Old Hollywood

I was walking around the Warner Bros. backlot yesterday when I came across a guy with his iPad. Must've been about mid-50's, early 60's. He was looking at something. I was just waiting for my models to finish dressing. So I chatted him up. It turns out he had clips from movies that were shot on the backlot. And, we were standing at the exact perspective of where these movies were shot. It was amazing.

He showed me a clip from one of my favorite movies of all time "Rebel Without A Cause." The scenes was with James Dean, after Buzz is killed in the chickie run, James decides to report the accident to the police. And he runs into Buzz's goons (yes, Dennis Hopper was in this scene). I was standing right at the spot where it went down. The buildings is much smaller than seen in Cinemascope, but it was clear. The roundtop archway into the police precinct (it's renamed as Rosewood High School entrance now). I was standing next to history. Not just Gettysburg type history, but iconic history. I watched that movie hundreds of times. And here I was standing right next to it. The stairs are the same.

It got me thinking about this older dude just walking through carrying around sample clips of movies from the WB lot. It was touching. Mostly because we've lost touch with cinema history. There is no more iconic people. I doubt in 40 years anyone will want to see where Katniss in "Hunger Games" was running around. I was standing next to "The Growing Pains" house catty corner to those stairs. It's was unbelievable, the years it endured. And just one person...cared to document. This meant something very important to him.

During the whole time too, tourist trams were doing rounds. With a bunch of people getting an earful about "Friends," since the house is also on the same street.

I miss old Hollywood. Not that I was ever involved. But it just seemed like a better time, where hopes and dreams were still possible. Although, in most babylon tomes, this was just a smoke screen to cover up terrible behavior. Movies still were in the infancy.