Fogged in at the Drive-In
May 27th, 2013 · No Comments · Posted in Blog, rural life
Our view of the big screen sometimes obscured
Last night’s entertainment was a double feature at Hathaway’s, the drive-in movie theater in Hoosick, a few miles from our new home. We were lured not only by the $8 double feature, but by the promise of locally-sourced burgers and home-made french fries.
Trouble was, the weather lately can’t make up its mind whether it wants to proceed to summer or slip back into the depths winter. It’s been cold, wet and windy this week. In fact, parts of the Adirondacks got three feet of snow.
What that meant for us last night, as temperatures dipped into the 40s, was a windshield that kept fogging up as we huddled inside the car under blankets. Occasionally we’d start the car and crank up the defrost. That seemed to work fine during the first film, Epic, an animated story about an heroic teenaged girl who saves the local forest and all its nymph-like inhabitants. But during the second bill, Oblivion, a really lame, post-apocalyptic Tom Cruise saga, it wasn’t the windshield so much as the movie screen that was obscured as a bank of fog rolled in.
Life is sweet: movie and a ton of fries
Still, we had a rousing good time, gorging on all those foods that are so bad for us–burgers, fries, popcorn, cheese nachos–and alternately freezing and blowing hot air at the windshield till sometime past midnight.
Hathaway’s is a family-owned business and the only weekend movie opportunity for miles around. And they are in a bit of trouble, as Hollywood turns to digital technology and threatens to make Hathaway’s reel-to-reel projector obsolete. According to the owners, they need to raise some $70,000 for new digital equipment in the next year or face closure. Many small theaters around the country are caught in the same bind.
At Hathaway’s, the fundraising effort includes raffling off a small, pre-fabricated backyard barn.
So don’t delay: support your local movie house or watch another piece of Americana slip away.
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