Drive-In Theater: Difference between revisions
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[[File:Drive-In Theater.jpg|frame|An iconic image from the drive-in's heyday. The movie is ''[[The Ten Commandments]]''.]]
{{quote|''"If you're going to leave before seeing the next movie, ''[[
The drive-in theater has been a fixture of American culture since [[The Thirties]]. Every summer night (and all year round in warmer climates), millions of viewers pay the admission fee for themselves and their friends (at least the ones who aren't hiding in the trunk), get some snacks at the concession stand, and watch two (or more) movies projected on an outdoor screen from the privacy and comfort of their cars. Although drive-ins are most popular in the United States, they exist around the world. The drive-in is an enduring symbol of Americana whose continued existence defies some heavy odds.
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'''The Rise:''' Drive-ins really took off after [[World War Two]]; by their peak in the late [[The Fifties|1950s]] and early [[The Sixties|1960s]], there were more than 4,000 drive-ins all across America. While they continued to show mainstream Hollywood fare for families, they also became popular with teenagers, who would come to see the latest [[B-Movie|B Movies]] (which usually dealt with [[Science Fiction]] monsters, juvenile delinquents, and [[The New Rock and Roll|early rock & roll]]). Of course, teens also took advantage of the privacy factor, which made drive-ins notorious as [[Make-Out Point|"passion pits"]]. In the popular imagination, drive-ins are still associated with these tropes derived from the 1950s. However, this heyday was [[Too Good to Last]]...
'''The Fall:''' Drive-ins gradually declined for a number of reasons. The real estate they used became too valuable to "waste" on a business which could operate for only a few hours a day, a few months a year, and even then was subject to bad weather. Meanwhile, audiences began turning to
'''The Resurgence:''' In the 2000s and 2010s, drive-ins have enjoyed a [[Revival]]; a few new theaters have even opened in the last few years. Some of this is due to Baby Boomer nostalgia, although many
During [[intermission]]s, drive-ins traditionally show [[Advertising Tropes|advertisements]] for the snack bar, as well as [[Public Service Announcement|public service announcements]], ads for local merchants, safety messages and reminders of when the next movie is going to start ("10 minutes to showtime!"). These peppy, often animated ads have a following of their own; many are available on DVD compilations and in the Internet Archive's [http://www.archive.org/details/DriveInMovieAds Moving Image Archive].
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They've also changed as technology improved. Originally, Drive-ins had physical speakers, attached by wire to a post, which you removed from the post, rolled down your window, placed the speaker inside, then rolled up the window. This often caused people to forget they had the speaker attached, causing them to drive off, usually ripping the speaker off the post and possibly breaking the window. (Some very small ones just had a single, large speaker.) Today, drive ins have low-power broadcast transmitters, that send the audio to your car radio. Some drive-ins even have digital sound (usually the DTS format, since they are the only company that does installations for digital sound in drive-ins). This also means, if the car has good stereo, that the sound can be as good as that in a high-quality walk-in theater. Some drive-ins run AM as well as FM signals for the few people who don't have FM radio.
{{examples}}
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* ''[[Tales Of The Starlight Drive In]]'', an award-winning graphic novel written by Michael Sangiacomo, is an anthology of stories set at a single drive-in over 53 years.
* An issue of ''[[Hsu and Chan]]'' had the characters head off to a drive-in and getting caught up in a money making scheme of an old movie anniversary.
== [[Film]] ==▼
▲== Film ==
* ''[[Targets]]'' ends with a sniper taking potshots at patrons at a drive-in theater. He is eventually faced down by [[Boris Karloff]].
* ''[[Spies Like Us]]'': A ''[[Star Wars]]''-style anti-missile system is hidden underneath an old run-down drive-in theater.
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* One of the scenes in ''[[Air Buddies]]'' has the puppies go to a drive-in theatre and interrupt the showing of ''[[101 Dalmatians|One Hundred and One Dalmatians]]''. A biker gang is there watching the movie, and when the puppies pass by them... they ''literally'' [[Pet the Dog]].
* ''[[Cars (film)|Cars]]'': The characters are watching parodies of other [[Pixar]] films at the end of the movie; since they're all vehicles of some sort, [[Captain Obvious|of course it's a drive-in theatre]].
** As ''Cars'' was based on multiple research trips on 1200 miles of the former US Route 66, the cinepark is likely the ''66 Drive-In'' in Carthage MO - which is on the national historic register.
** The American car culture in ''Cars'' also manifests itself in every hotel being a motel and every restaurant being a "car hop" style drive-in. Effectively, the film is [[nostalgia]] for [[The Fifties]] and America's love affair with the automobile in that era.
* ''[[Northville Cemetery Massacre]]'' includes a scene where a bunch of motorcycles pull up to a drive-in theater (specifically, the now-abandoned Jolly Roger Drive-In in the Detroit suburb of Taylor).
* In ''[[Red Dawn]]'', the [[Dirty Communists]] turn this icon of American culture into a prison/reeducation camp.
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* The original ''[[That Darn Cat]]'' features a [[Chase Scene]] at a drive-in.
* ''[[Blood Rage]]'' begins at a drive-in, where the killer (then a young boy) claims his first victim by hacking up a random patron up with an axe that was lying around... for some reason.
* The killer gets chased to a drive-in by angry bikers in ''[[New
== [[Literature]] ==
* ''[[The Cider House Rules]]'' contains a fictional example of a drive-in theater being used as a [[Make-Out Point]].
* The second ''Snark Out Boys'' novel by [[Daniel Pinkwater]] deals with the secret history of the drive-in as a major plot point. The book claims that the original "drive-in" was a stage show in Romania in the 1800s, which the peasants hated so much that they burned it down and drove the purveyor out of the country. The climax of the book is at the world's largest drive-in theater, founded by a descendant of the original inventor. [[Brick Joke|A Romanian pyromaniac shows up and sets the entire lot on fire.]]
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* A character is forced to watch the deaths of his friends in a decayed drive-in in ''The Nightmares on Elm Street: Freddy Krueger's Seven Sweetest Dreams'' story "Asleep at the Wheel".
▲== [[Live Action TV]] ==
* One of these appeared in an episode of ''[[The Adventures of Pete and Pete]]'' where older Pete and {{spoiler|Ellen}} go on a date.
* The bad guys on ''[[Chuck]]'' had their base in an old drive-in.
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* In the "Julie" segment of the [[Made for TV]] [[Anthology Film]] ''[[Trilogy of Terror]]'', a student who has [[Hot for Teacher|an unhealthy obsession with his teacher]] takes her on a date to a drive-in, knocks her out with [[Slipping a Mickey|a spiked drink]], then takes [[Blackmail|compromising photos]] of her while she's unconscious.
* One of the last episodes of ''[[Cold Case]]'' began with a guy getting sniped in a drive-in.
* The ''[[Mission: Impossible (TV series)
* An episode of ''[[Family Matters]]'' took place at a drive-in and focused on the dates of Laura, Steve, and Waldo. The latter of which didn't even come in a car, rather Maxine and he just walk in with folding chairs and coolers.
== [[Music]] ==▼
▲== Music ==
* "There's an [[Elvis]] movie on the [[Department of Redundancy Department|marquee sign]]" is the opening line to Hal Ketchum's "Small Town Saturday Night".
* "Moonlight Drive-In" by Turner Nichols recalls a former lover and how they would make out at the drive-in.
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* The multiplayer map "Drive-In" from ''[[Call of Duty: Black Ops|Call of Duty Black Ops]]'' is set in an [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|abandoned drive-in]]. Besides having an arcade with [[Easter Egg|Call of Duty: World At War]] games, the old movie screen has a chunk torn out of it to make an effective sniping post.
* One of the levels in ''[[Twisted Metal Black]]'' is a drive-in theatre. A well placed missile can destroy the screen.
* Starlight Drive-In from ''[[Fallout 4]]'' is a pre-War drive-in theater that the player can turn into a settlement.
== [[Western Animation]] ==
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