Movies Under the Moon.(outdoor movies)(Brief Article)

Toting bagfuls of snacks and drinks, a small crowd gathers on a swath of patchy grass beside New York City's East River. Seats are staked out with blankets and coolers. Conversation tapers off when a pinkish-red sunset envelops Manhattan's skyscrapers across the river, triggering a click, a whir and the flicker of celluloid on a large screen mounted on a trailer. This evening's offering at the Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens: "Wattstax," a 1972 documentary about an L.A. concert that captured the broiling racial tension of the era. Against a darkening sky, a young Jesse Jackson leaps out from the screen leading chants of "I am somebody!" The orange glows of cigarettes (some tobacco, some not) dot the audience like fireflies. Madhavi Me-non, a 31-year-old restaurant worker, explains the allure: "It's the feeling of the great outdoors," she says, "and experiencing a sense of community."

Watching movies and sitting under the stars have always been two of summertime's greatest pleasures. And now, at venues all over the world, more and more people are enjoying them simultaneously. In New York City, where obscure and commercial offerings can be seen indoors every night, the trend is relatively new. In Europe, outdoor movies--popular before the dominance of television --are winning a new generation of fans. From a castle in Switzerland to a bullring outside Madrid, today's open-air venues are almost as funky and diverse as the movies being shown. Those range from rare, old documentaries and Hitchcock classics to relatively recent releases such as "Gladiator" and "Pearl Harbor." But whether you're watching "Chocolat" on the roof of a Sheraton in Ankara or "What Women Want" behind the Parthenon, the appeal is universal. "You can sit under the stars, nibble on something and enjoy a good movie, and you've had your evening of entertainment in nature without spending a lot of money," says Athens resident Kyriakos Condoulis, 68.

The Greeks were among the earliest enthusiasts of outdoor cinema. In 1916 two Frenchmen showed an eight-minute silent film on a whitewashed wall in Athens. Three years later the city's first outdoor theater opened. The trend grew until the 1970s, when Greece's outdoor theaters- -like America's drive-ins--took a hit from the rising popularity of TV, videos and air-conditioned multiplexes. But lately new sponsors have discovered fresh-air films and distributors have started offering newer releases. ...