The quiet comfort of textured upholstered seats, a cloistered feeling as lights dim, ushers with flashlights escort late comers to their seats, the smell of hot buttered popcorn in old downtown theatres with balconies and rococo embellishments where tickets are sold from a large roll by young girls in glassed in wickets talking through small holes through the partitions causing patrons to bend low and talk too loud, then receive change dispensed into a stainless steel bowl imbedded into the counter top.
The marquis displays one, sometimes two movies to the street. No loud ads or subliminal seduction before the movie fades to a black and white newsreel narrated by a disembodied resonating voice describing world events to a sheltered audience shocking the world as they hear that Hitler has invaded Poland, tanks face off against the cavalry.
I explained patiently to my own Children that once, long ago, the whole world existed only in black and white. I could easily prove this by showing old family photo albums with groups of distant cousins, aunts and uncles posing in serious faces in black and white pictures held in place with photo corners, just as my father explained to me, as a child, his world of sepia tones.
Now the world has evolved and we
See events in
Techno-colour
Panavision with
Dolby surround sound
We walk to our seats on sticky Floors covered with spilt soft drinks and carpeted Popcorn. A giant fire breathing dragon in some distant mythical Silver City over sees the sale of thirteen dollar tickets so very far away from sepia tones merging to black and
white with subtitles and a…
little,
white
bouncing
ball.
And watch as our soldiers fight in living, vivid colour.
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