No More Midnights

After this weekend, Rainbow Cinemas at the Golden Mile will no longer have midnight screenings of movies.

A midnight showing at the Rainbow was one of the few unique theatre experiences in Regina. Personally, it's hard to imagine seeing pure schlock any other way.

Already, the decor of the Rainbow is a wonder - it's bright neon and carpet floors were dated when the place opened. The "Coming Soon" and "Feature Presentation" clips are a mish-mash from different years and theatres.

But the midnight showing was a special treat. The crowds were worth coming out for on their own. Trying to figure out their motivations for coming to Meet Dave or The Gameplan at this time was always as interesting as the film itself.

Of course, they could have been asking the same thing about me. The fact is, going to a midnight showing made the movie more of an event, in large part due to the mystique around it. A lot of times, you would enter when the Broken Rack next door was full up and leave when it was empty or emptying out. A midnight movie could be the cap to an evening or the main event. It had a gravitas that could make even the hilariously bad infinitely enjoyable.

Here, I saw some of my favorite movies and some favorite movies to mock. And I couldn't have asked for a better venue to discover them in. Here's hoping the midnight showing returns to Regina one day.

I'm not sure how this weekend will turn out personally, as I've got a birthday party one night and a wedding the next. I'm hoping to make it to at least one last midnight screening. Most likely, I'll go to All About Steve, because there are few films more suiting. It holds a special place as the worst Sandra Bullock movie and probably one of the worst movies ever, experience.