Drive-In Theater: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:Drive-
{{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.
▲{{quote|''"If you're going to leave before seeing the next movie, ''[[This Is Sparta|You're Stupid]]!''"''|'''D. Edward Vogel''', owner of Baltimore's ''[http://bengies.com Bengie's Drive-In]'', over PA system between films.}}
▲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.
Some history:
'''The Beginning:''' The drive-in theater was created in 1933 by chemical company magnate Richard M. Hollingshead Jr., who opened the first one in Pennsauken Township, [[Joisey|New Jersey]]. It was popular enough that [[Follow the Leader|similar theaters began to open around the country]]. The drive-in became known as a place where a family could enjoy watching movies from the privacy of their car.
'''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 [[
Many drive-ins have playgrounds for child patrons to use before the show.
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 (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.
* ''[[Our Man Flint]]'': One of the fantasy make-out areas inside the GALAXY base is designed to look like a drive-in theater.
* A tornado attacks one during ''[[Twister]]'', complete with [[Shout-Out]] to ''[[The Shining]]'', matching the "Here's Johnny!" scene to the tornado crashing into said theater.
* ''[[Grease]]'' had a couple of scenes at one, including the musical number "Sandy".
* There's an especially bad slasher film called ''[[Drive
** There's another DTV slasher film simply called ''Drive-In'', and its surprisingly decent.
* ''[[
* One was featured in a [[Played for Laughs]] scene in ''[[Back to
* Sean from ''[[
* The ending of ''[[Pee
* One of the scenes in ''[[Air Buddies]]'' has the puppies go to a drive-in theatre and interrupt the showing of ''[[101 Dalmatians
* ''[[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 ''[[
* In ''[[Thunderbolt And Lightfoot]]'', some of the participants in a just completed vault robbery hide in the (huge) trunk of a 1950s Chevy, which goes over to the nearby drive-in as a vehicle with a couple of regular customers. Unfortunately, the clothes of the men hiding are exposed hanging out of the trunk, which causes the manager to call the police.
* [[
* ''[[The Sugarland Express]]'' - the fugitive couple watch a Road Runner cartoon on the drive-in screen across from their motel room.
* [[Stanley Kubrick]]'s ''[[
* The original ''[[
* ''[[
* The killer gets chased to a drive-in by angry bikers in ''[[New
== [[Literature]] ==▼
▲== 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.]]
* This might be how [[The Dresden Files
* 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.
* In an early episode of ''[[That/That 70 s Show|That]]'' Eric, Donna, Kelso and Jackie go to the local drive-in to watch ''[[
* In ''[[
* [[
* In the "Julie" segment of the [[Made for TV]] [[Anthology Film]] ''[[
* One of the last episodes of ''[[
* The ''[[Mission: Impossible (TV series)|Mission Impossible]]'' episode "The Psychic" begins with Briggs receiving his assignment at a drive-in.
* An episode of ''[[
== [[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.
* In "Everything's Changed" by Lonestar, the narrator laments all of the things that have changed in his hometown — but the one thing that stays the same is how much he still loves her. One of the things that's changed is "That old drive-in is a new Wal-Mart".
* Post-punk band At the Drive-In, who take their name from a Poison lyric.
* "Wake Up Little Susie," recorded in 1957 by the Everly Brothers, describes a pair of teens who fall asleep during the movie. [[Banned in Boston]] for lyrics that, [[The Fifties|at the time]], were considered suggestive.
== [[Video Games]] ==
* ''[[
* ''[[
* One of the fields in ''[[Backyard Sports
* One of the stages in the first ''[[Destroy All Humans!]]'' has a drive-in theater.
** It even played a full length movie during one mission.
* One of the places that could be attacked by the giant ants in ''[[It Came From The Desert]]'' was the local drive-in.
* An abandoned drive-in is present in the ''Stilwater'' of ''[[
* The multiplayer map "Drive-In" from ''[[Call of Duty: Black Ops
* 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]] ==
* The syndicated opening and closing credits of ''[[
* A drive-in also appears in ''[[Scooby
* In an episode of ''[[The Simpsons (
** In another episode, Apu reveals that he sometimes gets up on the roof of the Kwik-E-Mart so he can watch movies at the drive in across the street for free.
* The Jersey Drive-In is the battleground for the penultimate episode of ''[[
* The ''[[The Magic School Bus
* The ''[[
* The ''[[My Life
* There was a one-hour ''[[
* The ''[[Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers (
* Part of the ''[[Pac-Man (
* The ''[[
* The ''[[
* On ''[[
** Another ''B&B'' example: In the [[Revival]] episode "Tech Support", the boys go to the site of an abandoned drive-in ("Abandoned drive-ins kick ass!"), only to find an office building in its place.
* The credits of ''[[
* ''[[Casper the Friendly Ghost
* Synergy, the supercomputer of Jerrica "[[
* In the ''[[
* Finn and Marceline crash one of these in at end of the the ''[[
* One episode of ''[[
* Was the focus of an episode of ''[[The Replacements (
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Settings]]
[[Category:Useful Notes/The United States]]
[[Category:Nightlife Index]]
▲[[Category:Drive-In Theater]]
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