FILM REVIEW

Tony Dodero

I remember the crackling sounds of the speakers, the fogged up windows

that hindered the view of the screen. I remember the cardboard pizza and

the playgrounds and the crunching sound of my mom eating popcorn.

I remember cramming into the back of a wood-paneled station wagon, my

little brother and I wearing matching flannel pajamas.

For those who have similar flashbacks, I recommend taking a drive down

memory lane and catching “Drive-in Movie Memories,” directed by Kurt

Kuenne.

“There’s something neat about the communal experience,” movie critic

Leonard Maltin explains in this vintage-looking documentary. “You

remember it as you would your first kiss. Your first car.”

Documentaries are successful if the viewer learns something new. And

this film, based on the book “American Drive-in Movie Theater,” by Don

and Susan Sanders, is brimming with lots of drive-in trivia.

According to the film, Richard Hollingsted launched the drive-in movie

idea in Camden, N.J., in June 1933. It slowly grew in popularity until it

spun out of control just after World War II.

The movie plays out like a drive-in scrapbook, chronicling the

different trends and inventions that were spawned in the wake of the

outdoor theater phenomenon.

Movie lot owners employed monkeys to entertain guests, sold heaters

that malfunctioned and blew black dust, and hawked mini-awnings to keep

the rain off car windshields.

The drive-in slowly evolves in the film into a societal behemoth, in

which moviegoers would spend hours watching flicks, eating junk food and,

of course, necking in the back seat.

Alas, the film chronicles how the once-mighty drive-in industry,

killed by video and its own failings, crumbled into ruin, the large

chunks of land sold off to shopping center developers.

But all is not lost. The drive-ins are making a comeback, the film

shows, and maybe, just maybe, there is hope that this pure slice of

Americana may return to prominence.

Now I just need to remember to get a new pair of flannel pajamas.

* “Drive-In Movie Memories” will play at 11 a.m. Wednesday at Edwards

Island 2, 999 Newport Center Drive, Newport Beach.