Finding Myself at the Movies
(My Summer Adventures in the Dark and Then Some)
Movies have been a definitive force in my life for as long as I can remember.
After many years of being acquainted with my prime interest, one that has now become much more than a hobby — friends, family and coworkers are now accustomed to the fact that, no matter what the topic of conversation, sooner or later yours truly will steer the topic toward ‘the movies’.
I think my great love of all things film has its origins in the fact that I was exposed to movies (especially good ones) at particularly impressionable, as well as particularly happy, periods of my life. And just as musical oldies on the radio can conjure pleasant recollections of youth, so too, do the many movies I have experienced over the years serve as a handy form of visual analogue to my most formative years.
The original Star Wars (1977) cemented my desire to want to work in the motion-picture industry, a goal which finally came to fruition in a major way just a few years ago. (Ah, but more on that later . . . )
As I recall, my love affair with the original George Lucas trilogy began when my Dad and I went to see the vaunted “Episode IV” (as it later came to be known upon reissue) at the Northgate Cinema in Hixson, Tennessee in June of 1977. What I remember most clearly upon leaving the theater was that feeling afterwards — that long walk across the parking lot, lost in the stars overhead — I felt like I could jump up and touch the sky.
Now even though I was only in middle school at the time, the pressure to determine a career direction (at the ripe old age of 13) was heavily inferred to us by multiple college-prep exams and the like. So, partially to relieve the pressure, I think, and partially to celebrate the joy of my new cinematic discovery, the next day I promptly marched into the office of my homeroom English teacher, Ms. Surratt, to announce:
“I know what I want to do when I grow up — I want to MAKE MOVIES!”
*(Followed by, a bit more demurely, “What do I need to do next?”)
But the beginnings of my passion for film go back much further, actually — to my childhood growing up in Atlanta, Georgia in the late 1960s and early 70s. It was there that one of my first memories was formed when I sat on my dad’s lap at the Westgate Triple in the summer of 1966 watching James Garner in director John Frankenheimer’s speedway extravaganza — Grand Prix. (This was to be the first of a series of films in the genre, as my father could always be drawn in by auto-racing subject matter — a long history of race films, both good and bad, follows to the present day.)
For me, long before the blockbuster era of the late 1970s, summer carried more than just the usual ‘school’s-out’ connotations — for me, summer came to be synonymous with going to the cinema. Each year, just like clockwork, the major releases would spill into the theaters the last weekend of May, just in time for an overabundance of free time and pocket money.
As far as taking my money was concerned, my first awareness of the now well-known studio practice of wringing a successful genre for all it’s worth came with the short-lived disaster movie fad of the early 1970s. Airport (1970), the igniter of the trend, quickly became a movie-of-the-week staple on television, and was followed in quick succession in theaters by Earthquake (1974)(In Sensurround! — no less!) The Towering Inferno (1974) and The Poseidon Adventure (1972).
As you can imagine, all of the aforementioned were somewhat traumatic for an eight-year-old, the latter in particular. My recollection of Ronald Neame’s sea cruise gone wrong (aka: “Hell Upside Down” as the posters teased) was a lasting one. After seeing the film I would relive in my mind its excruciatingly tense story thread of 12 characters’ long, depressing journey to the bottom of a ship in the search for an exit. As each protagonist was successively whittled down, the resulting memory promptly served to frighten me to sleep for many a night after.
Disaster films came to be regarded as must-see material — a side effect of the depressing dreariness of the 1970s: “Hey, my life’s not so bad — look at those people up on screen!”
My dad would never take me to any films of one particular genre, though, which would eventually form the core of my own personal film collection: science-fiction.
“JUNK!” my dad would always snarl, as he met the tug of my hand with a much stronger one and eventually pulled me away from the object of my adoration. In one particularly vivid memory it was my fruitless attempt to catch the last installment of the vaunted Planet of the Apes franchise while it was still in theaters. Defeated, the large 40” x 30” marquee image for Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973) slowly receded from my child’s height viewpoint.
However, once I had spending money of mine own, my eternal love for the science-fiction genre seemingly bonded with a subconscious need for redemption and, one by one, title by title, I slowly accumulated most of the now classic titles from the 1950s through to the 1980s: Forbidden Planet (1956) The Time Machine (1960), Slaughterhouse Five (1972), Blade Runner (1982) — the years of release, directors’ and actors’ names becoming part of my own personal lexicon.
My first realization of what an actual movie-star was probably began in 1973. Even though I was not yet a member of the industry’s key 18–39 ticket-buying demographic, it was not lost on me at the time that ‘this Robert Redford guy’ was everywhere, and I mean everywhere, as well as managing to turn out work at an incredible clip — especially considering the critically-apprised quality of the material: The Candidate (1972), Jeremiah Johnson (1972), The Way We Were (1972), and The Great Gatsby (1973), just for starters, were quickly followed by The Sting (1973), The Great Waldo Pepper (1974), Three Days of the Condor (1975), and lastly, All the President’s Men (1975). Quite a run of work, I’d say.
Then, in that now legendary summer of ‘75, all the rules changed. And even though I was usually taken to whatever was the cinematic flavor-of-the-month each June, I would not be able to see one particular film for some time, as a bold-type statement at the bottom of the poster declared:
PG — Parental Guidance Suggested
Some material may not be suitable for children. Parents are urged to give parental guidance as the motion picture contains some material that parents might not find suitable for their young children.
Yes, Steven Spielberg’s Jaws would just have to wait for me to grow up a bit, as well as for the coming home video craze, before I would learn what all that fuss had been about on that one June 20TH so many years earlier.
So I sit here now with a great sense of perspective — with a sense, perhaps, of actually being able to follow the figurative breadcrumbs back to the present day. I don’t go out to the movies as much as I used to, although I do watch a great deal of them in the quiet confines of my home.
I miss that sense of communal discovery, though, which the theater once held for me. I’m afraid the experience has been ruined for many film-lovers by too much over-marketing, too many focus groups and too much texting (not to mention those ridiculous ticket & refreshment prices.)
Director Martin Scorsese, once a candidate for the priesthood before heeding film’s siren call, likened the cinema of his youth to attending a church and having a deeply spiritual experience in the process.
Sadly though, it doesn’t feel like that much anymore.
So I have refocused my filmic passion and need for catharsis in new directions, with the year of 2012 being a movie homecoming of sorts. Once again, summer was movie season for me, only this time I was working as a locations assistant & standby painter on the set of 42: The Jackie Robinson Story.
There I met up with an old friend, as I labored for five weeks side-by-side with one of the stars of the picture, Harrison Ford, who plays Jackie Robinson’s manager, Branch Rickey, in the film.
Yes, fulfilling a lifelong dream can take a while, especially when it involves goals so auspicious. The important thing is — I finally got there.
