GOOD OLD DAYS:

With hordes of young people in line this week to buy tickets for the opening of the new Indiana Jones film, “Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” I couldn’t help myself from indulging in a little nostalgia for days gone by.

Not to mention also feeling a certain healthy respect for the fact that at 65, Harrison Ford (hopefully) can still maneuver the old bullwhip.

“Raiders of the Lost Ark” premiered in 1981. That was 27 years ago.

I was a young wife with a 3-year-old son, who is now promoting movies of his own. He works for William Morris, the talent agency in Beverly Hills.

My younger son hadn’t even been born yet, but I bet today he could recite lines of dialogue from each of the Indiana Jones films that followed the first one.

Once again, the entertainment industry finds a way to bridge the generation gap, to introduce characters and plot lines that are as enticing to kids as they were to their parents.

What is it about movies that transport us?

Not only to the magical, make-believe world these fictional characters inhabit, but to the times in our own lives that correspond to the film’s release dates?

Last summer, the Orange County Performing Artscenter debuted Movie Mondays, a series of free movies shown on Monday nights in the center’s community plaza. The outdoor series featured popular movie musicals from the past, projected once the sun went down on the side of Segerstrom Hall.

I went with friends to see “West Side Story.” We brought beach chairs, blankets, food and our love for the romantically tragic tale of star-crossed lovers Tony and Maria.

These friends of mine are young. Much younger than me.

I saw the movie when it premiered in 1961. I fell in love with Richard Beymer, sang “There’s a Place For Us” until my family begged for earplugs and yearned to one day love someone as passionately as those two did.

The girls I was with last summer may have been from another generation, but they were as captivated as I was when the movie started, and they had their own memories of where they were — literally and emotionally — when they first saw the movie.

This summer, the Monday Movie series will include “Grease.” The film that made stars of actors John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John will celebrate the 30th anniversary of its release in June.

If I know what’s good for me, I won’t embarrass myself or my friends by going to see it at the center. I really can’t sing a note, and I know that won’t deter me in the least.

I know every song by heart. I used to play the tape (geez, I said tape. No CDs back then) at the highest decibel level possible so I could hear the music over the sound of my vacuum cleaner.

It was such great exercise. I pushed the Hoover while I sang and danced, wishing my friends and I had thought to sing our way through the teenage angst and growing pains of our high school years.

Movies: They take us to a place where we can get lost in someone else’s life adventures.

Or remember our own.

SUE THOENSEN may be reached at (714) 966-4627 or at [email protected].