Films eh?
When i was little, my mum used to be a cleaner in the local hotel. With no-one to act as childminder, and with my dad working all the time, I had to go with her. Sitting in an empty bar playing with the dominos on my own was the dullest way to spend a saturday possible for a boy.
One day, the owners took pity on me, and showed me into their "cinema" room. The walls were covered in shelves, all filled to capacity with vhs tapes. each had a little number on the spine. The guy showed me a school excercise book, which had a number on each page and listed all the films that were on that tape.
Several hundred tapes...there must have been thousands of films.
WOW.
We were poor. We had a 14" black and white telly at home and I had never been "into" films as a result. trips to the cinema were rare ( i think I went twice in my childhood - the disney version of Robin Hood was one of the ones I saw)
He showed me how to work the tv and video, and showed me how to wind the tapes forward to the right place (each film had the timer number written next to it in the book) and left me to it.
From then on my saturdays were changed forever, I loved going there.
I had no idea at all what the film titles were about, no idea what ones were recent or old, no idea what ones were rated for kids, or 18+, I just picked out tapes at random, or film names I liked the sound of.
I was aged about 10 or eleven at the time, but I can still remember those days perfectly clearly. They had one of those kitch coffee tables with the smoked glass top and the fibre-optic fluffy thing under the glass that changed colours. Awesome.
Anyway, This is how as a boy, I saw some of the best films I have ever seen.
Robocop - wow, an indestructable cyborg cop, big guns, car chases, a glimpse of ladyboobs in the shower, a guy getting melted by toxic waste. Had a few nightmares after this, but it didnt lessen my love of the film.
Mad Max - I think I held my breath for the whole opening chase sequence. Matchbox toy car chases acted out in real life... FANTASTIC, although I was rather shaken by the bit where Max`s wife and child were mown down by the biker gang :(
Ice Cold in Alex - OH NO, IVE BROKEN THE TV! then I realised it was supposed to be in black and white! what a cool film, A boys adventure comic come to life in my eyes.
Star Wars - Speechless. I was 100% transported to that far away universe. It seemed so beleivable to me.
Indiana Jones - another Boys Own adventure come real.
Alien - Terrified me, really scared me shitless, but I couldnt stop watching it from behind the cushions. Despite being scared to the edge of tears, I left the tape running to watch Aliens straight afterwards. Not as frightening as the first, but awesome sci-fi.

I could go on forever listing the stuff I watched that had an impact on me then. Every saturday, I would sit and watch 3 or 4 films, often skipping through the dull ones till I found something that grabbed my attention.
Now Im 30, I till love films, and watch anything I can at any opertunity. I have a pretty big dvd collection now, but am more interested in seeing new stuff than re-watching stuff I have already seen, apart from the real favourites.
The internet has opened up a whole new means of accesing stuff I want to see. logging on to limewire or similar sites always makes me think back to that excercise book with the numbered pages and the carefully written titles.
(dave likes cheese, Sat 19 Jul 2008, 18:08, Reply)