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My local drive-in is open for the season, but with the non-stop rain we’ve been getting I’m not sure when we’ll be able to go. We’ve been taking the kids to the drive-in since they were babies. When you’ve got young kids it’s the perfect set-up: little ones sleep, older siblings enjoy the movie, and if you’re lucky they’ll all be out by the end of the first show, and the double feature will be something adult-friendly.
When I was a child, everyone in the neighborhood would pile into their respective station wagons and head for our local drive-in. There — already decked out in our PJs, retainers in place — we’d take a few turns on the carousel before climbing aboard the miniature train and screaming our way through the tunnel that went RIGHT UNDER THE SCREEN. Before we knew it, it was time to put down the back seat, blow up the air mattress and stretch out for an evening of magic under the stars.
What did we see? I’m embarrassed to say I don’t remember, except for what then made up the entire pantheon of Disney princess films: Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White. It was a little too late for the sci-fi classics of the 1950s (which I had to catch other times of the year in black and white on Million Dollar Movie on Sunday afternoons) and too soon for the next crop of big-screen blockbusters like Jaws and Superman.
Happily, while today drive-in movies are just a bit of nostalgia for most of the country, in my neck of the woods we have our choice of not one, not two, but FIVE drive-in theaters. They don’t have carousels and trains — and the backseat of the minivan isn’t anywhere near as comfortable as those air mattresses in our old station wagon — but it’s still a treat. I’ve even given in to progress and begun listening to the audio on our car stereo instead of the clunky window-hung speaker. In years past we’ve caught almost every new Disney flick and action picture at the drive-in. One year we even stayed up to watch a TRIPLE feature of Wall-E , Indiana Jones and Iron Man.
About the only bad experience I’ve ever had at the drive-in (well, aside from the time the double feature was Sister Act 2) is when we tried to see Pixar’s Up on opening night. The line to get in was so long, I missed the short and the whole beginning sequence. I still haven’t seen the whole film. But I’m glad that my kids have grown up spending their summers watching the dancing popcorn box tap away the minutes until the next feature.
Have your kids been to the drive-in? What’s your favorite theater?
(This post originally appeared in slightly different form on GeekDad.)
