Movie Memories

 

A week or so ago I watched the 1955 movie Foxfire as research for a book. My stories are fiction and my protagonists are fictional, but the historical context is not, and I like to get my history right. Since my eleven-year-old protagonist watches Foxfire in the book, I did, too.

If any of you have seen Foxfire and wonder why an eleven-year-old would watch it, there was no rating system in 1956 (when my story takes place), and it wasn’t unusual for parents to let pre-teens watch movies intended for adults. If the current rating system had been in effect then, Foxfire would have received a PG-13 at most and maybe even a PG. Except for some kissing, the adult situations are all offscreen and even the references are oblique. It isn’t a good movie, but Jane Russell was the female lead, so it probably did okay at the box office.

Next week’s blog post will give you a peek at the plot of my story. For now, I’ll simply say that my protagonist watches the movie on a transatlantic voyage, and that brings back memories of my childhood.

Growing up in DeTour Village, Michigan, the nearest movie theater was sixty miles away in Sault St. Marie (or the Soo, as it was usually called). Actually, there might have been one in St. Ignace, which was a little closer, but we didn’t go there as often.

The main reason we didn’t see any movies, though, is because Daddy didn’t like spending money if he didn’t have to. Even though we went to the Soo every other Saturday so Daddy could visit people in the hospital, he preferred providing us with free entertainment—exchanging our library books and watching lake freighters go through the Soo Locks.

There was one exception. Daddy actually took us to a double-feature of Ma and Pa Kettle films, which was his type of humor. I’m not sure if that was before or after our sabbatical in Scotland, though.

I crossed the Atlantic Ocean by boat three times as a child. The first eastbound trip was on the Nova Scotia in 1957 on our way to a sabbatical in Jordon. We returned from that trip eight months later on the Queen Mary. My next eastbound trip occurred in 1961 on our way to another sabbatical, this one in Scotland. That was also on the Queen Mary. (We returned home from Scotland by plane.)

It was the second Queen Mary crossing that gave me more movie memories. The fare included free admission to the ship’s cinema, and Mama and Daddy let us see as many films as we wanted. I probably saw several during the five-day crossing, but I remember only one. I’m not positive, but my memory of the plot line and subsequent research leads me to believe it was Parrish, starring Troy Donahue, which is an adult love story not meant for ten-year-old girls. I don’t think it had any lasting effects, but it must have made an impression if I remember it after all these years.

The next time I saw a movie was during high school We moved from DeTour to Lake City, Michigan, between my sophomore and junior years, and Lake City had a movie theater. I saw The Sound of Music there with my mother. She was disappointed because she had read Maria von Trapp’s autobiography and the movie took too many liberties for Mama’s liking.

Then I went away to college, and there were two cinemas in town. Since I had control over how I spent my monthly allowance, my movie famine was over.

Next week I’ll tell you more about the story that required me to watch Foxfire for research.

Movie Lure

This past week I took my mother to see The Sound of Music on the stage of the DeWitt Theatre in Holland, Michigan. That brought back memories of seeing it at the movies, and that lead to reminiscing about my childhood experiences.

When I was growing up, the nearest movie theater was sixty miles away. My father also hated to spend money. As a result, I rarely went to the movies. In fact, I went only once while living at DeTour Village, Michigan from third grade through tenth grade. Daddy took us to see a Ma and Pa Kettle double feature in Sault St. Marie, Michigan (at the theater that was sixty miles away). Daddy may have chosen Ma and Pa Kettle with his young children in mind, but the humor was exactly his type.

We took a sabbatical to Scotland in the middle of our time at DeTour. We sailed to England on the Queen Mary (pictured above)* in 1961 on our way to Scotland, and the fare included free admission to the ship’s movie theater. Because it was free, my parents let us see as many movies as we wanted. I probably saw several during the five-day crossing, but I only remember one. I’m not positive, but I think it was Parrish, staring Troy Donahue. In any event, it wasn’t meant for ten-year-old girls. It may be that my parents didn’t realize what I was watching, or they may have thought I was mature enough to handle it. Either way, I guess I turned out okay.

I didn’t go to the movies again until my junior year in high school, when The Sound of Music came to Lake City, Michigan. (The movie came out in 1965 and we didn’t move to Lake City until just before school started in 1966, so it must have taken a while to reach the small-town theaters.) This time it was my mother who was the primary force in seeing the movie, although I enjoyed it as much as she did.

When I went to college, I could finally go to the movies as much as my limited income would allow, which turned out to be several times a year. Then when I dated Roland, we went once or twice a month.

But it’s those lean years that I remember most.

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* I couldn’t find a picture of the Queen Mary among the slides my father took when we went to Scotland in 1961, so this is from our 1958 trip home after our sabbatical in Amman, Jordan.