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Author Topic: Can You Remember?
Graham Ritchie
Film God

Posts: 4001
From: New Zealand
Registered: Feb 2006

- posted March 07, 2006 09:41 PM      Profile for Graham Ritchie   Email Graham Ritchie   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Can you remember the first film you ever saw and the impression it left, well for me it was a long long time ago I spent most of my childhood growing up in Glasgow and on a dark wintery night I was told to get into my good clothes as my father was going to take me to the pictures, this indeed was a very special treat I was about 8yrs at the time and it was a night I have never forgotten, the film was The Alamo with John Wayne and for those few hours in my mind I was there at the Alamo and the world outside was gone, I have always believed that John Wayne should have been President! any thoughts on that one? finaly I would like to say I have enjoyed reading everyones views and banter it takes the seriousness out of life can anyone else remember there first film? [Roll Eyes]
Graham

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Dan Lail
Film God

Posts: 2110
From: Loganville, Georgia, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 07, 2006 10:00 PM      Profile for Dan Lail   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Hi, Graham, what a post! Gee whiz(strong language), I guess the first time a can barely remember being in a theatre was with my mom. It was in the beautiful Fox Theatre in Atlanta. They were showing a special screening of Gone With The Wind(1950's). The theatre was as much of an experience as the movie! When I became a teen, seeing a movie at this theatre made even a "B" film better than it actually was. [Eek!]

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Chris Quinn
Master Film Handler

Posts: 372
From: England, Bedfordshire.
Registered: Nov 2003

- posted March 07, 2006 11:57 PM      Profile for Chris Quinn     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I cannot remember the first ever film i saw, but the first film to have a real impact on me was The Sound Of Music, I thought it was fantastic and went on about it for weeks, i think i was only 9 years old when i saw it at our local Odeon.

Chris.

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Mike Peckham
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1461
From: West Sussex, UK.
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 08, 2006 03:49 PM      Profile for Mike Peckham   Email Mike Peckham   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Hi Graham

Interesting question, firstly; like Chris the first film to really make an impression on me was ´The Sound of Music . That opening sequence in stunning cinemascope on the huge screen at the Bedford Granada (reputedly the third biggest screen in Europe at the time, but now sadly a bingo hall) [Frown] Simply blew me away.

Secondly; the first film I ever saw I think would have been ´When the North Wind Blows´ I watched that with my Grandmother at the Bexhill Odeon, there was also a support film, ´The Vanishing Prairie´ , I can still remember this little dessert animal thumping its back legs against the sand [Smile] .

Funny thing is that when ever I think about that trip to the cinema I can´t help remembering that I was consumed with guilt through the whole showing because earlier that day I had broken a lamp in my Grandmothers house, I hadn´t told her yet and was terrified of the response. When I got home my Grandpa had already spotted the damage and turned the whole thing into a joke saying that he didn´t like it any way and I´d done him a favour. Phew, good old Grandpa! [Roll Eyes]

Mike

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Auntie Em must have stopped wondering where I am by now...

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Paul Adsett
Film God

Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 08, 2006 04:16 PM      Profile for Paul Adsett     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I can't remember the first movie I ever saw, but I can remember the first movie that I never forgot. It was that creepy gothic horror film 'The Spiral Staircase'. This film terrified me at the time, so much so that I could not bring myself to watch it again until I was well into my fifties! All I could remember was the awful terror that lurked in that basement, and that really creepy music and the suffocating atmosphere of the house. Other's in the same genre, which had a similar effect, were 'The Red House' (with Edward G. Robinson), and 'Spellbound'. Such is the power of film on a young mind. Today of course, these films seem very tame, and I have S8 prints of 'Spiral' and 'Spellbound', to which I am now thankfully completely de-sensitized!

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Joe Taffis
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1592
From: United States
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 08, 2006 04:36 PM      Profile for Joe Taffis   Email Joe Taffis   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I was only seven, when I saw an ad in the local sunday paper for a new film playing the Strand theater in the nearby town of Shenandoah. My grandmother(who raised me)took me on the bus and we stayed through back to back showings of "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad". I was so amazed and delighted by this film that she took me back to see it again a few days later! [Smile]

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Joe Taffis

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Barry Attwood
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1411
From: Enfield, U.K.
Registered: Aug 2003

- posted March 09, 2006 03:31 AM      Profile for Barry Attwood   Email Barry Attwood   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
The first film I can remember seeing was "One Million Years B.C.", my brother and I saw it at the ABC Turnpike Lane (just the top of our road, very conveniant), and it was in the days of continuous performances, and I remember seeing it 1 and a half times, amazing what you can recall from childhood isn't it! I even remember seeing "Doctor Zhivago" there in 70mm, now that was amazing.

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Gary Crawford
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 979
From: Manassas, VA. USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 09, 2006 08:16 AM      Profile for Gary Crawford     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I believe I was 6 years old when I got to go to my first movie. There was a small and old theater in the little town of Collierville, Tennessee....which, by the way , a tornado took down the next year ..and we didn't have another theater until 1973.....I think I saw some Randolph Scott western...and a Bowery Boys movie about hynotism. That's all I remember about it...it was not the inspirational event for me that it appears to have been for others on here. When I was seven....and wandered into the den late at night ( when I was supposed to have been asleep), .. my mom was ironing and watching King Kong on our little tv....THAT WAS INSPRIATIONAL! I had never seen anything like it...and that began my love of the movies.

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David Park
Master Film Handler

Posts: 346
From: UK
Registered: Nov 2003

- posted March 09, 2006 09:50 AM      Profile for David Park   Email David Park   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Wow! You are all so young!
Well the first film title I remember was the 'Wizard of Oz', Julie Garland. My mother took me to the ABC Ritz in the town were I was born, Keithley, West Yorkshire, UK. This was the only luxary cinema in the town.
There were also a small number of other cinemas the one that I was taken to as a child was the 'Cosy Corner' cinema. It was behind the shops in one of the 3 main shopping streets, and one queued down an ally to get in. It had been I know now a dancehall prior to a cinema, it had a balcony on 3 sides but they were not used, was told as a child they were unsafe. It was a dark cinema, they never put the lights up properly. (maybe it needed decorating.) The films there we went to see featured Roy Rogers and Hopalong Cassidy etc.

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Regards,
David

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Douglas Meltzer
Moderator

Posts: 4554
From: New York, NY, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 09, 2006 08:15 PM      Profile for Douglas Meltzer   Email Douglas Meltzer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
What great stories! The first memory I have of being in a movie theater is sitting in the balcony of the Loew's 175th Street watching "Snow White" (a re-release.....not the original 1937 showing. [Smile] ). That theater was a beautiful 3,600 seat movie palace with a terra-cotta facade. Unfortunately, the Loew's closed in 1967 and soon became the United Church-Science for Living Institute, headed up by the TV evangelist Reverend Ike.

The second film I remember much more vividly. "Ghidrah, The Three Headed Monster". Thanks, Mom!

Doug

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I think there's room for just one more film.....

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Jan Bister
Darth 8mm

Posts: 2629
From: Ohio, USA
Registered: Jan 2005

- posted March 09, 2006 11:07 PM      Profile for Jan Bister   Email Jan Bister   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
The first three movies I remember ever seeing as a little kid, in no particular order, are:

Flash Gordon (the 1980 one with music by Queen)... what a trip! The scene settings, and the colors alone! [Smile]

E.T. which unsurprisingly made a huge impression on me, even leading me to draw comics inspired by the film [Smile]

And, for some odd reason, I remember seeing Star Wars with my dad and brother in some run-down inner-city theatre which was empty expect for the 3 of us... and the only scene I remember seeing at that is near the end when Luke is about to fire his shot toward the center of the Death Star... odd, I don't recall seeing the rest of the movie there, just that one scene. [Cool]

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Call me Phoenix. *dusts off the ashes*

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Dan Lail
Film God

Posts: 2110
From: Loganville, Georgia, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 10, 2006 10:45 AM      Profile for Dan Lail   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I lied, actually the first movie I can barely remember seeing as an infant was True Lies with Schwarzenegger. I'm only 15. My mom drove me there in her Subaru. I remember being confused by all the little cinema rooms and getting confued as to which was which because they all looked alike. The sound scared me and deafened my tender little ears, hold on...what!..what! Okay, I'm back. Any way I haven't been to a cinema since. I've developed a phobia of getting lost in one and going deaf and broke. [Big Grin]

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Paul Spinks
Master Film Handler

Posts: 453
From: Barking, Essex, UK
Registered: Mar 2006

- posted March 10, 2006 11:55 AM      Profile for Paul Spinks   Email Paul Spinks   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Hi All,
I was about 6 or 7 years old and my mum took me up to London's West End to see "The Ten Commandments". I was enthralled and every time I see the parting of the Red Sea sequence now I'm still amazed.
Paul.

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Trevor Adams
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 763
From: Auckland,New Zealand
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 10, 2006 03:22 PM      Profile for Trevor Adams   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I was at the head of the queue when W of Oz opened in prewar Auckland.A life-changing film I saw no less than 8 times!The last time I STOOD through the entire film(all the seats were taken).The old man didn't think eight viewings was unusual-he went to The Jazz Singer 26 times!!
Hey Doug,I saw Snow White and Fantasia the first time around-at Aucklands magnificent Civic theatre-with it's lions/elephants and Indian decor.It still exists,the sky still twinkles there! [Smile]

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Trevor

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Tony Milman
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1336
From: United Kingdom
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 10, 2006 03:27 PM      Profile for Tony Milman   Author's Homepage   Email Tony Milman   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
The Hills are Alive............

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Tony

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Trevor Adams
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 763
From: Auckland,New Zealand
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 10, 2006 03:36 PM      Profile for Trevor Adams   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Graham,44 years ago I got engaged and on that evening I shouted my future wife to a balconey seat at the Embassy-to see the opening of The Alamo.She talked all the way through it-she is STILL talking!! [Wink]

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Trevor

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Chris Smith
Film Handler

Posts: 67
From: Aston, Pa. USA
Registered: Dec 2003

- posted March 10, 2006 06:07 PM      Profile for Chris Smith     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Ahh..just like it was yesterday. I was about 5 years old and my grandmother took me to the art deco Warner Theatre in West Chester, Pa. (Rapp & Rapp design, 1625 seats) and they showed a short, Disney's Johnny Appleseed, then the main event--Pinocchio. I was amazed at the size of the place, the SCREEN and the booming sound. (I was used to watching stuff on the small black and white tube at home.) Plus, you could buy popcorn and candy--what more could I ever want out of life? I was hooked. When she explained there were men up in the projection room, running the show with film and machines--hey, you know the rest of the story.

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Jan Bister
Darth 8mm

Posts: 2629
From: Ohio, USA
Registered: Jan 2005

- posted March 11, 2006 04:48 PM      Profile for Jan Bister   Email Jan Bister   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Dan, you're only 15??!!?? [Eek!] [Eek!] [Eek!]

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Call me Phoenix. *dusts off the ashes*

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Douglas Meltzer
Moderator

Posts: 4554
From: New York, NY, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 11, 2006 04:59 PM      Profile for Douglas Meltzer   Email Douglas Meltzer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Jan,

Dan's "Gone With The Wind" experience must have occurred in a previous life.

Doug

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I think there's room for just one more film.....

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Dan Lail
Film God

Posts: 2110
From: Loganville, Georgia, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 11, 2006 06:48 PM      Profile for Dan Lail   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Actually my mental state of mind is 15 on a good day. I'm over the hill and gone with the wind physically. [Big Grin] Just thought the second post on first movie experience would be amusing considering the state of the cinemas in recent years.

I see a lot of us are lucky enough to have seen a movie in a grand theatre with Egyption themes,etc. and clouds and stars twinkling in the ceiling. The Fox has seating capacity of 5000. Even the lounging/smoking and restroom areas were bigger than the house I grew up in. [Smile]

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Kevin Faulkner
Film God

Posts: 4071
From: Essex UK
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 11, 2006 07:07 PM      Profile for Kevin Faulkner         Edit/Delete Post 
For me it was a Disney great. My mum took me to see Snow White in a cinema in our local town. Its was this very cinema I use to visit on a Sat morning to help the projectionist in later years to come.

I wonder if this is the reason I have collected mainly Disney features on 8mm [Smile]

Kev.

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Carlos Plaza
Junior
Posts: 22
From: Setauket, NY USA
Registered: Mar 2006

- posted March 14, 2006 08:44 PM      Profile for Carlos Plaza   Author's Homepage   Email Carlos Plaza   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I don't remember which were my first movies...but I do remember the ones that made an impression on me. After seeing 'One Touch of Venus' I had a crush on Ava Garner for years after that. I'll never forget 'The Thing' and 'The Day the Earth Stood Still' because they scared the be-Jesus out of me ... they could not kill the monster.

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Michael De Angelis
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1261
From: USA
Registered: Jul 2003

- posted March 15, 2006 05:28 PM      Profile for Michael De Angelis   Email Michael De Angelis   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
It was these films:

Disney's 101 Dalmations- 1961,
Disney's Babes in Toyland- At the Beautiful Radio City Music Hall in NYC.
Absent Minded Professor
Re-release of Pinocchio - 1962
Re-release of Lady and the Tramp.
and
John Wayne in Hatari
and
The Unsinkable Molly Brown- At the Beautiful Radio City Music Hall in NYC.
Sword in the Stone- 1963
Mary Poppins-1964

Little did I realize, that there was something about seeing those large images, especially the ones in Dye Transfer saturated Technicolor - are burned in my memory.
And that neat echo that you could hear in the theatre as everyone sat quietly.

Michael

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Isn't it great that we can all communicate about this great
hobby that we love!

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Alan Rik
Film God

Posts: 2211
From: New York City, NY, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

- posted March 17, 2006 01:15 AM      Profile for Alan Rik   Email Alan Rik   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Hmm... It may have been "Herbie the Love Bug" or possibly 'Yog the Monster from Outer Space". My brother says he remembers us going to see "War of the Gargantuas" at a drive in. I know the film now..but I can't remember seeing that one back in the day.
When I was a youngster my father used to drop us off at the movies and give us 1.25 each for the matinee and a little extra for Popcorn and off we would go. I saw many Disney Films like "The Worlds Greatest Athlete", "Mary Poppins", etc. The first film I remember my father taking the family to was "Enter the Dragon" on a double bill with "The Green Hornet". That film made an impression! And then "The Exorcist". That one made an impression too! Couldn't sleep for weeks. Kept thinking of Linda Blairs creepy make up. And I have the 3x 400 cut down and the whole exorcism scene at the end is so much more horrifying on the Big Screen than on my 42 Plasma.

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Scott G. Bruce
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 229
From: Boulder, Colorado, USA
Registered: May 2005

- posted March 17, 2006 09:09 AM      Profile for Scott G. Bruce   Email Scott G. Bruce   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I was dinosaur-mad as a child, perhaps even more so than most, and my first movie memory is being scared to death by the allosaurus in the early 1970s rerelease of ONE MILLION YEARS B.C., which my father took me to see when I was 6 years old or so (probably as a welcome change from taking me to the dinosaur gallery at the Royal Ontario Museum, which he did often; Raquel Welch may have had something to do with it as well -- Thank you, Ms. Welch!).

My favorite film memory came several years later in 1977, when at the ripe old age of 10 I saw STAR WARS in a drive-in and then spent my allowance seeing it again and again almost every weekend that summer.

"Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi. You're my only hope . . ."

SGB

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"Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!"

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