These films elicit drive-in theater nostalgiaDate: 7/9/2015 It’s this time of year that I wax nostalgic over an American movie institution that is damn near dead: the drive-in theater.
Younger generations may not fathom the appeal of viewing a movie from your car, listening to the audio on a tinny sounding speaker one would hang on a window and resisting the ravages of weather, mosquitos and the people in the car next to you.
The attraction came from an inexpensive admission, a program of at least two features and the ability to have a certain level of privacy that was very appealing to young people on a date.
Drive-ins were important as they allowed a new post-World War II exhibition market to open in the movie industry. People who viewed themselves as showmen owned most drive-ins. They were willing and eager to take a risk on independent product, as much as mainstream studio fare.
Understanding their audience, the exhibitors frequently showed films that might not have received much play at traditional theaters: low budget, exploitation films. Horror, science fiction, rock musicals, Mondo movies, westerns and low comedies were all part of the fare.
If you were a kid at the time, going to the drive in was sort of a slumber party. Your parents would give you a bath, get you into your pajamas and put blankets and pillows in the back seat. Since the program didn’t start until past many of our bedtimes, going to the drive-ins was staying up late and many a child dozed off before the feature was done.
The Airline in Chicopee, E.M. Loew’s in West Springfield, The Red Rock in Southampton are some of the names I remember.
In honor of the drive-ins long gone I watched two recent releases that would have been drive-in fare.
The Pact II
“The Pact” was one of the most original horror films I’ve seen in years. It deftly combined two genres – the ghost movie and the serial killer thriller – into one frightening package.
It also benefitted from being a film about the relationship between an estranged mother and daughter. The movie was about something.
I was disappointed to see a sequel arrive on my desk as I thought it couldn’t be up to the original and I was right.
“The Pact II” takes up pretty much where the first film left off. The spirit of dead serial killer is now looking for new victims and his latest are people associated with the young woman who was his daughter – unbeknown to her.
June (played by Camilla Luddington) is smart, hardworking and talented and completely unaware of what is happening around her. She is unnerved, though, by the attentions being paid to her by an FBI profiler (Patrick Fischler) and by supernatural events in her home.
The problem is this film feels so completely tacked onto the closed narrative of the first film. Caity Lotz, the star of the first film, does make an appearance and it is a disappointing betrayal of the story of the first film.
Although competently made, like many sequels, “The Pact II” simply trades on the name and reputation of the first film.
Available on Blu-ray and on Google Play.
009-1: The End of the Beginning
This Japanese science fiction action film is new to Netflix and it certainly represents the best – or worst – characteristics of drive-ins movies. For many Americans, the only foreign films they watched were various genre movies imported from other countries.
Although this film was made in 2013, it has all of the elements drive–in audiences would expect: violence, a pretty heroine who can kick butt, a slightly futuristic setting, an evil genius villain and a near unstoppable opponent.
Of course, we’ve seen most of it before and this film didn’t really offer anything new.
Our heroine is a cyborg trying to stop agents of a foreign power. She has two machine guns built into her body. I’ll let you guess where.
While not very memorable, this film at least moves quickly, has an attractive and earnest lead and plenty of CGI effects.
Not every drive-in movie was good – in fact a lot were terrible – but that doesn’t prevent me from wishing the drive-ins and that style of roll the dice movie-making weren’t still here today.
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