October 23: John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness was released 30 years ago today.
30 years ago today, I was at the AMC 10 in Burbank. Today, that area is filled with businesses and chain restaurants and street performers and is always full of people. 30 years ago, there was the theater, a parking garage, a Fuddrucker’s that’s still there and still terrible, and not much else. The air was cool that night and it was so foggy, we couldn’t see the streetlights, just their glow. I went with three of my friends, who were all older than me and could drive us. We listened to Van Halen in the car. I remember that the movie wasn’t what I wanted it to be, and I was disappointed. It wasn’t scary, and the effects seemed cheesy. But it was foggy as hell that night, which is something that doesn’t happen in Burbank very often, and that made it eerie and worth the drive. On the way home, we went on streets instead of the freeway, because it would take us longer to get home that way, and that’s what being out at night with your friends is about when you’re fifteen. It’s hot and dry and I’m in the home I own. My wife is asleep in our bed. I think I’m going to go watch Prince of Darkness before I go to sleep, and see if 45 year-old me has a different reaction to it than 15 year-old me did. Time is weird, when you stop to think about it.
And at this moment I realized that I am older than Wil. Certainly we are of the same age, but I realized he was fifteen and I was 17 when I went to see this after it was released. It was the first R movie I saw after I turned 17. Still remember went on a date with a guy named Bert. Relationship did not last past the movie. I think he used me to get into the movie as he was 15.
