A long long time ago, in a state far far away, there was a house that my family refers to as "The House" we were a family.It was before us kids were molded into survivors or warriors. We did family things like go for ice cream, go for walks as a family and go to the park. The thing that stands out most to me was when we went to the movies. We wouldn't often go to the regular movies then. At the grocery store we'd specifically ask for paper bags instead of plastic and we'd save them for one specific purpose. Mom would pop popcorn at home with real butter and salt and we'd fill these paper bags full, hide them in the trunk and go to the drive in. I remember being so young watching Bill and Ted's excellent adventure with my brother and sisters lying in front of me as I was sitting on my parents laps. We were a family and we were together. The movies were a special treat. I remember one time my brother and sister went with their dad, and my sister went with her mom and I was really sad because I was left behind. My mom and dad
took me to see Dick Tracy at the drive in. I remember nothing of the movie other than his awesome walky talky watch, but I remember even as a child how in that moment I felt such a great amount of love being there with my parents. I remember seeing one of the back to the future movies and smuggling in candy that mom would purchase from Walgreens beforehand and tuck away in her purse because even back then, they would price gouge.
When the foundations of my family structure began to shake and fall there was a lot of fighting and yelling in my house. My Granny and my Aunt would sometimes pick up all the kids, but mostly just me and we would go to a United Artist cinema. They'd even spring for popcorn that was made there, fresh. I remember I was a little bit of a tyrant when it came to that popcorn; I once bit my aunt’s hand when she tried to take it from me when we saw Short Circuit 2. I remember the time she took me to see the land before time, the first one. She wanted to sit really close because she was practically blind, and I wanted to sit further back away from the screen. We compromised by sitting separately. I remember looking ahead and seeing her wiping away tears when littlefoot's mom died. I remember being really small and thinking, "This is a cartoon movie for kids, why is my aunt crying" Looking back now, I get it but it was odd at the time. My parent’s marriage crumbled and that took a pretty strong toll on me. I would still find times where things almost felt alright. My parents had joint custody and I remember seeing Hook with my mom and my sister and though people were missing and we weren't whole, it almost felt normal again. At least it did for a little while. I remember seeing Aladdin with my best friend, her mom and my aunt and how we laughed and laughed. We walked out of there and
quoted the movie and the jokes for weeks. It was a connection that lasted longer than the price of admission.
Something inside of me emotionally began to shut down when my mom moved away. Emotional wounds were being compounded and over time I began to lose myself. In my heart, in order to cope I was becoming numb. This was further impacted when I watched my father die at 8 years old. Depression hit me hard and I think that On some level, I tried to medicate a hole in my life with movies. Perhaps it was a sense of escape from what I'd gone through or what was continually happening around me. In part, I would think that somewhere in my subconscious I
was reaching for that place that felt like family and home where we were together in mind and action interpreting stories. When I moved to New Mexico, we didn't have a lot. We were not well off. We used to get food boxes from the pantries sometimes to try and make it through. For my birthday one year I remember getting homemade coupons good for a video rental at Hastings and one was for the whole family to go see the nightmare before Christmas. I didn't quite know what to make of Dana, my step dad because a lot of the time he was angry and mean in a passive aggressive way... but this was an effort. He was trying to make us a family and that for me, was one of the best ways to do it. I was so excited to see the movie and I remember the night that we were finally going, he was mad and had been yelling about something stupid before we all piled into the car. It tainted everything for me. It withdrew the family element of the situation. At that moment, I was seeing a movie with a jerk, my Mom and my sister. It was in New Mexico that my sister and I would fight like cats and dogs to the point that we would get grounded and our punishment was that we had to spend time together. Looking back, it was
brilliant. We hated it, but we both knew that it wasn't all that bad. One time we went to the mall together to see a movie and we were waiting for mom to pick us up and Jas ran into her friends from school. She took a drag off a cigarette and she told me not to tell. For whatever reason, I didn't It was one of the first times she had trusted me with something that could have hurt her and somewhere in my mind, I attribute that to being at the movies.
It was while I was living in New Mexico that I became old enough to be trusted with seeing a movie by myself. George Lucas had just added a bunch of little things to Star Wars like that garbage about Guido shooting first and my mom had assessed that I was finally old enough to go see a movie by myself. She dropped me off and picked me up, but I was able to watch The Empire Strikes Back alone. For a kid that wasn’t at that time allowed to stay home by himself it felt like a milestone. Movies helped me feel something. They made me laugh. They instilled a sense of awe and shock and anticipation that I knew was supposed to be somewhere in my real life. I acted out and had terrible behavioral issues stemming from suppressed emotional
coping and issues that I didn’t even trust anyone enough to open up to about regardless of how badly I needed to. My rebellion landed me in a residential treatment facility while my family moved to Michigan.
My Mom’s new boyfriend at the time reconnected with His dad and they thought the best way to spend quality time together was to go to the movies every Friday at 5pm. Every week we’d see the new movie whatever it was, good or bad. Saving Private Ryan was amazing and we were in awe coming out of the theater. Universal soldier 2 had us in tears laughing so hard when Walt Sr. loudly remarked that the portion of the man’s skull that was just removed and looked exactly like a ham sandwich. We’d watch movies together and talk about all the best action scenes or how artistic the cinematography was. We’d sit around the dinner table quoting the dumbest lines from the worst movies because they were so bad they were almost good. For all the bad, for all the struggles in that time with Walt going through liver treatments and high school being as bad as it was, I always pressed through until Friday here things felt like normal. Fridays were an echo of family.
In Michigan, we still were poor but I don’t think we were AS poor considering Dana was no longer around to waste money on stupid pet projects that he’d never finish. Outside of the usual Friday thing, If I wanted to see a movie with friends, My mom in her embarrassing but smart wisdom would make me come up with the money. I remember going to the movies with a group of kids in middle school and having them in tears laughing when I pulled out a zip lock bag full of change, mostly pennies, and the man at the counter had to count my $3.00 bills and the rest change to make the $7.00 ticket. I was embarrassed but at the same time, I realized that David Byers wasn’t laughing at the fact that I was poor, He was laughing at the situation and how this poor guy had to sit there with handfuls of gross couch change being pulled out of a sandwich bag with $ written on it in sharpie. It was there that I learned that even if you’re in a crappy situation you can still laugh at it. As I write this now, I’m laughing at it. After my brother moved to Michigan, his father ended up there not too long after and again, it became our ritual to see movies together. One of my fondest memories was sitting in English class board to tears about to fall asleep when the phone rang. My teacher hangs up and says that I’m needed in the office and to bring my things because I’m not coming back. As all the students let out the classing “ooooooohs” I started to think long and hard about anything that I could have done wrong for the reason being summoned. I was drawing a blank. I walked down the hall and could see through
the glass, my brother was standing in the office looking stern. I pushed open the door and he looks me in the eyes and says “We’re late. Did you forget you had a Dr. Appointment today? You were supposed to meet me here.” Without missing a beat I responded “ I TOTALLY forgot, I’m so sorry” Kane said thanks again to the attendance lady and we walked outside where his dad was already waiting in the car. I climbed in and buckled up and asked him “Where are we
really going?” “Well, Dad and I were thinking we wanted to see Legend of the
Drunken Master, and there is just no way we could see it without you… so we
came to spring you out” For a while, It was like there wasn’t years without my brother, we just did a brother like thing.
When I moved back to Arizona I was living independently. I was 16 at the time and working, while going to school. I remember my brother was at work and my friends were busy so I decided I would walk down to the cheap theater a block and a half away and catch Swordfish before it left the theater. The whole situation felt off from the second I set my mind to it. There wasn’t the excitement of anticipation to see the movie, I just walked alone in the Arizona
sun. I sat by myself in the dark theater near other people that were by themselves and it just made me even sadder. When the movie was over, I didn’t have anyone to talk to about how cool
the explosion was at the beginning and how the movie pretty much peaked there, or how Hallie Berry without a shirt did absolutely nothing to advance the plot. I felt really alone walking out of that theater, and to top it off the movie wasn’t very good at all.
I met one of my best in high school, we got an apartment together after I had to drop out to support myself. We both worked at Gas stations about two blocks apart. We hung out all the time and we’d see two movies a week if there were that many. Sometimes we would see two movies in a day. One time, we even watched Terminator 3 twice in the same night because after we got out we met up with our friend Ray who felt left out that he couldn’t see it due to a prior engagement. I felt like I had a new family beyond the scope of my original. There was one time James needed help moving to north Phoenix and he had rented a U-haul. We crammed it full of his stuff and we were exhausted.I looked at my phone and realized that Superman Returns was about to show at the Mills mall just off the freeway and so, right in the middle of moving, we
took a break at the theater to watch Superman. James was awful at actors' names and he’d get Kevin Spacey and John Travolta mixed up and it became a running joke that James thought Lex Luthor was Danny Devito. I remember when him and I went to see Finding Nemo and at first were embarrassed that we were two grown men going to see a kids movie, until we walked in the theater and saw that it was predominantly adults.
It wasn’t all action movies or Sci-Fi thrillers that I would see. Some of the best quality time that I have had with my sister Jasmine would be when her and I would go see some romantic comedy that she wanted to see. That’s probably the only reason I know who Hugh Grant is. We’d talk about what was going on in her life and my life. We’d go over pressures of family and chaos
until the lights dimmed and the previews would start. I’d sit there wide eyed thirsty for a story that would soon head my way that would be an epic cultural event, or would be so bad that we could tear it apart.
Some of my favorite memories are from being with friends at the movies when I lived in Woodstock. One particular time comes to mind when I went to see the Wickerman with Kelly Childs in what could have been a date had I not also invited my friend and her ex boyfriend Kyle. It was awkward, that is until we were sitting there watching Nicolas Cage slowly traipse
his way down the stairs with a stone set stupid look on his face and then BOOM, He punches some lady in the face out of the blue. I was so unprepared for it that I immediately began laughing, loudly, from the gut, uncontrollably. Knowing that I would be unable to contain this outburst and TRYING to be respectful of other guests, I left the theater, past the lobby, outside into the street. I stood in the street laughing for a few minutes trying my hardest to get things under control. I walked back inside and sat down and noticed a few glares from strangers and then I turned to kyle who said in a very monotone voice “Yeah, We could still hear you laughing” It was even harder to contain myself later when the movie featured Nick in a bear suit punching people and screaming about bees.
Some people look at movies and they think that it isn’t much of an interaction, that you just sit there and then it’s over. For me, it’s more than that. Movies are something special that in some ways tell truths that Sometimes we can’t put it into words. In Grosse Pointe Blank when Martin Blank is telling people to their face that he’s a contract killer and people laugh and dismiss it, I’ve felt that around my grandmother’s kitchen table when I’ve said things very openly and honestly and people have laughed it off. In some regards they reached into places that I had shut off and the world had told me that I was wrong or alone in the way I saw things, and they made life more relatable. I can’t tell you how many briefings at work have been in side splitting laughter because of quotes from Tommy Boy, Black Sheep, Dumb and Dumber . Relatability.
Family. Home.
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