A different kind of Malta

The film, Never Take No for an Answer, showing at the Empire Theatre in Paola came with a quirky notice saying “the rev. Clergy may attend”.

It was a British film about an Italian orphan who went to see the Pope in Rome and the all-clear notice for priests was included in the cinema listing in The Times.

This was Malta in June 1953 when Nationalist Party leader George Borg Olivier was Prime Minister, heading a coalition government with Sir Paul Boffa’s Malta Worker’s Party.

It was a time when a packet of 20 Fine Virginia Cigarettes made by Abdulla of England imported by Captain A. Caruana of Kingsway, Valletta, cost two-and-a-half pennies and this newspaper cost three pence.

On June 3, a day after the Queen’s coronation, The Times went to town with coverage of the event under a front page banner titled The Coronation.

It also reported on a solemn ceremony presided by Archbishop Mikiel Gonzi at St John’s Co-Cathedral where the Te Deum was sung in commemoration of the Queen’s coronation.

Today’s Prime Minister, Lawrence Gonzi, was born a month later and that same year the children’s classic film Peter Pan was released in US.

Malta was still a British colony uncertain whether it wanted independence or integration with Britain.

That changed in 1957 when the Maltese Parliament unanimously approved the Break with Britain resolution that set the course for independence in 1964.

The Queen remained the country’s head of state until 1974 when Malta became a republic.

But it is a different Malta that will follow the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations today. Sure enough, cinema listings no longer include notices giving the clergy a green light to watch films.

Unlike 1953, when it was only the Queen’s speech that was broadcast live on radio, the grandeur of the celebrations will be beamed to all the world in full colour via television broadcasts and the internet.

In an era of Big Brother television and celebrity cults many will be watching. Whether they will be lured by the feelings of “loyalty and affection” the Queen spoke of 60 years ago is another matter altogether.