You may have heard the story about the 9-year old Alec Greven who wrote a 46-page book called How To Talk To Girls. You can see an article on it here but basically he wrote it for a class project, went on Ellen Degeneres' show and sold the book to Harper Collins (Ellen came before the sale).
They did a story on this on our local news this past week and were showing pages from the book on air. It's 46 pages - with pictures. As they were discussing it they said something about it being made into a movie. If it was a joke, the reporter (the entertainment reporter at that) didn't let on and the anchors were asking if he was serious and then they all had a brief discussion as to how a 46-page book could (pictures or not) could be made into a movie.
And that's when the nostalgia kicked in. Now, I know I'm dating myself with this but remember Drive-In movies? Carloads of people going to the movie and, depending on where you went, paying by the person (in which case people might hide in the trunk until you got in) or by the carload (in which case you took as many people as could fit in the car for the cheaper cost). You could take the entire family. You could have several carloads of friends and all park together.
You would sit in the car and hang the speaker on your window or bring lawn chairs and sit outside to watch the movie. You could sit on your car - there were any number of ways you could watch the movie. They usually had two movies playing on each screen so you could come and watch two movies back-to-back, or you could leave after the first (or come late and only watch one - some drive-ins charged less if you came later). There was a concession stand usually at the back of the drive in that you could get your drinks and snacks at. And some drive-ins had multiple screens where different movies were playing. Those usually had a community concession stand accessible by all the areas. Some even had areas for the kids to play if they weren't interested in the movie playing.
By now you're probably wondering what all this has to do with the 9-year old's book, right? Well, there really is a connecting thought. See, the movies at the drive-in usually started with some sort of short thing. Maybe a short cartoon or little advertisement. I can't remember whether or not they had previews (I'm thinking no?) but when the little short (whatever it might be) came on, you knew the movie was about to start. I was thinking since it was such a short book, maybe they could make it into a little thing they played at the beginning of the movie at a drive in.
In any event, this strange little story got me to thinking about something I hadn't thought about in a long time. I used to enjoy going to the drive-in and watching a movie - and other such things that have fallen by the wayside.
So what about you? Anything you wish they'd bring back - even just for a day?
2 comments:
There's still a drive-in in Melbourne--I love going! I grew up at the drive-in, playing in the playground, eating all the junk food. I love the sound when you're out of the car and you can hear all the speakers.
Although...there was also a drive-in when I lived in Port Moresby and it looked very colonial and behaved it--I can distinctly remember sitting on the verandah of the restaurant and local kids fanning us with banana leaves!!!
I've heard, don't recall where, or when, that some drive-ins are coming back.
Or that could of rattled out of my head from baking too many cookies this weekend.
Used to love going to those, the drive-ins, not the cookies. ;)
Love the new look.
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