFF. Many thanks.
Did I ever tell you about the sand/gravel supply company that was right next to the drive-in where I went to high school? We got up to some pretty ridiculous stunts between the double features.
Sounds pretty awesome already. Thanks, Rachel.
Awesome post, as you know I have a soft spot for the whole experience of seeing films. I used to go to the Drive-ins frequently with my Dad after my parents divorced, I remember seeing such titles as Raiders of the Lost Ark, Howard the Duck (heh), and Darkman at the Capitol 6 in San Jose, which is miraculously still in operation.
Just curious if you remember, how did The Godfather look at the Drive-in? From my experience and maybe it was due to bad bulbs, darker films usually looked murky at the Drive-in.
I really appreciate the way you write about those experiences, my friend. And since many of the old venues continue to disappear, sometimes it is those old memories are the only things left.
And yes, the drive-in did have an affect upon how it looked for those in the cars. But, it did force you to focus on the dark scenes, specifically, and the film overall. Thanks for your comment and the inspiration, Kevin.