bloody hell...
I turn my back for a few days to go and slap some Arabs around and you resort to this nonsense.

I love the cinema, I have since I was a small child. My earliest cinema memories are 'the head' in Jaws; being terrified at the rumbling sub woofer effects in Earthquake, every new Bond movie. Farrah Fawcet and Lee Majors, Escape to Witch Mountain, Superman, the BRILLIANT Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, I could go on.

Every Saturday from around 7 years old I would go with my little friends on the bus to a run down old fleapit in Alexandra Parade in Glasgow (no adult supervision was required – kids had freedom in the 70’s when we still had summers and before the Daily Mail bred legions of marauding vampire Nazi pedalos). For 50p you would get two movies AND cartoons and (I shit you not) they let a little downs syndrome kid dance on the stage at the intermission for braying matinee brats to throw sweets at. I still cringe.

Cinema has been a constant pleasure all my life and at each stage has offered something different. When I was 8 years old taking my little sister to see Star Wars on a hot summers day while on holiday on the Isle on Man was the height of cool and decadence – the sand pit was still there later. Getting in to see an AA’ movie while underage was a buzz. Taking Jackie Marshall to see Pretty In Pink seemed far more suave than a fumble up a close. On our first date Mrs Spimf and I both wanted to see Who Framed Rodger Rabbit? but were afraid to seem uncool – I even did the shady yawn routine.

Sudden loss of cinema freedom after the birth of my son was really tough. I have a huge DVD collection. I gambled on Bluray before it was a clear winner. I spend a fortune in Blockbuster. I have all the movie channels and yer HD and yer big Philips ambilight LCD knob extension with 7.1 surround. In short I watch a LOT of movies.

But I am fucked if I am going to define my entire life’s movie going experience to one single movie. I am a complex and emotional creature with a myriad of emotions, opinions and desires. I could no more point out which hair on my child’s head is my favourite than rest upon one movie. It’s a crass infantile question.
Goodfellas though innit.
( spimf ™ is whoever you want him to be, Mon 21 Jul 2008, 8:31, 2 replies)

"the BRILLIANT Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"
Oh noes! Ian Fleming will be rotating in his grave!

The REAL story of CCBB is much better than the crappy "it was all a dream" twee rubbishness of the film.

Inventing! International arms smugglers! Skeletons! Kidnapping! Fiendish plots! Implausibly named french villains! And all from the pen of the bloke who brought you James Bond.

Buy the book. The film was awful by comparison.
( Amish Information Systems hates misplaced, commas, Mon 21 Jul 2008, 10:40, closed)

Well said mate,
A lot of crossover in your story, it sort of mirrors my life with cinema.

Except for Goodfellas. (Harvey - James Stewart)
(Tugnut I got them all..., Mon 21 Jul 2008, 11:24, closed)