Can it really be just a year since, in my previous Hater’s Guide, I compared the then just-released Twilight to “the lamest episode of 90210 ever made combining forces with the second-lamest episode of 90210 ever made”? So much has changed! For one thing, there is the alarming number of my previously sane female acquaintances who this year fell under the sway of Stephenie Meyer’s vampire books and the first film adaptation. One minute they’re all, “I agree, Clark, this all sounds like a bunch of crap.” The next, it’s, “Ooh, Robert Pattinson is so dreamy,” and “Go, Team...

It was on this day, 75 years ago, that Richard Hollingshead Jr. opened his first drive-in theater in Camden, New Jersey. At its peak, there were nearly 5,000 drive-in movie theaters across the country. In the post-WWII period, the drive-in represented both the emergence of the teenage leisure class and our country's strong identification with the automobile. Also, petting. Though there are a few drive-ins left, they represent a novelty more than a primary destination for cinematic appreciation. This saddens us, because the idea of a movie you can enjoy from the confines of your personal auto...