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Back in the 1980s, usually at Christmas and Bank Holidays, films that you may have missed at the Odeon or the ABC (Associated British Cinemas) three or four years before finally made its appearance on the television, meaning that: A) one didn't have to take a bus ride to the cinema to see the latest blockbuster and see it in your own living room; and: B) instead of purchasing a cinema ticket, one had one's TV Licence instead. The 1980s was they heyday of the Movie Premiere on British TV, of those American hits, with A-list stars in character, doing stunts, driving crazily and doing anything else that Hollywood movies often have. And teenage lads in their back-to-front baseball caps playing cool and capitalising on Macaulay Culkin's success. And then Sky came around in early 1989 - thanks, Mr Murdoch!
It wasn't quite the Butterkist popcorn (raa-raa-raa) in a sub-KFC Bargain Bucket-sized container, but mostly something from the fridge, probably a Wall's Feast or a Ski yoghurt when the adverts were on. The screen size was a lot smaller than at the Flicks, but one had the privacy of watching it without strangers in the row in front gossiping and talking about something irrelevant to what they were watching, and in later years, playing on their mobile phones, and someone telling them to shush and be quiet. Now, the screens have got a big bigger, but so has the price. Never mind of the controversy of bringing one's own food and sweets in from outside - how about a McDonald's takeaway instead?
ITV and later Sky Movies saw this as lucrative for advertising - if it wasn't the soap operas and the lucrative Coronation Street ad breaks (7.42 pm on Mondays and Wednesdays, on the dot), then it would be the big movie premieres - and weren't they a big thing back then? The James Bond films, along with Superman, Jaws (shown as recently as 17th April) and other films that the BBC couldn't quite get the rights to, were beamed into our living rooms via local transmitters. The cinema have the advertising before the film rather than the television companies every 25 minutes. And then circa 2000 we had Front Row - the service on, what was then ntl (all small letters), where one paid a premium as if we were at the cinema for a ticket to see a film in the comfort of our own home - that's how I saw Billy Elliot for the first time, and Ali G in da House (Kate "Keep it Real" Hedges of course). I have to admit that it did take away the excitement of waiting for Christmas to see the movie premieres on one of the terrestrial channels like what had happened in the past, and as I have explored in the past - the post-Queen's message slot on Christmas Day afternoons.
When I see old ad breaks from films on YouTube I think about this - the fact that they must have been seen by millions of viewers who would otherwise have gone to get a Pepsi (bottle not can) from the fridge or gone to the toilet in the three minutes and forty seconds they of have left until the next part comes on. And the film had been seen many times before - the film might not have been first shown on TV in the same year that it was made, but there seems to be a bit of nostalgia finding out the premier TX from old TV listing guides and of course TV Times.
And then there are the Disney films - some of them have never been premiered on any terrestrial TV channel. Snow White has never been premiered - only on DVD, video and the cinema once every seven years on average. Dumbo was made in 1941 and was premiered in 1986, and the BBC must have pulled a lot of strings to get Fantasia on the small screen. But it only took 20 years for Mary Poppins to make her appearance after Julie Andrews appeared in the film in 1964.
Wasn't the movie premieres on TV such a big thing back then? I bet that LWT and Thames used to have their work cut out getting them on the ITV network back then.
It wasn't quite the Butterkist popcorn (raa-raa-raa) in a sub-KFC Bargain Bucket-sized container, but mostly something from the fridge, probably a Wall's Feast or a Ski yoghurt when the adverts were on. The screen size was a lot smaller than at the Flicks, but one had the privacy of watching it without strangers in the row in front gossiping and talking about something irrelevant to what they were watching, and in later years, playing on their mobile phones, and someone telling them to shush and be quiet. Now, the screens have got a big bigger, but so has the price. Never mind of the controversy of bringing one's own food and sweets in from outside - how about a McDonald's takeaway instead?
ITV and later Sky Movies saw this as lucrative for advertising - if it wasn't the soap operas and the lucrative Coronation Street ad breaks (7.42 pm on Mondays and Wednesdays, on the dot), then it would be the big movie premieres - and weren't they a big thing back then? The James Bond films, along with Superman, Jaws (shown as recently as 17th April) and other films that the BBC couldn't quite get the rights to, were beamed into our living rooms via local transmitters. The cinema have the advertising before the film rather than the television companies every 25 minutes. And then circa 2000 we had Front Row - the service on, what was then ntl (all small letters), where one paid a premium as if we were at the cinema for a ticket to see a film in the comfort of our own home - that's how I saw Billy Elliot for the first time, and Ali G in da House (Kate "Keep it Real" Hedges of course). I have to admit that it did take away the excitement of waiting for Christmas to see the movie premieres on one of the terrestrial channels like what had happened in the past, and as I have explored in the past - the post-Queen's message slot on Christmas Day afternoons.
When I see old ad breaks from films on YouTube I think about this - the fact that they must have been seen by millions of viewers who would otherwise have gone to get a Pepsi (bottle not can) from the fridge or gone to the toilet in the three minutes and forty seconds they of have left until the next part comes on. And the film had been seen many times before - the film might not have been first shown on TV in the same year that it was made, but there seems to be a bit of nostalgia finding out the premier TX from old TV listing guides and of course TV Times.
And then there are the Disney films - some of them have never been premiered on any terrestrial TV channel. Snow White has never been premiered - only on DVD, video and the cinema once every seven years on average. Dumbo was made in 1941 and was premiered in 1986, and the BBC must have pulled a lot of strings to get Fantasia on the small screen. But it only took 20 years for Mary Poppins to make her appearance after Julie Andrews appeared in the film in 1964.
Wasn't the movie premieres on TV such a big thing back then? I bet that LWT and Thames used to have their work cut out getting them on the ITV network back then.
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