April
19, 2021
Greetings
from the big screen,
Not
long ago I was thinking of watching a movie.
I flipped on the TV and scrolled through the myriad choices, until just the
act of searching was more wearying than I cared to deal with. I am sure most of us have felt this fatigue,
especially in the last year. This week I
felt it with a pang of loss.
Like
a good book, I enjoy a well made film, perhaps a moment of escape or
entertainment, or maybe the chance to explore.
But on that night, I felt more like the luxury of choice had soured the experience.
In
the time when I fell in love with cinema, the act of watching a movie was engaging,
unique, a special occasion, for me not unlike going to church. The process was inconvenient by our standards
today, but there was a commitment by the viewer that is hard to explain now.
I remember our
neighbor Mr. Berry worked for Butterfield Theaters, a company that owned some
of the screens around town. It was strange
to see him raking his yard one day, and another standing in his suit in front
of the Capitol Theater, important, smoking a huge cigar. To me he was a celebrity, and at the time I
was sure he must be a millionaire.
I lived most
of my young years in Flint, Michigan, where, at the time, the city was filled
with movie theaters. Decades before, the
growing population, nearly desperate for entertainment and a respite from
whatever their daily labors, pushed the demand for theaters until there was
hardly a place in town where you couldn’t walk to see a movie.
The first
movie I saw was at the Della theater on Welch Boulevard. We walked six blocks from our house, which didn’t
have a TV yet, and sat in that dark place and watched the magic unfold. It was not my favorite movie, ‘The Blob’ but
it was the beginning of a fascination with film.
Some Saturdays
I would go to YMCA downtown and watch serial movies of Rocket Man or the Lone
Ranger. I’m sure my parents hoped I was
making the trip there to exercise and learn how to swim, but I was lost in the
adventures of Superman.
Most of the
movies I saw in those years were at the Capitol Theater, a classic 1920’s example,
with its ornate pillars and formal décor, painted ceiling and friezes. It had a dramatic lobby, and in the shadows was
a giant pipe organ, left over from the days of vaudeville stage acts, and silent
films.
It was perhaps
a two mile walk for us kids to go downtown to see a movie. We were instructed to wash our knees and faces
and hands before going, a futile attempt at fooling our peers that we were well
raised. We would sometimes be dropped
off on the sidewalk with firm instructions, and then we were free to forget
them and enjoy the afternoon.
We would buy
popcorn, so drenched in butter it would stain the bag, and then weave between
the seats in the theater, make a noisy cluster with our friends, and sit back
and watch the giant curtain reveal the screen.
There was a
balcony there, for a while a place of racial divide, but by my time was where teenagers
would make out during the movie. Ushers
in the aisles, discretely sweeping the dark with penlights, making sure the
standards of decency were upheld and to ‘hush’ unruly kids.
Just a block away
was the Palace Theater, across the street from Hale Hats, just to give you bookmark
of the era. For a while I had a friend
who worked there in the concession stand, and she would let me in to watch the ‘Blaxploitation’
films that ran at the time, including ‘Shaft’ and ‘Superfly’. I saw ‘Wattstax’ there, the only white face
in the seats when the lights came up.
There was the
Royal, where the older kids, adults, would go to see ‘racy’ movies. I never saw the inside of it, and my guess is
that its reputation was more interesting than experiencing it.
A
different escape, but embossed just as deeply, was when our family piled in the
Vista Cruiser and went to the drive in.
It was an event. The kids would put
on pajamas and my parents would sit in the front, and we would prowl through the
gravel lot to find our spot, and then back in, hook up the speaker to the window
of the Vista Cruiser, and then sit in the ‘way back’ and watch the movie. If we were good, we could go to the concession
stand for some awful treat. We prowled
the dark lot of the US 23 or the Dort Drive In, wearing our Keds with our PJ’s,
watching the other families make their camps in between the stanchions that
held the little speakers.
The
other thing I associate with all of these, was the countless times my teenage friends
and I would sneak in to catch a film.
Sometimes one of us would buy a ticket and then while the movie was playing,
sneak down to the fire escape door and let the rest of the gang in. Or three of us would pile into the trunk of
the car while the driver innocently bought a ticket at the drive in.
The
movies we watched were forgettable. Maybe
a few held up and might be called classics, but truthfully movies have gotten
better since then. We would sit through
the trailers, and then sometimes newsreels, and the little blurbs from the theater
urging ‘Let’s go out to the lobby, let’s go out to the lobby…’
What
was not forgettable was the experience of going to the theater and being changed
by the journey, the environment, the unique partnership of the film makers and
the people who came to see their work.
Even as I write this I can remember the feel of the crushed corduroy of
the seats, the smell of cigarettes and buttered popcorn and the mingling odor
of people.
I
realize this is a sentimental indulgence, but the contrast to what we feel
about movies today is bold. I have seen
people watching one movie on TV and another on their laptop while scrolling their
phone to fill in the slow moments. What
is seen is ‘content’, no longer valued in the same way. I know this cliché is hardly worth repeating,
but for this morning it felt important.
Some
time ago it seemed that artists involved in making films were creating
expressions of ideas, creating an image of another time, or adventure, or
romance, to take the audience with them.
In that time the media was still unique, distinctive from other experiences
available, and so we held it with a different regard. Also, we had to be involved enough, committed
enough, to devote energy and time to the process of seeing a movie.
It
is not unlike setting a needle to a phonograph record or opening a book. There is a connection between the creator and
the person enjoying the creation. I don’t
know if it is lost entirely, but it is harder to feel.
I
chose ‘Cool Hand Luke’, and it held up pretty well, but even with my nostalgic
filter, I smiled at the corniness and the innocence and the social baggage of
the era. That said, I think it’s worth
remembering, and respecting, the era of movie watching that has now nearly disappeared,
and the mark it left on my generation.
Hope
this finds you transported,
David
Copyright
© 2021 David Smith
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