Selected shorts

Remember when movie theaters displayed this on their marques? They would name the two (usually double features) movie titles playing, the add "And selected Shorts."

The newsreels would play after the first feature, then maybe a cartoon, and then a brief film. This often was a travel log of some far away place, in full color, too. And then a musical film, often some backwoods hillbilly stuff, Hollywood's perception of mountain music. And, sometimes it was Bob Wills and his band, or Spike Jones. The hillbiklly stuff was pure corn, with coonskin caps and blacked out front teeth.


And all of this for twenty five cents, plus the cost of the popcorn!

Bob Wright

Now they spend that time shoving video ads in your face and you have reserve seats online, no more first come first served. I stopped going to the movies years ago.

Remember going to the movies and watching a double feature?
For the younger ones here, that was sitting through not one, but two movies.

The last movie I saw in a theater for was "Stewart Little", with my nephews. They were 4 and 5 years old. The oldest one turns 34 this year. Guess I can get along without Hollywood.

nvbirdman said:

Remember going to the movies and watching a double feature?
For the younger ones here, that was sitting through not one, but two movies.

Click to expand...

Were the movies as long as today's movies (around 2 hours)

I like going to the theater, but it's expensive. The movie theater we go to sells dinner and has waitresses and everything.

But after the tickets, then dinner, it ends up being $30 to $35 per person.

And, don't forget the 'serials' that went on each week so you needed to come to the theater each week to keep up. A fifteen mile bus ride each way (only ran on Saturday), ticket to the movie, a box of milk balls or chocolate. and across the street for a fountain Coke after the movie and before boarding the bus home... all for around $2.00

I once sat through a double feature of Gone With The Wind, and How The West Was Won. All for 49 cents.

Just saw Fall Guy last night. The tickets were expensive, but what shocked me was the $20 for 2 sodas and a medium popcorn. I had high hopes for the movie, as I was a big fan of the TV series…but while it was entertaining it didn't come close to my expectations. I save my theater visits for movies I feel are worthwhile. Oh well.

And to add insult to injury I got a flat and had to change a tire on the way home.

Early 50's. Saturday cartoons (20 of them) before a double feature.

I used to love to go to the movies. As recently as 10 or 11 years ago when I retired, I probably went to a movie theater around once a week. I enjoyed going alone (my wife has very limited interest in movies in general), and sitting in an empty or almost empty theater. COVID ended that when the theaters were closed, and ever since there have hardly been any movies that I thought were worth the $12.50 or so ticket price or the short drive to the theater. I still look at the listings for the two multiplexes in my area, with a total of 30 screens, and most of the time there is literally nothing playing that I have any interest in.

Two weeks ago on a gloomy, rainy day my wife was busy quilting, and I decided to go to the movies to see a film on the big screen about the Webb telescope images. But when I read that it was a 40 minute documentary, and ticket prices were the same $12.50, I decided not to go but to wait for this documentary to be available for my big screen TV at home.

The last film that I went to a theater to watch was Oppenheimer. I enjoyed it, but probably would have enjoyed it just as much on my TV.

Well, I can't argue with the inflation aspect. But I would like to point out that TCM broadcasts a few of those travelogues every Sat. morning, along with (sometimes) short classics from the '30s and '40s. We have DirecTv, and can set them to be recorded, and viewed later. Some are extremely funny, to people as old as we are.

When I was a baby my parents couldn't afford a babysitter so when a new movie came out my mom would go one night and my dad would go another night.

Last movie we seen in a theater was the first Star Wars flick, A New Hope.
To be honest, I've always prefered a good book to a movie or TV.
Dano

I can lose myself in a movie more than I can ever do in a book, or for that matter, a movie on TV where there are always interruptions either in the movie or in my home. In a quiet theater I can immerse myself in the story without distractions. When things are on my mind, and I want to stop dwelling on them, going to the movies was by far the best medicine for my ailment. That said, when a movie, however fantastical, is internally inconsistent, then I have trouble letting myself be swept up in the story because those logical or visual errors jump out at me, such as if a 19th century Western film showed a cowboy with an AR.