Memories of Drive-In Movie Theaters

[DoomsDave]

Once upon a time there were these places where you could pack the brats and the old lady (or, the brats and the old man) into the family car, and go treat yourself to a night of movie watching on the big screen, outdoors, rain or shine, in the right season. Just sit in the car, together, oh, family togetherness! Slap brother or sister, while mommy or daddy threatened same . . .

Sigh. Nostalgia up the wazoo!

After we got too big for mommy and daddy, we took our sig-others to the drive-in to watch movies or, in the very back back row . . . . sometimes to drink out of shoes. Ahem.

Remember those speakers in the widows?

So, what movies did you see? What did you do and who with?

Here's a link to dying drive-ins and pictures of some, by a funded study, I think. I never imagined as my little brother smacked me that our venue would be part of a nostalgic study . . .

http://photos.msn.com/slideshow/autos/almost-gone-drive-in-movie-theaters/238s9a95#7

[trioderob]

[_Keith]

Yes, I got memories of those little things you burned, that looked like the electric coils on a stove to keep the mosquitoes out of the car. Lord, I am lucky to still be alive from all of the stuff I breathed as a kid. Remember Flit guns?

[Kim]

I can remember as a kid seeing "The Wreck of the Andrea Doria" or maybe it was "The Sinking of the Andrea Doria" with all six of us in the car. The movie was based on the actual sinking of the ocean liner, now a mere footnote in history. All I remember is a lot of sloshing ocean water and people yelling at each other. Going to the drive-in was a treat, though we never ventured to the snack bar to buy any popcorn, at least that I recall. Other kids went in their pajamas, but we did not. I remember the speakers that you hooked on the window -- inevitably, the space we picked had a malfunctioning speaker, and just as the pre-movie cartoons started, we'd have to move the car to another space.

When I was much older, I went to see Silent Running, with Bruce Dern, at the drive-in, like, 3 times. They didn't change the movies all that often, I guess.

[DoomsDave]

OH yeah

Saw this bad movie in the Drive in on Euclid Avenue

Drank beer from a shoe

[Jerry@TreeZoo]

There used to be a lot around here but they have dwindled down to just one venue, The Swap Shop. http://www.floridaswapshop.com/swap.html

They bill themselves as Florida's second most popular tourist destination. Hmmm. They used to be known as the Thunderbird Drive In but discovered that putting a daytime flea market in brought more money than their 14 screens.

I remember the burning green mosquito coils, the bad speakers, the loss of the picture when it rains, backing the station wagon in and opening the tail gate and flip up widow with all the seats down, some of the drive ins even had cold air blowing in your car from flexible hoses. At the old Thunderbird, they had X-rated movies playing at two of their screens. These screens were not visible from the normal car viewing spaces but you could see them pretty well when you went to the concession stand. Not that I ever did that.

[paulgila]

I can remember as a kid seeing "The Wreck of the Andrea Doria" or maybe it was "The Sinking of the Andrea Doria" with all six of us in the car. The movie was based on the actual sinking of the ocean liner, now a mere footnote in history. All I remember is a lot of sloshing ocean water and people yelling at each other. Going to the drive-in was a treat, though we never ventured to the snack bar to buy any popcorn, at least that I recall. Other kids went in their pajamas, but we did not. I remember the speakers that you hooked on the window -- inevitably, the space we picked had a malfunctioning speaker, and just as the pre-movie cartoons started, we'd have to move the car to another space.

When I was much older, I went to see Silent Running, with Bruce Dern, at the drive-in, like, 3 times. They didn't change the movies all that often, I guess.

i saw that ( Silent Running) at the Helix theater in la mesa. i was too young to really get it.

[Walter John]

Three distinct memories come straight to mind.

1. I took my sweetheart to see "Summer of 42" at the drive-in. That's all I'm gonna say about that.

2. The lads (mates) and I, when we were 17 and so, used to hide in the boot etc.to avoid paying.

3. One time my brother drove off with the speaker still inside his front drivers window, it pulled the whole speaker stand out of the ground.

[DoomsDave]

Urp!

Sorry

[Gonzer]

We went to the one in San Juan Capistrano right off the freeway where the admission (many times) was free, the beverages were free, and the movie....what movie?

[BS Man about Palms]

3. One time my brother drove off with the speaker still inside his front drivers window, it pulled the whole speaker stand out of the ground.

I had a headache and was out of sorts and did this too down in the Point Loma area near the sports arena.. I realized too late as I reached for the speaker and it left the window, shattering the glass with it... Went and took the speaker.. (still working) hung it up and drove off..

[John in Andalucia]

I've only ever seen these in the movies. Movies of Americans at the movies.

[Stevetoad]

Here in santee we still have a drive in. I haven't been in a while but in high school we were there all the time. Used to sneak our friends in inside the trunk.

[DoomsDave]

Here in santee we still have a drive in. I haven't been in a while but in high school we were there all the time. Used to sneak our friends in inside the trunk.

[bgl]

Growing up in Sweden I had never been to a drive-in movie, since there were none in the entire country. Way back in the 1960s, on one of my first visits to the USA I was staying with a good friend of mine, Jim, whom I am stll in touch with, and his parents in Coral Gables, FL. His dad was a retired Pan Am pilot. Started for them in the 1930s, piloting flying boats down along the South American coast. Anyway, one evening Jim suggested we should go to a drive-in movie, and since I had never been to one, that sounded interesting. I asked him "so when does the movie begin" and he said "I don't know, it makes no difference". I said "shouldn't we get there at the beginning of the movie?" and Jim's response was "well, they show the same movie over and over so if we get there in the middle then we'll stay just until they show it again, and then we can catch the beginning." That was a strange concept to me. But we did go, and I'm sure that drive-in is long gone. It was immediatelty east of Le Jeune Road, close to the airport entrance. And I have no idea what movie we ended up seeing, or even if we got there in the middle...

[palmmermaid]

I remember the drive-ins well. Mom and Dad would pack all 6 kids in the car and off we would go. They had benches up front for the kids so we sat up there eating our popcorn. No ratings on the movies back then. Always a double feature with cartoons, a serial (I loved the Black Whip!), a news reel, and the movies. I remember seeing "Old Yeller" and "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" the same night. That's when I fell in love with Paul Newman.

Later as a teenager the big date on Saturday was the drive-in and A&W Rootbeer after the movie.

I hate to think about sitting in one the small cars in today's world watching a movie.

[sur4z]

_{When I lived and worked in Venezuela, I owned an orange and white beater VW bus that had three rows of bench seating...the back two rows were not bolted down very tight so when we would go to the drive-in movies we would parallel park between two speakers and take the back two rows out and lean them against the bus...with speakers on either end of the bus, the movie was in stereo...life was grand!}

[Daryl]

I was a great fan of Drive-Ins...way back when movie theatres weren't all surround sound etc..so the tinny sound out of the windows speakers didn't matter too much. We used to find a parking spot where there were spares on either side and park between them with the speakers stretched to both windows...'stereo!' Later on they started the FM broadcasts which were pretty good if you had a decent car stereo unit. I remember when we were in Sydney the local drive-in used to play dusk till dawn 'horror features' on occasion. We used to drive around in a Holden panel van surf wagon. We'd reverse into the spot and open up the tailgate and hatch, then lie in the back of the 'pano' with the girls and watch the movies on our bean bags. Later, when I lived in Darwin we used to go to the Nightcliff Drive-In (haha- for Ari) and it was too hot for sitting in the cars. Everyone used to bring along those aluminium fold-up camp chairs and sit in front of the car...a few cold beers and oila!

Here is a link to some Aussie Drive-In history... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive-in_theatres_in_Australia

[paulgila]

daryl is there some aussie name for a "drive in theatre?"

I find it hard to believe that aussies didn't come up with some other name for it that was purely their own

[DoomsDave]

daryl is there some aussie name for a "drive in theatre?"

I find it hard to believe that aussies didn't come up with some other name for it that was purely their own

Maybe we can invent one . . .

[Walter John]

daryl is there some aussie name for a "drive in theatre?"

I find it hard to believe that aussies didn't come up with some other name for it that was purely their own

I read somewhere that Aussies in fact had the first drive-in theatre before the yanks. It is strange Paul, but I can't recall any nickname other than the "Drive-In". I think we were simply enamoured by them so much, very very big deal when I was young. Adding to Daryl's memoirs, the mates and I would go in this old FE Holden where we would take the entire back seat out of the car, plonk it in front of the grill on the ground and crack a tallie or two, drag on a ciggie, ah, those were the days when we really had no worries, man things changed, stupid technology.

[Daryl]

daryl is there some aussie name for a "drive in theatre?"

I find it hard to believe that aussies didn't come up with some other name for it that was purely their own

Droive-In??

[DoomsDave]

Drivie?

That sounds Ozzian!

Used to love to go to the drivie with mum when I was a tacker . . .

[Walt]

Drive-in movies are rapidly going the way of the horse and buggy. Most of what few remain (I think a little over 300 in the US) will go belly up because of the cost to convert from film to digital (35 mm movies will no longer be produced). Since most drive-in movies are seasonal and are mom and pop owned, the owners just can't afford to convert to digital projection.

I remember back in the early '50s as a pre schooler kid my parents taking me to the drive-in movies. Back then many cars had single or dual spot lights that could be hand operated from inside the car. My father had a '48 Pontiac with single spot light. Many of the patrons would use their car spot lights to follow a projected ball around the movie screen prior to the movies beginning. This was a big deal, as the kids wanted to control the spot lights.

In the summer of 1955 near my hometown, a new drive-in movie (Queen's Chapel Drive-in) opened which had the biggest screen in the country at the time. I could actually watch the movies from the apartments we were living in at the time, but, of course, I couldn't hear the sound.

The last time I was at a drive-in movie my wife and I went with my best friend and his wife in their convertible car. This was at least 25 years ago. I recall it was a double feature. We watched the first movie but never stayed for the second movie as the mosquitos were eating us alive!

[NApalm]

Daryl and Wal (and other interested SE QLDERS), There's still a drive in at Yatala, not too far from Daryls. It's pretty good value for money and a great night out. Especially if you've got a newborn and she'll sleep in the capsule while you catch an otherwise impossible movie.

[Gonzer]

I never could understand how people could actually SEE the movie! What with all that smoke and condensation on the windows inside. Oh well.

[Daryl]

Classic old intros...

http://youtu.be/z4hpXsSwogY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Scv6xxMgQHc

[Darold Petty]

This one is still alive, I have patronized the Spud, as my sister-in-law lives near Driggs, and yes, I have the tee-shirt!!

www.spuddrivein.com

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spud_Drive-In_Theater