A private Facebook community out of Washington that I belong to asked today for people to submit the titles of the first and last movies they had watched in a theater. I'm older than most so considered not contributing, but after a bit, asked why not?
The first movie I remember seeing in a theater was a "sneak preview" offered at a theater near us. A sneak preview meant that the audience had no clue what they would be seeing, and this was in the early 1950s, long before movie ratings were even around. My brother hadn't been born yet, so I think I was 5-years-old or maybe less. Mom and Dad took my sister and me to see the movie. It had Rock Hudson in it and was titled Something of Value. It was a horrible movie, about a Mau Mau uprising somewhere in Africa, where the natives were attacking "innocent" white people. The movie was black-and-white, which was probably a blessing because one frightening scene of a Mau Mau attack showed a living person whose tongue had been cut out. The blood was black, not red, but I was horrified. I didn't know what was going on. I asked my mother. She told me...and then we had to leave the theater because I immediately felt like I was going to throw up. (My guess is that we would have left anyway. It was no movie for children! Had my parents known, we would not have gone to it in the first place.)
All things considered, I was a fairly unflappable kid. It took a lot to frighten me. Still, this movie haunted me. It was my first introduction to man's inhumanity to man, and I was too trusting to believe that it could happen in the real world; plus, I was somewhat protected. My parents were of the Old School that believed that children had the rest of their lives to worry about adult things but should not be challenged by them until it was their time. The folks didn't consult with us about family decisions that we couldn't affect anyway. I do remember at the same age being sent to a movie with my older sister after seeing the Mau Mau movie. We lived in Coronado, CA, at the time, and within walking distance of the movie theater. It was a Red Skelton movie--can't remember the title--but didn't want to go because I thought it would have skeletons in it. I'd had enough of things to frighten me, thankyouverymuch. My mother assured me that it would be okay because Red Skelton was a funny guy. I went, and she was right, but I've been suspicious ever since.
I've never heard of the Mau Mau movie before or since. (It can be found on Google, however, so I know it was real.) When I was 10, the Navy sent our family to Japan, 1957...12 years after the end of the war with that country. Our ship docked in Yokohama on the island of Honshu; we were booked on a train that would eventually take us under the ocean to the island of Kyushu, in at least a 20-hour trek, to the city of Sasebo; were boarded at a guarded building known as the Bachelor Officers' Quarters (BOQ), while Dad sought private lodging for us. Base housing wasn't available. Can't remember, exactly, how long we were at the BOQ before we landed in a little settlement of somewhat modernized homes on Yamata-Cho. What I do remember was lying in bed in the BOQ, fearful that the Japanese could rise up against us and we would be the "innocent" victims of the same hatred from the Mau Mau movie. I prayed a lot in those days. Prayer was like casting a spell on all of the evil in the world. I never saw a moment's evil in Japan, but that first movie had scared me, lasting many years.
The last movie I saw in the theater happened maybe a year ago, with my co-grandparent friends. The movie was 1917, and had received some critical acclaim. It was every bit as dark, depressing, and violent as the very first theater movie I had seen. The main difference was that I was older, and the movie showed some redemption for the characters. Honestly? I wouldn't pay to see it again.
For most of my life, I have maintained that violent movies, video games, and television shows don't influence children--that it's the family that has the most power. I still think I'm right, but looking back to post on that Washington Facebook site has caused me to doubt myself. I choose musicals, comedies, and chick-flicks for my own viewing pleasure. Am I hard-wired for that? Or did that very first movie scare me too much?
My next question, of course, is "Who cares?" I think I'd rather be too frightened than too accepting of the violent themes. To each his/her own!
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