Fun Friday at the Drive-In

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One of the last places with a direct connection to old-school car-culture, the drive-in movie theatre is like a time machine.

Whether you used to go when you were a teenager on date night, or as a kid in the back of your family’s station wagon, everyone loves the drive-in. And they’re still around today, and yes they’re as cool as you remember.

The Stardust Drive-In north of Toronto serves up nostalgia; on Screen 1 they were playing ‘Beetlejuice 2‘ followed by ‘Joker 2‘ so the horror movies would have to wait until closer to Halloween.

Even though it’s Indian summer in Toronto, having a big American ‘family car’ is a good idea at the drive-in. Sure, you’ll start off the night by enjoying movies under the stars. But after midnight when it gets really cold, everyone can just pile into the vehicle for warmth and comfort. We left the convertible at home this time and brought the GMC monster truck instead

We really only came to see ‘Joker 2‘ so we arrived at the ticket booth around 9:00 pm and planned on grabbing a bite to eat first, so our headlights wouldn’t disturb the moviegoers. The main building houses the projector room and snack bar. It’s a real time warp walking in there, but not quite ‘original’ as you’d hope.

The Stardust has been in operation since 1955, so you might expect turquoise walls and checker-board floor tiles. It looks like it was renovated in the late 90s and the pale yellow interior hasn’t really been kept-up all that well. Too bad because with that great art-deco styling, little more than some fresh paint and new tiles would make it sparkle again. Maybe next year.

Nice part of the centralized snack bar is that you can sit ant any one of the picnic tables and still watch all three screens while feasting on fresh-cut fries. Just make sure you give schnauzer a taste too, or you there will be no end to the whining.

And with Flash, the official Demaras Racing wonder-dog, whining is an artform!

During intermission, we quickly drove into one of the spots vacated by a young family whose little kids had already falen asleep. We parked front and centre for ‘Joker: Folie à Deux‘.

The whole Batman comic book universe is in it’s 85th year, and it’s kind of cool that the Joker sequel is keeping it alive. The choice of movie added the retro vibe of the experience. Just think; families been coming to this theatre to watch Batman movies for decades!

How was Joker, you ask? Well, ignore the reviews. Yes, it’s a musical…but not in that weird ‘West Side Story‘ sort of way. Not going to do a review here, but this movie was extremely creative and took that same-old same-old story into a totally new direction. Visually stunning too!

And that’s what makes the drive-in just so cool. The screen is massive, and even if the movie sucked, you wouldn’t even care because the experience is fun. Wandering around the parking lot carrying four boxes of popcorn while trying to find your car is kind of funny. Teenagers quickly hiding cans of beer as you approach makes you hold in your laughter. Relax kid…just a couple years ago, that was me!

There’s such a sense of history to the theatre. All those old pictures on the walls of the Stardust theatre showing how it looked in the black & white era give you an appreciation for the place. With Halloween in a couple weeks, hopefully they’ll show a classic like ‘It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!‘ on the massive Screen 1 again and give us another reason tom come back before the end of the season.

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