Flicker

There are movies that stick with you. Flicker of the camera and long dead actors and actresses are young again at the height of their powers.

Bette Davis, Bogart, great character actors like Ross Martin. Technicolor, Cinemascope, movies with gimmicks like seats rigged to shock you.

We shiver at Vincent Price, Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Peter Lorre in classic films like Dracula, Frankenstein, M, and House on Haunted Hill.

Alfred Hitchcock makes us wonder what all those birds in the trees are really thinking.

Great performances etch us like a diamond cutting glass.

We are not the same people we were after watching movies like 2001 A Space Odyssey. Since my name is Dave there are still times I can hear the voice of Hal 9000 calling my name.

I was young now I am not but a big tub of popcorn drowning in butter and shared with the woman I love is one of the best things in life. After watching commercials for dancing candy and the trailers of things to come just to watch the lights dim and hold hands is one of the greatest thrills a person can ever have.

I salute all the great stars of today and yesterday too many to mention. The great directors, producers, music geniuses, cinematographers, the crew, and the writer.

Without the writer there is no great movie no okay movie not even a lousy movie.

All my writing life it is clear to me that filmmaking is a great collaborative effort.

I salute each and every one of you who have chosen to make this your calling as I hunker down with a thrill lump in my throat and grab a handful of popcorn gold in a bucket and watch.

If you listen very close you can just hear the faint sound of the diamond cutting the glass of your soul as the magic of movies etches you into a different person than you were when you walked in the theater.