Drive-In Theater: Difference between revisions
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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 21st-century drive-in visitors are too young to remember the medium's heyday. Also, a "guerrilla drive-in" movement has developed to show films in parks, parking lots and other open urban spaces. Drive-ins received an additional popularity bump during the 2020 pandemic: people could go to see a movie on a big screen ''and'' maintain physical distance from everybody else at the same time. Although it's unlikely that drive-ins will ever again be as numerous as they were during [[The Fifties]], it seems that they're here to stay — at least for the foreseeable future.
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* ''[[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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* 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.
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