Thursday 30 June 2011

So I felt a touch guilty about sloping off to the cinema on a sunny (working) day ...
But it was brilliant. Literally.
West Side Story has been restored for its 50th anniversary.
And from that opening sequence when the camera pans across New York, it was a joy to see it on the big screen. I think I've only once seen it at the cinema before.
I was jiggling in my seat (I know, I know but there were rows and rows of empty seats.)
I was barely refraining from singing along.
And the colours ... why have I never noticed the wonderful colour before? The stained glass door in Maria's apartment, dresses in the bridal store, green light reflected on a cobbled street ...
I loved it. This wasn't the film I knew from afternoons in front of the television. It felt as vibrant as if I were seeing it for the first time back in 1961. (I got talking to an older woman who had brought along her original souvenir programme.)
And there was an Intermission. I love an Intermission. All that was missing was a Look at Life.
And continuous performances. Remember continuous performances? Now if they'd only revived those, I'd have settled down in my seat and watched it through again.

5 comments:

love those cupcakes said...

So much better than being at work. I hope you were shown to your seat by an usherette with a torch and that that same usherette walked backwards down the aisle during the intermission, flogging strawberry Mivvis. (I remember my cousin taking me to the cinema when I was younger and she produced sandwiches and her knitting in the intermission).

mary said...

Even the word Intermission conjures up Mivvis, and Orange Maid and Kia-Ora and a very posh tub of strawberry sundae that we hardly ever had because they cost 2s. Maybe we should campaign for the restoration of Real Intermissions, lovethosecupcakes.
Unfortunately, I'm now sitting down to the work that didn't get done yesterday!

Anonymous said...

What a lovely post, took me right back to my youth. Ahh...

Anonymous said...

Ah, intermissions! And no one crunching enormous tubs of popcorn. And sitting in the back row with your boyfriend...

I have a wonderful DVD of Look at Life: The Swinging Sixties.

mary said...

I'm lucky, callmemadam, my two local cinemas don't sell popcorn.