Growing up in Dhahran in the 1950s without television and
barely radio the movies were everything. Our only link with the outside world.
Three movies a week with a rerun on Thursday, as kids we’d go to pretty much
anything that was playing. Even if the feature was some unfathomable drama
about thwarted love, boundless ambition or existential trauma in 1950s America , we’d
go just for the pre-show filler.
There would always be two cartoons. Glorious
big screen, lovingly made animated stories, the likes of which today’s children
will never see. Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, the incredibly violent Tom and Jerry
or Woody Woodpecker, another particularly vicious character whose antics
couldn’t be shown these days without a PG-13 restriction. Once in a while Mr.
Magoo or Droopy would wander across the screen as marvelously clueless as we
were. In the later years we had the pleasure of watching the Road Runner duel
Wiley Coyote on the big screen.
