Big Screen
Outdoor cinemas have become a star attraction in recent months – but they’re nothing new, as Mairi Hughes discovers!
DURING the recent virus pandemic, entertainment as we know it changed. With large gatherings banned, cinemas, concert venues and theatres were forced to shut their doors.
As the lockdown dragged on, many of these industries looked for new ways to showcase films, gigs and shows.
Around the world, one way that cinema chains have stayed afloat amidst the uncertainty is by holding drive-in and outdoor film showings.
But, like all the best ideas, it’s nothing new!
Outdoor cinemas began on a small scale as a novelty at fun fairs in the early 1900s.
The practice was followed by permanent outdoor cinemas, which created an opportunity for larger film theatres than ever before.
In 1916, the Sun Picture Gardens outdoor cinema opened in Broome, Australia.
The cinema first showed silent films, playing its first “talkie”, “Monte Carlo”, in 1933.
The cinema faced issues in its early days, including tidal flooding amongst the audience benches, but it prevailed and is still open for business today.
In 2004, it won a Guinness World Record for being the world’s oldest outdoor cinema still in operation.
From the trend of outdoor cinemas, drive-in cinemas were born.
The world’s first patented drive-in cinema was opened in New Jersey in 1933 by Richard Hollingshead.
Hollingshead patented this idea after having created a mini “drive-in” cinema in his driveway using a projector for his mother, who was too large to fit in a cinema theatre seat.
These new drive-in cinemas popping up across the US were advertised as a family-friendly outing, welcoming even the noisiest of children.
By the 1960s they were commonplace, popular both with families and as a date destination.
However, these cinemas began to decline following the 1973 oil crisis. With people downsizing their cars to save money on petrol, this meant less spacious vehicles to take to drive-ins.
In a last-ditch attempt to maintain the cinemas’ popularity, some film theatres began tapping into a different market by showing gorier films.
Sadly, the rise of VCR around this time meant people were staying at home to watch films.
While drive-in and outdoor cinemas largely lost their appeal, today these novelty film theatres are popular at film festivals around the world.
In Paris, the Parc de la Villette is annually transformed into an outdoor cinema during summer months, with a differing theme each year.
Similarly, in the Swedish city of Locarno, a yearly International Film Festival opens up the city’s Piazza Grande to create Europe’s largest open-air cinema, with 8,000 seats.
Likewise, summer time in Vienna is accompanied by daily outdoor film screenings at the city’s Karlsplatz town square.
Closer to home, London is host to an array of weird and wonderful outdoor cinemas.
These include a rooftop cinema club, which holds rooftop cinema screenings across the city, and an outdoor hot tub cinema, where films can be viewed while stewing in a hot tub!
Many new outdoor cinemas are cropping up around the globe as the world adapts its usual pastimes in line with social distancing.
It seems watching films outdoors and in cars many once again become the norm! ■