Night Of The Living Dead And Elvis Lives!

[Darko]

My Night of the Living Dead (1968) experience from last night. 1/9/09

I had never seen this on the big screen before in a theater. I could have set at home and watched my old dvd copy but couldn't miss the chance to see this at a theater.

A friend of mine noticed in the newspaper it was screening in some town 35 minutes away. A town I had never heard of even thou it was so close.This town was in the middle of nowhere.Perfectly creepy for a viewing of the dead. So four of us drove out to this place called Buchanan VA.

The town was a throw back to the 50's. It was only like one street long and surrounded by Virginia mountains.The first thing I noticed was it was still decorated for Christmas. Glowing wreaths hung from lamp posts and shops blinked with uniformed white Christmas lights.It made me wonder if it stayed that way year round.Two buildings stuck out on the street, the theater and across from the theater was a food joint called THE FOUNTAIN SANDWICH FOUNTAIN.

We finally stood in front of The Buchanan. It was built in 1914 as the Main Street Show, a silent movie house for this small Virginia town.
The theater was vintage all the way and slightly reminded me of a cross between The Last Picture Show and The Majestic. The marquee for the theater was huge and bright.In bold letters across the front of this picture show house was NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD Fri and I swear under it, it said ELVIS LIVES Sat. That gave me a HUGE laugh. Apparently an Elvis impersonator was going to be there the next night.

Anyways I bought my ticket for $5.00 and headed in.The kids at the food counter couldn't have been older than 12. To my surprise the popcorn only cost a dollar as well the drinks. I set down with a crowd that had maybe 7 adults(four was my friends and I) and fourteen 7 to 13 year-old kids in attendance with no parents. I was beginning to think maybe I was in the Village of the Damned or quite possibly Children of the Corn.The inside was a total throw back but the screen looked newish and the sound system was new.

Anyways the movie sprung to life and I was actually seeing Night of the Living Dead in the theater.We all let out a low clap and chuckle when Johnny uttered the now famous line "They're coming to get you, Barbara, there's one of them now!". The kids would laugh and giggle at the naked zombie and make yuck noises as the zombies ate on some flesh.I could only imagine how awesome it would be to be so young and view this film for the first time in a theater like The Buchanan. My friends and I sat back and watched this classic laughing as we all shared this silly smile on our faces. It was an awesome unexpected time in the theater.

Once the movie was over we explored the theater a bit. I discovered they actually show episodes of The Andy Griffith Show on the movie screen and have trivia for it.I read a bit about the Elvis impersonator before leaving.Very strange town indeed but a fun experience. I will have to go back one day to eat at the shop across from the theater THE FOUNTAIN SANDWICH FOUNTAIN and catch another flicker show!

[fletchlives]

Cool story Darko. When I lived out in NYC a few years back we were able to go see this and at the time George Romero's only other zombie movies Dawn and Day of the Dead at a film museum in Queens. He came out and spoke in between the movies and it was cool seeing them up on the big screen after watching VHS copies for so many years.