May 14, 2018 6 min read

This past weekend’s rainy weather wouldn’t have made for a very pleasurable drive-in movie experience in Southwestern Pennsylvania. However, if we travel back in the past and look at what was playing on the second weekend of May in past decades, there were plenty of great movies showing that would’ve made up for the soggy weather.

For example, 40 years ago in 1978, there was a double feature that shouldn’t have been missed at the Route 19 Drive-in. Kicking off the night would have been Brian De Palma’s horror thriller “The Fury.” Starring Kirk Douglas, John Cassavetes and Carrie Snodgrass, “The Fury” follows a former CIA agent who teams up with a psychic to save his telekinetic son from terrorists.

But the real winner in this lineup came second: Dario Argento’s horror classic “Suspiria.”

I discussed Argento in last week’s column. “Suspiria” is his true masterpiece and hands down the most beautiful horror film ever made. It follows an American ballet student, Suzy Banion (Jessica Harper of “Phantom of the Paradise”), studying at a German ballet school who slowly discovers the school’s dark history of witchcraft.

With a vivid theatrical color palette and a haunting score from the progressive rock band Goblin, “Suspiria” has stood the test of time to become Argento’s most popular film. The film was shot with heavily colored lighting giving the entire movie a surreal, otherworldly atmosphere during the most terrifying moments. The colors were further intensified by being processed in three-strip Technicolor – similar to the process that gave “The Wizard of Oz” it’s vibrant hues. In fact, it’s believed “Suspiria” was the final film to be processed in this method, as the machinery was dismantled shortly after the film was finished.

Washington audiences back in 1978 would’ve been treated to the shorter R-rated version that loses some of the more violent set-pieces and disturbs the suspenseful rhythm of Argento’s director’s cut. I saw one of the U.S. theatrical prints projected at the Riverside Drive-In in Vandergrift a few years back and the cuts are quite jarring, as they even cause a jump in the music. However, I do enjoy the title card that was added for the U.S. cut where the letters are made up of some kind of flesh that appears to breathe. 

However, audiences in 2018 can enjoy the film completely uncut in the best possible quality. A new 4K digital restoration was performed from the original camera negative and released on Blu-Ray in 2017.

The image looks gorgeous in the restoration, but the real draw for fans of the film is the soundtrack. Synapse Films, the company behind the restoration, also reinstated the original 4-channel surround audio. This mix was previously only available for select screenings in the U.S. and was digitally restored from the original elements. I had seen the movie at least a hundred times before getting to hear the surround mix and it felt like I was seeing the film for the first time.

And apart from the restoration, a remake of “Suspiria” will be hitting theaters soon with an all-star cast that includes Chloë Grace Moretz (“Hugo”), Dakota Johnson (“Fifty Shades of Grey”) and Tilda Swinton (“We Need to Talk About Kevin”). Harper is also set to make a cameo and Argento himself recently gave his seal of approval.

A less-prestigious horror double feature was also playing in Mt. Lebanon this past weekend in 1978. The Roger Corman produced “The Evil” and a low-budget yeti horror movie “Shriek of the Mutilated” (misspelled “Shreek” in the ad copy) were sharing a bill that night.

While “The Evil” looks like a pretty entertaining haunted house movie, “Shriek” seems like the type of film you’d find in an episode of “Mystery Science Theater 3000.” Director Michael Findlay and his wife, Roberta, are infamous for the 1976 film “Snuff,” which was marketed as containing footage of actual murders. It did not, but the film’s reputation helped spread an urban legend that commercially released films exist featuring scenes of real murders.

If you’re not a fan of horror movies, other decades had some less lurid title selections that might be up your alley.

Going back another 10 years to 1968, Sidney Poitier was all over the outdoor screens in Washington County in two Academy Award-winning films.

Mt. Lebanon Drive-In had that year’s Best Picture winner, “In the Heat of the Night,” playing on its own screen – apparently without a second feature. But Route 19 was featuring “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner,” which was a controversial film for 50 years ago, as it depicting a white woman (Katherine Hepburn, who won Best Actress in a Leading Role that year) bringing home her African American fiancé to meet her parents.

“Dinner” was backed by the Dean Martin secret agent comedy “The Ambushers” at Route 19, in what must have been quite a change of tone for the audiences who were there for both pictures.

Interestingly, both of these Poitier pictures were also remade for modern audiences: “In the Heat of the Night” spawned a TV show that ran in the early ’90s and “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” became the Ashton Kutcher and Bernie Mac feature “Guess Who” in 2005 – albeit with the race roles reversed.

And going back 60 years to 1958 was a double feature at Mt. Lebanon featuring the classic Western “3:10 to Yuma” backed with “Baby Face Nelson,” a true-crime gangster film starring Mickey Rooney.

Rooney’s company, Fryman Enterprises, produced the film and according to a Los Angeles Times report from 1958, he was offered $1 million for his interest in the film, but refused because he knew it would be a success.

He was right. “Baby Face Nelson” brought in so much money that Rooney was cast as a tough guy in more gangster films, which might be a surprise to audiences mostly familiar with his comedic work. 

“Nelson” was directed by Don Siegel, whose filmography spanned four decades includes classics like “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and “Dirty Harry.” Coincidentally, Siegel would have another film playing as the b-movie at a neighboring drive-in just 20 years later. According to an ad in the Observer-Reporter’s May 10, 1978, edition, his film “Telefon” starring Charles Bronson was playing after “Coma” at the Blue Moon in Wellsburg, W.Va.

That wraps it up for another week of Drive-In Time Machine. Just make sure to leave your lights off until you’ve reached the exit!