Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • 44

DRIVE-IN I Silverdome hosts a revival of 1950s tradition From Page IE SILVERDOME DRIVE-IN BNFO twilight years in the 1970s. The theater is wisely waiting to show "Kill Bill" until after the PG-13 rated "Duplex," allowing family audiences to come for the first movie only. Drive-in aficionado Ritzenth-aler will likely check out the Silverdome for himself this weekend, though he still can't shake his romantic drive-in notions. He will miss the speaker poles, the crush of the gravel drive, a classic neon marquee. Organizers say the bathrooms will be heated, but no matter how nice they are, Ritzenthaler says, "I still can't warm up to the idea of Porta-Johns in the winter." into your popcorn money.

rooo: You can bring your own or buy Big Boy-catered con-' cessions, available from a carnival-style concession booth. The menu Includes popcorn nachos hamburgers ($4) and soda $4). There is no car-side service, but orders can be called In on a cell phone, then picked up at the booth near the auditorium entrance. admission: Tickets are $7 per double feature; $4.50 for seniors and children younger than 12. Switching theaters will be frowned upon.

The owners suggest you keep your ticket stubs. Movies are seven days a week. rules: No pets or alcohol. By John Monaghan, Free Press special writer location: The Silverdome Drlve-in is at 1200 Featherstone on the east side of Pontiac. Box office info at 248-456-1600 pr www.silverdome.com.

access: Located off I-75, the drive-in entrance is on Featherstone, The Silverdome sign at the main entrance an- nounces the evening's program. Cars exit onto Opdyke. sound: Like most modern drive-Ins, the Silverdome uses stereo sound broadcast through your FM car stereo. Playing the radio for two hours will not run down a healthy battery. HEAT: Because there are no portable heating units, on a cold night you'll want to leave the car running with the heat on.

Opinions differ whether it's smart to idle a car for long periods, but either way the extra gas may eat weekend and you'll see lines down the street to get in. There are also two drive-ins near Flint, the U.S.-23 Twin and the Miracle Twin. Ford-Wyoming co-owner Charles Shafer says he doesn't see the Silverdome as competition. "I figure they're almost 35 miles away, so it won't cut into my business," he says. "What worries me most is how they're going to work out their sight lines on such a flat surface." Shafer is referring to one of the principal rules of comfortable drive-in viewing.

To see over the car in front of you, there should be a ramp that lifts your front wheels up. Click onto the Web site www.driveinworkshop.com and you'll see a mathematical equation that shows exactly how high the cars should be, with the highest ramp in the back rows. Joe Cobb and Ronald Slavik, partners in Farmington-based Movies at the Drive-In, a newly formed company that will operate the Silverdome Drive-In along with Silverdome Stadium Authority, say they have compensated by placing their screen 20 feet off the ground. This means that you must be farther away from the screen to be able to see it. Watching from the back seat becomes even more difficult.

And good luck if your sedan is parked behind an SUV. The drive-in puts to use Silver- screens are in. Five 40-by-80 foot movie screens will eventually line the perimeter of the lot, accessible from the main entrance off Featherstone Road. Though only one screen will be lit this weekend, two will run throughout the winter before all five open in the spring. The concession stands, the bathrooms and the blue metal projection sheds can all be removed when the Silverdome needs the lot back for an event.

The Silverdome Drive-In was supposed to open this summer, at least in time for the Woodward Dream Cruise in mid-August, but there were construction complications. Though movies can begin earlier now than they could have in the summer about 7:30 p.m. this weekend cold weather will soon force patrons to keep their cars running throughout the features. At the Ford-Wyoming, which supplies in-car heaters, business drops off by between 80 and 90 percent in the winter months, to owner Shafer. Writer-director Quentin Tar-antino would likely appreciate that his new movie, "Kill Bill Vol.

1," will help launch the Silverdome drive-in. After all, it pays tribute to the violent action movies that played at drive-ins during their Boy, you can call on your cell phone and then pick up your order. Newly equipped projection booths promise that the movie image will le clear and bright. But there won't be portable heating units, nor will there be boxes to pump in sound (that will come through your FM radio). There is no playground for the And it remains to be seen how well the sight lines will work.

Talk to local drive-in experts and enthusiasts and you'll find excitement tinged with skepticism. "I really want this to succeed," says Wixom-based Gary Ritzenth-iler, Who has charted the history of drive-ins on his Web site wwwwaterwinterwonderland iom. "Still, it's the difference between going to a vintage Dog-n-Suds drive-in restaurant and a McDonald's drive-through," he says. "I can eat lunch in my car at a McDonald's, but somehow it just isn't the same." Though the United Theater Drive-in Association says the numbers of outdoor theaters dropped from 4,068 in 1958 to 433 last year, drive-ins never disappeared completely from the Detroit area. The Ford-Wyoming Drive-in in Dearborn has actually expanded to nine screens over the past two decades.

Go there on the iricirk out off Dstroft Fm Pmi I taunts their 1 25th Comedy Revue dome property that has sat mostly vacant since the Detroit Lions moved to Ford Field. Rising real estate prices have made it more difficult to secure the land needed to launch a Viable, multiscreen drive-in. Movies at the Drive-In has a contract with the Silverdome Sta- dium Authority, ending in December 2005, agreeing that proceeds will be split 50-50 after expenses. This is the first drive-in movie theater to open in the Detroit area since the now-defunct Madison Heights Galaxy in 1975. The project could eventually accommodate up to 1,300 cars, once all the The Best of the 1st fen Yean 313-965-2222 Next to the Fox Theatre 'KILL BILL' I Tarantino's 4th film is ultimate B-movie them with the skill and joy and passion and ingenuity of this one, I'm certainly not going to begrudge him.

Cynics will argue that the decision to split "Kill Bill" into two parts was financial instead of artistic, just another way to extend Tarantino fever. But had "Vol. 1" not delivered, no one would be queuing up for "Vol. 2" and Tarantino might have become his generation's Michael Cimino remembered only for the big plays, with no follow-through. I would have been perfectly happy to have watched another 100 minutes of "Kill Bill" after I had watched these.

But what's better is having something to look forward to. Cont act TERRY LAWSON rt3J3- Even those who get the dozens of inside jokes and references like casting Chiaki Kuroyama, star of cult favorite "Battle Roy-ale," a film so disturbing in its killer-kids plotline that no American studio would release it may leave the film asking a troubling question; Am I too geeky to live? For now, I'm not heading there. Like Tarantino's first two films, "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction," "Vol. 1" is a shot of pure adrenalin on celluloid, headed for the heart and the gut, not the head. (The more sober "Jackie Brown" is, in retrospect and on repeated viewings, almost as good, simply not as kinetic.) If Tarantino chooses to make films that are lavish displays of movie-geek love the yellow tracksuit worn by the Bride is just like the one worn by Bruce Lee in "Game of Death" and makes i i i i5 feSetscal1 v4 WdbyC' liW rndBrtbyJllitV JA I Medio Sponsors NEMlUnW, ar4ftl, 1 Till ondWeWiMfroirtfop.

1 ft I .1 IKWW Bride, a.k.a. Black Mamba, is able to rehabilitate herself enough to take a trip to Japan (traced on a map) to hunt down Cottonmouth, a.k.a. O-Ren Ishii, whose own troubled background we learn via anime the often violent, always fantastic, style of animation specific to Japan. First, the Bride stops in an Okinawa sushi bar to pay her respects to the world's finest sword- -maker and ninjitsu master Hattori Hanzo. It's a name that will be familiar only to those who have seen the actor who plays him, Sonny Chiba, the legendary star of Japanese samurai films.

Soon, both sword and swords-woman are ready for the trip to Tokyo for her confrontation with O-Ren (Lucy Liu), now the brutal but cute boss of the yakuza underworld, at the House of Blue Leaves. There we see ah extended samurai demonstration that is to violent martial arts movies what the climax to "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" was to lyrical, mythological ones. The best way to decide whether or not you will be on the Bill" side of the dividing line drawn by Tarantino is to ask yourself this question: Can you watch in the spirit in which it is intended limbs and heads being hacked off, with blood gushing like colored water from a Las Vegas fountain? If not, you will be one of those who would understandably question why a filmmaker with such prodigious gifts would squander them, millions of dollars and a couple of years making the ultimate B-movie. From Page IE dream made real. There is barely a story in "Kill BUL.VoJ.

1." In fact, Tarantino's script only sketches the plot between the elaborate action sequences, a tale we assume will be filled but in February. It is presented in five chapters, each with its own, title and each filmed, beautifully, by cinematographer Robert Richardson in a specific style. The first adopts the flat, utilitarian approach of exploiters like 45" to introduce the Bride (Uma Thurman), driving a truck whose nickname can not be repeated here, to a Pasadena tract house where her unexpected visit to a former, traitorous and retired colleague (Vivica A. Fox) provokes a vicious knife fight. It's interrupted by the arrival of the woman's daughter; after the girl is introduced to "one of mama's old friends" and sent to her room, things seem to calm down, but one is highly advised not to become complacent.

As we learn in the following, exceedingly nasty interlude, the Bride was left for dead in her bridal gown in a Texas chapel on her wedding day four year previous, the wedding party slaughtered by her fellow killers in the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (a.k.a. the DiVAS) all code-named for poisonous snakes. They were led by a malevolent mystery man named Bill (not fully seen in this volume, but voiced by David Carradine). Snapping out of a coma at a horribly opportune moment, the E3 2003 HUNDREDS OF EXHIBITS Michigan Kitchen Bath Show by the Michigan Chapter of the NKBA Designer's Sample Sale by the ASID Michigan Chapter to benefit Habitat for Humanity Decorator Vignettes by members of the ASID WKQI Home Facelift" contest DESIGN EXPCB- See products for improving your home 4 inside and out design ideas, kitchen makeovers, additions, enclosures, roofing, siding, lighting, windows, decks and more! Appearing daily-Peter Fallico, host of HGTV'This Small Space" Faux painting with Harrison Paint Pictorial display of 73 "Showcase of Distinctive Homes" Over 200 exhibitors featuring thousands of products and services for the home KITCHEN SHOW UK Presenting Sponsor Standard Federal Bank i SEP nm i Jim Krengel, certified HlihlfW gut FRIDAY, OCTOBER 10, Noon-9pm' r0am-9pm', SUNDAY, OCTOBER 12, I0am-6pm; I 'ADMISSION: master kitchen bath designer alee smart m4 NOVl Amrl.n S.el.1, el D.tlanan Michigan ctwm OIC 3S $6 Seniors 12 land under For more information go to www.builders.org or call 248-862-1019 Receive $2.00 off coupon from participating Toarmina's pizza FREE i A public service of the Building Industry Association The consumer guide, every Sunday.