I moved to Willow Road, Enfield in about March 1947. Just a hundred yards away at the Junction with Southbury Road, was a wonderful Art Deco Cinema, the ABC which at sometime became the Savoy. There is a huge physical and mystical gap there now as it was demolished to make way for a Tesco supermarket. In time, when we were 6 or 7 I suppose, my sister and I would walk to the cinema for Saturday Minors’ film club. We were so excited and it was wonderful. Twenty odd years ago, I thought of the Saturday club as I was settling into luxurious seating in a cinema in Dubai.

Music, Dark Water Secrets – Epidemic Sound, sound effects – BBC

At the Pictures

At the Pictures

In Enfield and Dubai         

                              

It was the Saturday Minor’s Club
at the huge art deco Savoy.
Rubbed seats and yellowed air
the flickering black and white of
Flash Gordon, Hopalong Cassidy.
The Lone Ranger, colourful Road Runner
all thrown by a chattering projector;
their paths marked by dancing dust.

We queued. A string of jiggling children
clutching a tanner for admission,
tuppence for Kiora drink and liquorice,
before tumbling into the vast auditorium
its huge, silvered screen seeping films.

Sometimes an organ rose on a swell
of jolly music and a small ball of light
bounced along the pale, freckled words.

We roared, when the film broke,
projector jammed or perhaps at the delay
as one reel finished, and another began.
Clapped, booed and then cheered
as the jiggering image and hollow sound
pulled us back into our fantasy land.

Now I stretch into a new armchair
with tub of popcorn, drink and straw,
in the chill, conditioned, clean, dark.
The programme was to begin.

First the slick, grand adverts for perfume
loud trailers for films yet to come
and, as in the art deco Savoy,
fuzzy, dull slides of local emporia,
in old scratched analogue film
here jagged with Arabic script.
Bold words grow on the screen,
Do not smoke, do not litter or cause a nuisance.
No phones, no pagers.

I live in extravagant digital images,
wide-angled Dolby sound washes round me.
Then it’s over.

Tears run down my face as we rush away
as the credits roll, a long list of names
no one reads. I’ll never know the grip or gaffer,
never forget going to the pictures in Dubai.

© Anthony Fisher June 2000