What was the first film you saw at the movie theater?

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When Saturday Night Fever (the R version, I’m sure) was showing at the local drive-in, I made plans to go with some buddies of mine. At the last minute, I found out I had to watch the kid brother (he would have been about 8 at the time, I was 16 or 17). So instead of staying at home, we took him with us to the drive-in - the deal was he wouldn’t tell the parents where we had been (or the fact that we were drinking at the drive-in) and he would get whatever he wanted from the concession stand. As far as I know, Mom and Dad never found out. At least I never heard from them about it.

Then there was the time in high school where I was going to play cards and drink beer with my buddies one Saturday night - and the “you have to watch your brother tonight” scenario hit again. So Mom and Dad left and we moved the card game to our house. Brother is downstairs watching TV and all is well until the beer ran out and we raided an open bottle of my dad’s lime vodka. Brother calls up my parents and rats me out and then hands the phone to me. Not pretty. The night ended with me threatening to kill him and him hoping the parents got home before I could make good on the threat.

Somehow we all survived.
 
As best as I can remember, the very first movie I saw in a theater was possibly Macbeth in the early 60’s, but I can’t find which version it might have been. I do remember a scene with the three witches, as well as the warning about, “when you see Birnam Wood”. I was far too young to understand most of it, I would have been around six, but my parents believed in exposing us kids to classic entertainment at a young age. I liked the movies much better than the ballet I was taken to around that same time. And a night out like that always meant I got to take the next day off from school. 🙂
 
No idea. Check Disney movies from late 80s/early 90s, probably one of those.
 
True Story: The first R rated movie I ever went to see (when I was underage, naturally) was Black Sunday – a forgettable thriller by the same man who would later write The Silence of the Lambs ff.

As I waited to go in, who should come strolling out from the previous showing but my parochial vicar!!
😱

😂
 
Another True Story, about an even-cringier R-rated theatre experience.

I must have still been just underage, but was accompanied by a parent, because my mother (the doctor) was also interested to see the movie adaption of Robin Cook’s Coma.

So my adolescent self had to sit in the dark, next to my mother, while a nekkid Genevieve Bujold showered behind a foggy glass door.
🤯
😂
 
I think that watched either the Croods or Epic I don’t remember which one came first.
Edit: I googled it and the croods came first so I watched that first.
 
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I can’t remember, but it was probably a Disney movie - Sleeping Beauty, Snow
White or Cinderella
 
I’m thinking Chitty-chitty Bang-bang, or Mary Poppins, which ever came out first.
 
Titivillus said:
True Story: The first R rated movie I ever went to see (when I was underage, naturally) was Black Sunday – a forgettable thriller by the same man who would later write The Silence of the Lambs ff.
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I was afraid of violating the “rules” of R rated movies – so when I went to see my first R-rated movie in a theater (at age 15), I got my Grandma Betty to take me. The movie was Aliens. Made me an instant fan of Sigourney Weaver.

I think I saw Blade Runner on cable before that. It’s one of my Aunt Louise’s favorite movies.
 
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I don’t remember the first movie I ever saw, but the most memorable one for me was Summer of '42.
 
I saw the Ten Commandments at the Fox Theatre in Detroit in 1956. I barely remember a thing about it except that I was disturbed when the Red Sea closed in on the Egyptians. I was barely out of infancy and I thought that it was very wrong that the horses had to drown too. For some reason, that seemed to be unfair.
 
I’m told it was One Hundred and One Dalmatians in 1961 when I was 4 or 5, but the first ‘big’ movie as opposed to the 50 cent Saturday matinee at the local theatre was The Sound of Music in 1965. And though I don’t remember much of the movie —it was 20 years in the making! Was “Sandokan the Great” in early 1964. I’ll always be a sucker for adventure movies.

And does anybody else remember seeing “Santa Claus conquers the Martians” on the big screen?
 
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Either Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang (in a special screening; when it was first released I had not yet been born), or Escape to Witch Mountain.
 
The first one I recall was at the Bordertown drive-in theater in El Paso, TX in 1972 and it was “Napoleon and Samantha”. I don’t remember much about the storyline except there was a lion and the kid who played Jody on “Family Affair” in it.

The earliest one I remember seeing in a sit-in theater was “King Kong” (the 1976 version). I was nine at the time and had probably seen others before that, but that one stood out for some reason.
 
I saw “Escape to Witch Mountain” at the movies as well.
I don’t remember it much. Except the part where Eddie Albert says, “Those two kids are witches!” And I remember not understanding why the man from Green Acres was being mean.
 
I remember going to the drive-in a couple of times when I was quite young, but both times I was so taken in by the experience of being at the drive-in that I don’t even know what film we went to see. 😊
 
I was five years old at the time. I remember being in the back seat of the car in my pajamas, with a blanket, pillow, and teddy bear. My four-year-old sister fell asleep and I got to sit up in the front seat between my mom and dad. Back then, cars had a fold-down armrest in the middle of the front bench seat, and my dad folded it down and I got to sit on it so I could see over the dash. Obviously, I remember more about the experience than I do about the movie. I think if it weren’t for the lion, we probably wouldn’t have any memory of it at all!
 
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