I always :dubious: when I hear the old, “poor us, we give all our money to the studios and only profit from snacks” bit, for several reasons.
In the small town where I grew up, movies were still $3.75 into the late 90s/early 2000s when I know they were $8+ in bigger cities.
Matinees are still considerably cheaper almost everywhere. Are they losing money on matinees? Doubt it.
AMC, one of the biggest if not the biggest theatre chain lets you bring your own food in now.
Drive-ins, obviously.
I don’t know all the details, but anybody in the movie industry will tell you there is something very funny about how money flows around that business. I’ve heard from several sources that NO movie makes a net profit on paper. It might be a joke but I’ve heard a few Hollywood types say that Titanic “lost money”.
Closest to me is the Rodeo Triplex Drive-In, which is about a 15 mile drive. Mostly first run movies, just in the summer. It also hosts a swap meet on Sundays. It has been open since 1946.
When I was a kid (in Kentucky in the 70’s) we had a drive-in right next to our neighborhood - so the kids would go in and turn the speakers up so that we could hear the movies outside the fence. The more adventurous would sneak in during the movie and hit up the snack bar. It mostly showed first run movies, and some soft-core 70’s porn (such as The Cheerleaders). When those would play, many of the males in the neighborhood (of all ages) would find a need to walk their dogs, and gather on the street to watch the movie.
When I moved to a small town in North Carolina the drive-in there showed nothing but hard-core porn. We used to drive up a small dirt road to watch for free after football games.
Both of these drive-in’s have long since gone away. The KY one was turned into a housing development, and the NC one became a truck company depot.
I saw “Cars” a couple years ago at a Drive-In. It was a strangely appropriate setting for that movie. Supposedly, there’s another one also reasonably close by.
Makes me feel guilty (cause I haven’t been to one in ages) but I live in the Hudson Valley halfway between Albany and NYC and we still have two drive-ins close by! About ten years or so ago we still had a third!
The only one left here in Baltimore is the Bengies Drive In. It’s a great place. Just one screen, but they run triple features every night. The admission is less than the multiplex, you can bring in any food you like (no alcohol or grilling) for a reasonable $7 per car charge. We (me, wife, 2 kids, 14 and 3) saw Kung Fu Panda there just last week, and we had a good time, although we did learn that Jimmy (3) is still a little too young for a movie. The snack bar has an incredible variety of food, jalapeño poppers, hamburgers, pizza (damn good pizza, for a drive in), nachos, chicken strips and popcorn, and the whole place is run by an old time showman named Dee Vogel, who gets on the speakers and makes the whole experience much better. He shills a lot for what they are selling (and I don’t blame him, I know the movie business, and I know Dee, his profit is a shoestring, I honestly believe he does it for the love of drive-ins, he could make way more money in another profession), but he also lets patrons know if there is a little scene at the end of the movie and provides fascinating trivia, all the while keeping the experience a good one, i.e. reminding people not to turn on headlights until they are on their way out, keeping kids off the swings when the move is running, that kind of thing.
Never been to one, they dont exist in Ireland… whats the deal with the sound? Does everyone get a little speaker for in their car, or is it full theatre surround sound? If it is just a little speaker, then do you guys listen to these movies in (gulp) Mono?
They use to be tinny little speakers you took from a small pedestal and place on your dash or hooked to the window. Now they usually broadcast on an FM & AM radio station so you can hear in on your car radio.
Of course if you happen to be in your wife’s minivan and she forgot to mention her battery is weak, this can lead to some additional fun, like your car not starting when it is time to leave.
The drive-in my in-laws own broadcast the sound from the film in Dolby stereo in the FM band. They have two low-power transmitters that the sound is fed through on an open FM frequency (which is hard to come by these days). Patrons can listen through their car stereos or, if the weather is nice, they sit in chairs in front of their cars and listen with portable radios or headsets.
As mentioned, it comes on a radio frequency so the sound is as good as your car stereo system is. It sounds great in mine. You can bring any other radio or portable stereo that you want if you want to move around. The one I go to is usually so packed that you don’t need anything if you want to sit outside. A few hundred vehicles tuned into the same station in the immediate vicinity fills the whole area with the movie broadcast.
Wes-Mer Drive In
2090 West Highway 83, Mercedes, TX
It’s like five minutes from home, and a total dump. A good place to see a new movie when you have a two-year-old and no babysitter, but apart from that…
Just stay away from the rear rows, unless you’re looking to buy some crappy weed.
We have the Summer Quartet in Memphis but I haven’t been there in years. I saw Star Wars there as a kid but I don’t remember much, being distracted by “10” playing on the other side of the lot.
Crazy kid, more interested in a cornrowed Bo Derek than Star Wars!
Yep! We have the Pleasant Valley Drive-In about 15-20 mins from here. I would go all the time, but they’re only open Friday, Saturday and Sunday and I work nights and have Tuesday and Wednesday off each week instead of the normal weekend, so I can’t go.
If you’re near Warwick, there’s also the Fair Oaks Drive-In (I’m about ten minutes away). Seven bucks, double feature, and ridiculously good (and cheap) motz sticks. Every time we’ve been there are a host of classic cars people bring. Great times!
Aww…bouv beat me to it! Sunset in Colchester is way cool. It’s too bad these things are going the way of the dino. I have many fond memories of drive-in movies over the years.
::sighs::
Enjoy 'em while you can, folks!
Oh, and Hi!, bouv. Nice to see another Vermonter on the board.
