An Orange experience

I’m a big fan of film, I love movies, cinema, visual entertainment but more than this I love going to the cinema. Now at first glance that last bit might sound the same as all the previous statements – but there is a big difference between them.

You can love a film, a movie and visual entertainment; you can enjoy going to the cinema – but having a love of going to the cinema is taking things to another level – it’s about the experience.

The cinema is in my blood, syrup cola runs through my veins (eugh that sounds nasty), the smell of popcorn and nacho cheese haunts my nostrils and the screen fills my eyes.

Alright I admit it – that was all a load of bollocks but at least I didn’t use the word Inspirational or Aspirational.

I do have a passion for ‘the cinema’ though, it started as a small child going to the original ODEON Hemel Hempstead with its single large screen, its smoke and booze smell and its bingo machines off to one side.

The cinema only showed films three days a week as it was a bingo hall the rest of the time – but that didn’t matter when I was sitting in the chair – on my knees so I could see – watching a film, taking in the surroundings, the smells, the popcorn – giving my money to the woman in the little box behind the glass and getting a tiny piece of paper in return – keeping the paper for my scrap book.

Then later at the ‘newly built’ multiplex while bunking off Games lessons at school (the cinema was ten minutes from my school at the time).

Although this cinema didn’t have the same history and athmosphere as the original cinema in the town centre – it still had the buzz of a picture house. The screens smelt of popcorn not smoke, the little woman in a box was replaced by three people at desks and the tiny scrap of paper was replaced by a card based ticket.

But it was still a buzz, it was still a thrill to go and see the film – to get inside early and listen to the music, to watch the curtains open and the lights fade down, to see the adverts in anticipation of the trailers (in the days of the town centre odeon to enjoy the ‘local ads’) and then to watch the film itself.

And later still working at that very same cinema catching bits and pieces of films – enough to give me an idea of what it was all about but then enjoying watching it properly ‘for free’ when I wasn’t working.

Followed by working in Jersey at the ODEON in Jersey – another purpose built cinema, made for film in the 1950s and eventually writing about and talking about films for the BBC.

Recently,  well as recently as the last few years, there have been two additions to the cinema experience. 1) the PACT threats that basically call me a criminal – even though I’ve paid for my ticket and all the extras.

2) is the Orange don’t let your mobile ruin the movie’ adverts going out JUST before the film itself. They mark that point in the experience when you know the film is just minutes away – they almost act like the ‘shorts’ that went before films decades ago.

They’re almost always brilliantly produces pieces of art in their own right – sometimes funny, sometimes moving (in the case of the one with the song by Joanna Newsom – in fact it was that advert that led me to discover one of my ‘now’ favourite artists.

Well there are some new adverts coming – six in total and they will fall into an episodic form one after the other.

In fact the video at the top of this blog post is a preview of the first one here it is again – looking ahead at the six part series.

What’s different about this series – compared to the previous one that was in cinemas first – is that this one will be online first – appearing on blogs and YouTube before starting in cinemas – or at least at the same time.

The first series of Orange films featured actors pitching films to the guys from the Orange Film Funding Board – the guys that want a mobile phone to feature in every movie.

Well apparently this series follows on from that concept – I expect we will start to start to see the making of, or even the finished ‘short’ of each of those films.

This Orange ‘short’ concept – giving me a small piece of produced, if advertising heavy, content before the main feature is wonderful – it is as much a part of the ‘cinema experience’ as popcorn and the curtains sliding open as the lights fade down.

Although – when you’ve seen them three or four times (if you’re a heavy film goer like me) then it does get a little tedious and you beg for something else.

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