The Primal Screen

 A couple of days ago I posted this photo from 1938, curious for its incongruity to me. In the foreground, a row of council workmen mowing the municipal lawns of Oamaru's Severn Street, scythes at the ready or already being put to use. In the background, the familiar arch of the portico of The Majestic Theatre, the town's only cinema for as long as I lived there. The lawns endure, but a different manner of traffic now breezes up the hill in the middle distance, the oaks have increased their girth, and the Majestic has long since shut off its projector amps, turning into an Elim Church.

"She may not look like much, kid, (etc) The Majestic 1985-86

There have been several attempts to bring the flicks back to Oamaru - and currently there is indeed a theatre in the main street. But I'm sure I'm not alone on my generation and those before who miss the old theatre, modest as it was, with its front foyer, two-tier seating and single screen. From a rerun of Dumbo to Tim Burton's Batman it was, bar one or two holiday visitations, the only movie theatre I knew, and the one in which I thrilled to animated Disney classics, was traumatised by the likes of Watership Down, The Black Hole and The Mouse and his Child (yes indeedy) got turned away weeks before my 13th birthday attempting (rather weakly) to get past the front door to see Blade Runner, hooted with my friends to the brilliant near-mid 80s run of Ghostbusters, Gremlins and Back to the Future, was blown away by Star Wars and The Terminator, and, of course, saw in my first proper date - the details of which can stay in my memory, thankyou very much.

As do many of the details of the theatre insides. I wish I could remember more , even as it does occasionally appear in my dreams, its back wall and screen strangely open to the blinding outside world, into which we would surely emerge from a reliably good matinee. You'd hope it was good, being from my end of town, as the bike ride there and back was at least forty minutes either way. Like much of my childhood and teenage entertainment, some planning was required. That, of course, was one of the essentials of the experience, confirmed by at least one instance of me mowing my nan's front lawn and mutely witnessing a troupe of schoolfriends wheeling their way past, surely (definitely) to see Flash Gordon. At that age moviegoing was a purely social experience to be recounted the next school day, so that was that. No videos, to VHS boom for a few years of course, and no toilet breaks. You never timed those well.

it was, of course, video that killed the local cinema's star. The not-small number of choices on offer, the possibility of two - even three movies to watch in an evening, then rewind and watch again. The power of the pause button... a Pentecostal fate seemed the only salvation to our beleaguered movie house, and so it was. 

Ah, but they burn into your mind, those early projections, and if I could borrow a time machine I'd surely take a trip to 2pm on a Saturday afternoon and pay a visit to those dim aisles on squeaky crocodile-jawed chairs. And I'd be faithful and true - staying seated right through to the end, bladder be damned. Or at least the intermission.