BARRY NORMAN/ADMIT ONE

Q. How did Britain’s biggest cinema names get into the business?

Critic supremo Norman says:

"The early film that made the most impression on me was They Died With Their Boots On, which had Errol Flynn as, believe it or not, an admirable, heroic General Custer.

I saw it with my father one Sunday morning at a special preview in Leicester Square when I was eight. It was the first preview I had ever been to.

I loved the occasion, loved the film, thought Flynn was terrific.

I’ve since changed my mind about the movie but I’m still a fan of Flynn.

Westerns were my favourite films.

My family’s maid used to take me to Saturday morning matinees when I was even younger than eight and westerns – men in white hats chasing men in black hats – always dominated the bill.

Westerns have been my favourite genre ever since.

Inevitably I am more selective about going to the movies than when I was doing the day job. I still go to previews but now, happily, I can pick the ones I want to see.

I catch up with the good ones whose previews I had missed at my local multiplex. It was a great shock to me to discover that people actually have to pay to go to the cinema.

I don’t have a DVD “collection” as such. I simply have a random assortment of DVDs and videos, among them “Bringing Up Baby”, “Gregory’s Girl”, “The Man with Two Brains”, “The Searchers”, “Casablanca”, “The Aviator”, Laurel and Hardy and W. C. Fields shorts and, of course, the “Citizen Kane” DVD (above) that includes my introduction to it!"

Reprinted from the Premiere issue of British Film Magazine.

Posted March 20, 2008.