Chris Bois, 19, left, and Mark Martineau, 10, live next to the Rustic Tri-View Drive-In, in North Smithfield. They can see movies just by looking out their window or sitting in a lawn chair, but they also have to contend with noise and litter.

The Providence Journal / Steve Szydlowski

NORTH SMITHFIELD

When 19-year-old Chris Bois wants to watch movie favorites like Harry Potter or Transformers, he takes a seat at his mother’s kitchen counter, looks out the window over the fence at screen number 1 and turns on the radio.

His mother, Paulette Bois, lives next door to the Rustic Tri-View Drive-In. On the other side of Bois’ fence, screens 1, 2 and 3 tower over a vast concrete parking lot that fills up each night at dusk with carloads of people — with blankets, lawn chairs and coolers — who come to watch the movies.

Living next to the drive-in has had some pluses for Paulette and her brother, Paul Martineau, who lives next door and owns the two houses they live in at 1191 Eddie Dowling Highway (Route 146). The Bois family and Martineau have gotten jobs at the drive-in. The minuses come by way of noise and, now and then, rocks or bottles that people throw over the fence into their yards.

Paulette Bois, 45, was on the cleanup crew at the drive-in. Martineau, 51, has been there seven years in addition to his full-time job as a forklift operator in Massachusetts.

He got his job by accident. “It was the third straight day of kids throwing rocks at my house from the drive-in parking lot and I went to talk with the [former] owner,” he said. The owner told Martineau she was short-handed and offered him a job.

Martineau runs the projector. His other job is to direct people to park as they come into the drive-in — smaller cars in front and bigger cars to the back so everyone can see. Sometimes people sneak in beer, which is prohibited. Another of Martineau’s tasks is to make sure people are not doing things such as throwing rocks or sneaking off into the woods for intermission high jinks. At $20 a carload, people pack into their cars.

Paulette said the noise factor comes in when people put their radios on too loud when they are listening to the movie or when they lay on the horn in unison when the movie doesn’t come on right away.

Chris Bois’ job on the cleanup crew begins the morning after the movies. Aside from the candy wrappers, cups, bottles and broken chairs Chris finds evidence that some people may not be watching the movie. “Bras, underwear, jeans, condoms,” he said. “We wear gloves, trust me.”

Although he gets in free to the movies now, Chris, who lives in Woonsocket, says sometimes he’ll still watch from his mother’s kitchen. “Sometimes I just like watching them in quiet.”

tpina@projo.com