Lights, camera, no action

The first film I ever saw, from beginning to end, was Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Lights, camera, no action

The first film I ever saw, from beginning to end, was Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. This was years ago, when I wore pigtails and pinafore to school and, from there, to the local theatre for an afternoon of wholesome entertainment under the watchful eyes of my teachers.

It wasn't just Dopey, with his button nose and beagle ears, who got me hooked on the big screen. It was the delicious magic up there in the projection booth the movie theatre equivalent of backstage on School Day. As for the man behind the curtain, he became my hero! He was the guy who made the movie look and sound so good to everyone, so I wanted his job when I grew up, I declared over dinner at home.

Why am I lumbering down memory lane now? Because I am wallowing in self-pity, dreading another movie-less weekend. Will I have to get my entertainment fix from watching crafty Sadie feed her human visitors to hungry alligators in Placid Lake 2 on cable TV as my eight-year-old squeals in delight? (Clearly, too much movie-watching has blunted my parenting abilities.)

Going to the movies now means a trip to a multiplex as single-screen theatres have been razed to make way for more malls and more multiplexes. And when that trip to the multiplex on Friday night doesn't happen nine weeks in a row, you cannot blame me for romanticising those nights spent swatting swarms of mosquitoes at Drive-in theatre while watching desi disco king Mithunda's obscene pelvic thrusts.

Had the teachers of my childhood seen how futile their efforts to maintain my innocence by nurturing me on a diet of Walt Disney had proved, they would have wept into their lavender-scented handkerchiefs!

Drive-in, on Bannerghatta Road, disappeared but left behind in me a voracious appetite for movies arty stuff, trashy stuff and everything in between. It also explains why I craved Govinda films, and not raw mango or imli like all good moms-to-be, during my pregnancy.

While folks at home must now put up with my crabby behaviour each time I catch sight of crocs on cable TV, readers of this column (assuming there are any) must excuse this tripe as the ranting of a movie-deprived mind.

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