Drive Ins - Get In The Trunk!

 

I would guess most kids growing up today wouldn’t want anything that their parents had. We had three channels. They have about 300. We barely had black and white TV. They have color and high def. We had a single home phone that was tethered to the wall with a cord. They have one on their wrist. But we had one thing that I’m sure most of this generation is missing out on - the drive-in movie. 

What a wonderful thing it was - watching a motion picture under a starry sky while you were in the comfort of your own car.  It was almost magical. Rows of cars and speakers facing a giant silver screen. Being indoors  and outdoors at the same time. 

As a child, going to the drive in was a major event. My sister and I would put on our pajamas (the kind with sewn-in feet), get blankets and pillows, and head for the back seat of our 1963 Chevy Impala. Mom, always the thrifty homemaker, popped a copious amount of popcorn and placed it in a brown paper grocery bag. No need to buy those high priced snacks from the concession stand. My father would pay admission, and then carefully find the parking spot that would give us the best possible viewing angle of the  screen. Finally, he attached the car speaker in our window so that the sound, which was tinny and somewhat irritating, properly flooded the interior.  

Most of the movies were first run, and carefully vetted by my mom for proper content.  For example, Son of Flubber, or It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World would certainly get the mother stamp of approval. An Elvis film like Fun Acapulco was iffy, and a James Bond movie like Dr. No was a certain no-no for obvious reasons. That really didn’t matter  much to us because  sister and I rarely made it through the entire film. That meant my parents had a semblance of a date night, even if it was only 90 minutes or so. 

A few years later, the drive in took on a whole new purpose for me. It became a cheap source of entertainment for me and my high school buddies. So every weekend, carfuls of teenagers would flock to the place, including several who were hiding in the trunk to get out of paying the outrageous $1.25 admission. Since I was a big kid, I never had to get in the trunk. It was reserved for my smaller friends.  Sometimes as many as four people were crammed in there. One friend of mine who worked at the drive in years ago said, “I can’t tell you the number of times a car with one person pulled up to the gate, told me they were alone, and handed me $1.25. And when they drove in, I noticed that the rear bumper was almost touching the ground.”  We were lucky no one was asphyxiated.

The drive in was also a prized location to take a date. It was a chance to be in a comfortable environment where you could talk and laugh - unlike a movie theatre. 

It was also a good place to kiss. Once I took a date to see the Ten Commandments at a drive in. The opening credits had barely finished running when she turned and planted one on me. We didn’t come up for air until Moses parted the Red Sea. Then went right  back at it again and didn’t stop until he saw the promised land. Good thing I’d read the book. 

Think that’s over the top? I have a buddy who frequented the drive-in throughout high school. He said once they showed the same movie for over three months, and he still went to see it every weekend. Apparently his girlfriend felt safer there rather than being parked on some deserted road in the middle of nowhere. He can’t recall what the movie was. That’s because is he wasn’t watching the film. 

In fact, he even had a special parking spot. To be sure they weren’t disturbed, he pulled beside a row of tall hedges on the driver’s side of his car. And for   complete privacy, he cut the wires of the car speakers beside the passenger side, insuring that no cars would park near him. 

Fortunately, there are still a few hundred drive ins scattered over the country - in fact, there are seven of them still operating in the state of Alabama. So, if you’re feeling nostalgic, you can take a short drive and still see a movie in an old fashioned way.  

Just bring along a giant bag of popcorn. And be sure not to park beside the car that’s near the hedges.