When I was a youngster, living in Brooklyn, on rainy Saturday mornings, when I couldn’t go out to play with my friends, I would crank up the old Olympia TV, and watch a movie. In those days, the only movies on were wartime or prior black and white movies. There was the Million Dollar Movie, with the Gone with the Wind movie theme that opened and closed each presentation. This was a fond memory: that to this day still makes me nostalgic for the old days.
Recently, on a very rainy Saturday morning, April 23rd, as it poured, I put on the TV and watched an old black and white movie, once again. The movie was made in 1944, called ‘Phantom Lady’, and had all the ingredients to make me smile, feel good about the rain, and remember.
That morning, TLW (The Little Woman) complained as she went off to work that she hated to go out in “this weather” as she so put it. As she uttered those words, immediately I recalled those Saturday mornings of my youth. I couldn’t wait for her to leave so I could perhaps find a movie that would fit the bill. I went to the TCMHD channel 97 on my cable and sure enough, there was Phantom Lady just starting!
It is funny what can trigger a long lost forgotten memory. I guess if you can recreate the circumstances you can remember! The movie itself took me back to the elevated rails, the station platforms, the old steps in front of neighborhood apartment buildings, the big band era, the old cars and the clothing of that special time and place. It also reminded me that the actors were not all that great in those days! It was a dark movie in many ways.
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