The movie experience

I love going to the movies.

The first movie I ever saw was Mary Poppins. The best part about it for me were the penguins. I’m not surprised. I’ve always loved animals more than people. (Unless I know you. Then you’re loved.) Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was another doozy. When that car went flying in the air, it was exhilarating.

I remember seeing The Beatles in A Hard Day’s Night. They ran around a lot, although looking back, I don’t think there was a plot. Who cares? It was The Beatles!

I’ll never forget Franco Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet in 1968. I was 13 and to this day I don’t think I’ve seen a finer bottom than Leonard Whiting’s. And Olivia Hussey! We all wanted to look like her.

I only had one bad experience in a movie theatre. My friend was on the end of the aisle and I was beside her. A man in our row kept moving closer to me throughout the movie, but since I only knew wonderful men like my father and Grampy, I wasn’t alarmed — until he reached over and rubbed his fingers on my leg. I jumped two feet in the air and he ran away. I trembled until I got home.

Some of the best times I shared with my parents were movies we watched on television. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum or The Russians are Coming, The Russians Are Coming, and It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. I can still hear my dad laughing. If you’ve never seen these movies, do yourself a favour and look for them. The world needs laughter at the moment.

At this point in my life, going to the Sydney Cineplex is as exotic a date as hubby and I can muster. And we’d rather go in the afternoon, which makes us even more pathetic. We always sit in the same seats, in the middle of the very back row. I’m not sure how we got so lame. Oh, I remember. Hubby decided it would ruin his life if someone sneezed on him. And since a date requires you to sit with the actual person, I have to sit in the back row, too. This means we head for the cinema an hour ahead of time, so John can save the seats. I don’t care anymore, because I just walk over to Pennington’s and browse until the movie starts. Doesn’t matter if it’s dark. I know where to find him.

I’m one of those odd people who loves to go to movies alone. That way you’re not fighting over the armrest or poking someone in the ribs to get them to shut up and stop asking questions. I feel an instant affinity with the lone male teenager, sitting with his large popcorn. I want to tell him that it doesn’t matter that he doesn’t have a girlfriend right now. He’ll have a wonderful life down the road.

And then came the day when I was asked to write a screenplay for my first novel. Six years later Relative Happiness played on the big screen in Sydney for five weeks, along with Hollywood blockbusters. I was too busy thinking to actually watch it. I was remembering when I wrote that particular scene and what I could’ve done better. All the years of work passed through my mind.

It wasn’t until I was in a balcony, in a playhouse at the St. John’s International Women’s Film Festival, that I looked down at the almost 800 people below me, laughing and sniffling in the dark, that it hit me. This was my movie.

I wished my parents were with me.