Persistence of Vision
Drive-In theatres are fondly remembered for providing teenagers with both a cover story (a trip to the movies) and a relatively private place (a car) for their furtive, mutual anatomical research. But they were also frequented by families with small children. Before the ages of video and DVD, a drive-in theatre was where parents could see movies without having to feel self-conscious about their bawling kids. No need for a baby sitter for the tiny ones, just bring them along. Sealed off in your (more or less) soundproof bubble you weren’t likely to bother the other patrons, who were probably families themselves, or teenagers who had more pressing things (ie; the pressing of “things”) on their minds. But you could easily bother each other, cooped up in there during a double bill of “Blue-Beard’s Ghost” and “Herbie the Love Bug”. With all the bickering and crying and spilled drinks and whatnot there was often as much tragedy and comedy and drama in the car, as on the screen.
I remember going to the drive-in to see family films when there were little babies in our family (and I was small myself). In particular I was very affected by seeing “BAMBI” when I was 5 years old. My brother Jo was still a small baby and provided his own vocal accompaniment from the front seat where he was attended to by my Mother, already pregnant with next brother, Rob (who would be along to help out with the yodelling chores in a few months). Despite the occasional noise, and being treated to moments of SENSE-AROUND when baby-bro had to have his underthings changed right there in front of me, I was very much engrossed in what was going on up on the screen.
Like a lot of children, the death of BAMBI’s Mother affected me very deeply and I’m absolutely sure that I added my own blubbering to the general commotion within our car at that point. Parents sometimes like to shield their kids from such raw emotions, but this moment of tragedy is a big part of one of my most powerful early-childhood memories. And it wasn’t over yet, BAMBI was about to affect me in perhaps an even more powerful way; it was while at the drive-in watching “Bambi” that I realised that this film was somehow different to other movies… IT WAS DRAWINGS… Moving and talking and seeming to be alive… and then seeming to be killed… drawings making me feel both happy, and then sad. The tears of anguish were barely even dry on my face before I started to wonder how this could be so…. What kind of magic was this? I could not grasp how it was possible for these drawings to be alive. It was a singular moment; I was both pulled into and popped out of, the movie at the same time.
I had always liked cartoons, but never thought about how they were made, in fact I don’t think that I had ever thought about how ANY movies were made until this moment watching Bambi at the Drive-In theatre in Hobart. If I had thought about it at all, I probably thought that films were documentaries and the events on-screen were really happening (Reality TV in today’s parlance). But the realisation that this film was made of drawings made that idea an impossibility. Mum and Dad now had their hands full. Baby on the one hand and on the other, a 5 year old who needed some answers. They both did their best to explain the rudiments of the animation process, but it seemed completely unbelievable. Tiny drawings? What? How? I wasn’t apt to take their explanations at face value either; I hadn’t forgotten the great lengths they had taken to try and dupe me with that Santa Claus nonsense (which I never believed in for a moment, much to the great disappointment of my Mother). You never knew what kind of hokum grown ups were going to put over on you next….
Behind our car at the back of the drive-in, in the same building as the snack bar, there was a tiny window allowing patrons to peek into the projection booth. In an attempt to convey the truth of the animation process to me, my Dad lifted me up high enough that I could see in. I watched a big machine spool out a long shiny ribbon that passed through a ray of light, sending a flickering beam out through the main window and onto the huge screen, in front of which our family car was parked, under the night sky. I was told that there were thousands of hand drawn little pictures on that strip of film and through some process as yet beyond my ability to comprehend, they looked alive when put through the projector and light went through them.
It sounded like some kind of magic to me and even If it wasn’t “real” magic then it was clearly the next best thing. The sense of wonder from that night stayed with me for quite some time; certainly long enough to get me into the animation industry. I can still conjure up a ghost of it even now after 25 years in the biz.
These days of course, people don’t need to go to Drive-In movies. You can watch whatever you like, and whenever you like at home on your groovy big-screen home entertainment centre, or for that matter just go ahead and take the tiny kids to the multiplex, no problem. Nobody is going to hear them over the all cellphone chit-chat anyway.
