Saturday, May 26, 2001
Sometimes the cinema is more memorable than the film: last week I watched ‘Pearl Harbour’ in a run-down seaside cinema in Burnham-on-Crouch in Essex (don’t ask what I was doing there). It had clearly not been renovated since the 1960s, and as I bought my ticket (for ?2.50) the guy taking my money said, ‘The last film’s not quite finished yet. If you’d like to take a seat.’
Sure enough, the foyer boasted a row of seats. It was beginning to feel more like a doctor’s waiting room than a movie temple, but I figured that the seats were merely window dressing – when all the other Essex filmistas turned up, people would be milling around with their popcorn and drinks, just like anywhere else.
As it turned out, not all the chairs in the foyer were needed. Just three of us were ushered into a room that resembled nothing so much as a school assembly hall.
Below a largish screen at one end were two small speakers – the only sound system in the place, and banks of wooden seats were upholstered in a threadbare brown velvet. All the filling in the seats had been pushed towards the back, so unless you wedged yourself well in there, it was quite possible to slide off the front in exciting moments, catching a nasty splinter on the way.
I’m sure we didn’t get the sound of the Japanese planes zooming overhead with quite the force that Michael Bay intended, but at least as we left we were met again by the proprietor who said goodbye to each of us personally, as if we’d been round to dinner.
The closest thing to this I’d experienced before was in Manhattan, Kansas, a downhome town on the American prairies, a thousand miles from the sea. There was an old second-run cinema in a converted dancehall, where for a dollar a throw you could watch failed films in an appropriately failing environment.
They didn’t even bother to put up the films they were showing on the boards outside. Instead, as a service to the community, they explained the traffic rules for the T-junction outside the cinema: “ You don’t have to stop, and you can’t turn right”.
The smallest beverage (which was huge) cost twice as much as the cost of the ticket, so I drew some hard stares whenever I visited, since I never bought anything to eat or drink. But once inside the auditorium, some of the glory of the dances held there lingered. There was flock wallpaper, ornate pillars and a grand proscenium arch.
(Not quite as grand as the Castro cinema in San Francisco, with its overblown Art Deco interior boasting murals, chandeliers and an organ that still goes up and down, much to the delight of the local audience.)
Closer to home, the Savoy on O’Connell St in Dublin may be lacking the latest technological developments but I’d still rather go there than to the gaping barns that are the out of town multiplexes.
So you can keep your cutting edge THX sound and your acres of parking. I’m looking for something with a bit more character, like that door halfway up the wall at the IFC. That way, if the film’s dodgy I can at least watch the cinema.