A curtain coating method and apparatus using a rotatable or slidable coating plate and in which a coating liquid freely falls in the form of a thin film from a hopper. The thin film collides with a web continuously running and circumferentially turning around a backup roller to coat the web. The coating plate is rotated or slid to retract so that the freely falling coating liquid reaches the web so as to coat the web after the freely falling coating liquid flows along a checking plate which is doglegged in section and provided on a forward end of the coating plate, thereby coating the web with an even thickness at the start of coating operations.