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This topic comprises 10 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
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Author
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Topic: Movies featuring theatres
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Michael Barry
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 584
From: Sydney, NSW, Australia
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 01-22-2001 08:42 PM
In Barry Levinson's criminally underrated 'Jimmy Hollywood' there's a scene at the end around and in (what a friend tells me is) the Egyptian theatre in LA. Joe Pesci's character (Jimmy Alto) is on the run from the law and escapes into the auditorium! He then imagines himself with all the characters from JW in a 1940's film noir which is superimposed on the screen. He glances at his portable TV and sees himself there as well - and the outside of the theatre is surrounded by police. He has become the character that he imagines himself to be. Wonderful stuff!David Koepp's screenplays always allude to film projection and cinemas in some way. Someone mentioned 'A Stir Of Echoes'. There is also 'Apartment Zero' in which one of the characters owns a movie theatre. There's a line of dialogue where the owner defends his position: 'Real movies on a real screen'.  (Note: name dropping in following paragraph). When Curtis Hanson came to Sydney to promote his new film, 'Wonder Boys', I spoke to him about 'Bad Influence' (A David Koepp screenplay) and how there's this party scene in which Jean-Luc Godard's 'Alphaville' is projected onto a wall! What I found out from him was that the selection of 'Alphaville' was his (Hanson's) choice; its themes strongly parallel those of 'Bad Influence' and both main characters are also led astray. As a side note, I took in my laserdisc of 'Bad Influence' for him to autograph (there's no DVD of this yet) and when I got home I wanted to play it. It was so badly warped that it wouldn't spin up; when I tried to flex it back - snap! Where's the DVD??? I love that movie...I told C. Hanson that it was one of my favourites and his response was , 'You're a sick individual!'. OK, I'm definitely rambling now...'Cinema Paradiso' is a very special film! So here's my final anecdote for this post: one of the first theatres I worked at showed this movie quite regularly (they were an arthouse/rep theatre) and the booth was located on the top floor near a window facing a terrace house with a blank wall...can you guess the rest? Well, when the movie was over, they would usher patrons toward the exit that faced that wall, and they would thread up one of the reels of CP and use the 'mirror trick' from the film to project the movie onto the wall as the patrons were leaving the theatre! 
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Dave Bird
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 777
From: Perth, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Jun 2000
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posted 01-23-2001 11:59 AM
TARGETS - filmed at Reseda Drive-In (closed and demolished in the 80's) in 1968, Reseda CA.TWISTER - "Galaxy" destroyed in the movie is actually the Beacon of Guthrie OK (still very much open since 1950). And now I add another which was on TV last night - "Hope Floats". Harry Connick Jr. and Sandra Bullock revisit their youth by parking in the local "abandoned" drive-in. I'm sure many have done just that, however this drive-in looked spotless and manicured.
Anyone know where this theatre is? IMDB lists shooting locations as Smithville Texas,
Austin Texas, and Chicago, but none of Chicago's DI's look close, all Austin's are gone, and none listed for Smithville????? (My wife was watching it, OK???!!  )
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Dave Bird
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 777
From: Perth, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Jun 2000
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posted 01-23-2001 01:46 PM
I checked one of my old fan club journals, where they talk about the Northfield. It actually straddles the state line. When built in '48, the owner apparently wished to avoid exhorbinant Mass. entertainment taxes, so while the screen is in Mass., the box office and concession sits in Hinsdale, New Hampshire! (Look there on drive-ins.com.)As for the "Hope Floats" question I posed above, turns out it's a trick question. I was shocked to learn that this very real looking theatre was laid out on a local softball field in Smithville Texas. That explains the manicured grass, posts with speakers and nice looking screen. VERY real looking. Why can't we harness this phenomenon of "termporary" drive-ins for the good of mankind? (ie- Anyone's welcome to film on location in my back yard - free - just leave the screen!) This TV movie about the guy who comes home and dreams of building his own drive-in (anyone know anybody like that? ), "The Flamingo Rising" (William Hurt, Elizabeth McGovern) features a custom-built DI which was located at Marineland Florida.
This Hallmark movie will air on CBS early February. Unfortunately, though the Flamingo Drive-In did actually show some "movie shorts" and cartoons (with no sound), it was completely torn down after shooting.
Woulda looked nice out behind the house!
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John Wilson
Film God
Posts: 5438
From: Sydney, Australia.
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 01-24-2001 10:39 PM
Dave wrote...>>And now I add another which was on TV last night - "Hope Floats". Harry Connick Jr. and Sandra Bullock revisit their youth by parking in the local "abandoned" drive-in. I'm sure many have done just that, however this drive-in looked spotless and manicured.
Anyone know where this theatre is? IMDB lists shooting locations as Smithville Texas,
Austin Texas, and Chicago, but none of Chicago's DI's look close, all Austin's are gone, and none listed for Smithville?????<<From the drive-ins egroup... >>The drive in scene that you saw was a set built on a softball field
in the town of Smithville. Everything was taken down after the movie
was finished. Looked real didn't it?<< I've never seen Hope Floats so I can't say...but from what I've heard, that's not such a bad thing...  ------------------
"It's not the years, honey...it's the mileage". Indiana Jones
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