The first movie I ever watched, was at the time of when I used to go to Sunday religion classes. It was in summer, and the church used to organise movie sessions, as the priests and nuns understood how difficult it was for teenagers to keep still and follow a religion class with the heat of summer. So, they let use watch movies and have an ice-cream at a very convenient prize of $1: of course, the movies were screened so that only the ones with moral teachings were showed. Anyway, that was the first time I ever went to watch a movie, and the fact that it was thanks to nuns and priests, tells a lot of how inexperienced I was of the ways of the world.
The movie was 'Le Beautemp' or, translated in Italian 'Il tempo delle mele'. I think that the plot was about a shy girl, who likes a very cute guy who already has a bitchy girlfriend, but in the end love triumph and they come together. With the cynical experience of today, I do realize that the movie was not such a great thing. But at the time, it was a myth for use teenagers. Most probably it was a myth for my brothers' generation, as I learnt that they went watching it 3 times, each time with a different girl... as it seems, taking a girl to watch it was a sign that the guy was a sensitive new age guy, something very rare at the time, and as such very appreciated.
I remember that I was not overly impressed by it, a bit too out of my understanding as I was not as yet on the market of soul-mate searching, but I liked the male lead character, Pierre Cosseau. I even wrote to him a fan letter. Unfortunately, neither he nor one of his assistant or however they call those people who fake stars' signatures and their writing for the benefit of fans, answered back to me, so I learnt an important lesson: beware of male stars...
The movie was so successful that it required a sequel, with the same actors, I think, and more or less the same plot. I didn't watch the sequel, knew by then that not everything that advertisement says that it's great, turns out that way.
The first movie is unforgettable, but the second one, is even better.
At the time, circa when I was 11 years old, there was on television a series of Japanese manga, 'Candy Candy', that everybody watched. It was supposed to be a girlie series, as it talked about an orphaned girl, who is adopted by a rich family and has to overcome prejudices and envious enemies in her path to reach a place in society and finally find love.As my brother just told me recently, all his classmated used to watch it as well, guys included; and they used to play a game in which each pretended to be a character of the series and act out the episode that everyone had watched the evening before. As it turns out, the most sought after characters were:
To cut it short, I went watching the movie length version of the series. Nothing new, all already shown on television, but still everybody went watching it. Even some of the nerds of my class went watching it.
This was the first intelligent movie I ever watched.The movie was famous enough, that I don't think there is any need to talk about the plot. I liked the wit in the movie, I even liked the topic : can men and women be really friends without being lovers? But I didn't like very much the conclusion of it. I mean to say that of course everybody expected Harry and Sally to realize they were made for each other, but that doesn't give an answer to the question, it goes around it, as the two of them first become friends and then become lovers...
In between the anomated cartoon feature and this movie, I did go to watch other movies, but that was during school excursions, so I was busier socializing than paying attention to what was on the screen. 'Robin Hood: prince of thieves' was the first movie I ever watched in English. It was after sometime it was released, so there were very few people in the theatre, and I didn't know English at the time, so the only thing I could understand were the physical sketches. Can you imagine, in the middle of a silent theatre, 3 silly people starting to laugh like crazy in the middle of the movie, and the few people who are present, ALL turn around to stare at the source of the sound. I think I was so embarassed that I didn't make any more sounds for the rest of the movie. Anyway, I was so unimpressed by it, that I decided it was nothing special, so I promised myself I would not waste any more money on such a futile activity.
Well, what can I say about this movie? I LOVE IT.
I didn't go to watch it when it was released, as I thought it was one of those girlie movies like 'Boys on the side' or 'Circle of friends': I HATE THEM .So when my brother took the video, I was not impressed by it: I even considered not watching it, as I have already done in various previous occasion when the video was not of my liking.Luckily, he convinced me to stay, and I never regretted my decision to give in. I like the basis of the movie: would a guy prefer a good looking girl but dumb to a smart but not so good looking girl? Well, of course, being the movies, even Dr Abbie, supposedly plain, is not so bad looking... But still, it is conforting to know that out there, even if in the world of movies, there is someone who prefers to give priority to his brain than to his groin.