When I first watched Cinema Paradiso, I could not believe it. I saw initial days of my life there. For uninitiated Cinema Paradiso in essence would be a story of an eight or nine year old boy who is fascinated with behind the screen happenings at a theater. Loading the reels, focusing, aligning and projecting enthralled him.
The first ever movie (that I remember) I watched in a theater was Silsila (Amitabh-Rekha-Jaya) from the projector room. I remember standing on the stool and peeping through a hole to see a big screen of an open theater. Soon, I came out and stood in the lobby next to the projector room. I was mesmerized. I wish I knew the word love then.
My father worked for Indian Air Force. Those days almost every defense unit (Army, Air Force or Navy) had a mini-theater or an open theater. When he was transferred to Air Force Station Rajokri (Delhi) from Air Force Station Jodhpur (Rajasthan) I was three years old. He was given the charge of an open theater. My mother tells me that technically my first movie was Rocky (Sanjay Dutt) when she carried me along with my twin brother for the first ever screening under my father’s supervision. Of course, I do not remember. However, I saw Rocky much later, bought the DVD and see it once in a while out of ‘missed’ nostalgia. So, Silsila it was, and the coincidence is both these movies were released the year I was born (1981).
I entertained my father’s colleague with an enthusiastic dance whenever ‘Rang Barse’ came on the screen. I saw the last two shows back to back daily for three days, making it six viewing of Silsila in three days. Thereafter, almost all movies had at least three viewings by me.
There were no Fridays release decrees in the Air Force. It was two different movies in a week regulation. Every Tuesday a movie would release which will run for three days and Friday another movie was screened that went till Monday. I was hooked to it. Most of the times the movie would get screened six months after their India release (this I got to know much later) as prints were not directly available to the defense units in those days. Elders knew but no one cared. Defense people were by and large known to be cut off from the world then. There were no updates on new releases anywhere whatsoever which a child could get hand on. I got into a mild depression thinking how I was cheated with the fact that I am the privileged one to see a movie the moment it is made is a different story. I was thinking people who made movies knew my father and are sending those reels directly to him to screen it.
Nevertheless, I also realized I have had an experience of a lifetime. I could touch those reels, feel them, could pause the various stages of the movie right in my hand. I wasn’t allow to load the reel or fiddle with the projector as per my father’s strict orders to his employees but I did start the projector, positioned the focusing light through the hole and adjusted it accordingly on the screen whenever father was away with the help of his subordinate. I spent my time after school drifting around in theater than playing with my friends. I did play few sports but I was a better spectator of them.
The seeds of frenzy for cinema were sown.
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