Can’t Explain has review of one of my favorite movies of all-time, Sunset Boulevard. I saw it at the Castro in San Francisco in the 90s in a double feature with “In A Lonely Place”. That was the most fun I’ve ever had at the movies, partly because I like the movies so much (“In A Lonely Place” I only like in a campy way), partly because it was such a great audience. I wouldn’t have understood half the things they applauded (like Buster Keaton’s cameo) had my hard-core film friend not explained it all to me.
What’s your best movie-going experience ever?
Crashman
Watching Jaws on the big screen a few months ago in a theater that served 16oz Narragansett tall boys.
Damn, that movie is scary in the dark.
redshirt
Perhaps sadly, I saw the Star wars re-release in 1997 or so in NYC in this one big giant theatre downtown. It was sold out with a thousand or so people in the house and everyone was so into it.
Leaving the theater, I bumped into Rudy, pre-911 when he used to be an OK guy.
OR – the first time I saw The Empire Strikes Back in an equally huge theater out in LA. The shock I experienced at the end of the movie blew my young mind.
DougJ
@Crashman:
Where?
Jody
Why, the Rocky Horror Picture Show where I met my husband, of course. :)
attica
Wizard of Oz in a Greenwich Village Dollar theater full of teh gheyz. Never knew a movie-going experience could be that funny.
piratedan
at age 23 leaving the cinema after The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai… thinking that it would be cool to be able to write a screenplay that would be nearly as nifty as what I had just seen.
DougJ
@redshirt:
Seeing the re-release of Empire Strikes Back (or maybe the Jack London theater just happened to be showing it) in the late 90s is up there for me too. Mostly because we had fun doing our Billy Dee voices, “you should live with me among the clouds.” Alcohol may have been involved.
geg6
Back in the late 70s, going to the drive in to see a double feature of “Kentucky Fried Movie” and “The Groove Tube” having taken a couple hits of acid and bringing with us about an ounce of Columbian.
That was a fucking blast. Probably the last time I actually enjoyed going to a movie.
cleek
Aliens + acid was pretty wild.
i was 15, and everything is pretty wild when you’re 15.
shoutingattherain
Backintheday I won tickets from the local radio station for the movie “Tommy” and spent a couple hours smoking dope in the theater watching Ann-Margret slide out of a big can of Heinz Baked Beans. Yeah.
redshirt
@DougJ: Oh yeah, alcohol was involved.
There was one just exquisite moment – when Luke and the gang are breaking into the Cell block to free Leia. Luke busts into Leia’s cell, she makes a Stormtrooper joke, he takes off his helmet and says “I’m Luke Skywalker and I’m here to rescue you”. The crowd erupted in applause. It was so awesomely innocent and pure…
Phylllis
Richard Pryor: Here and Now at a midnight showing in Charleston SC. My two friends and I were the only grains of salt in the audience; the place was rocking.
KG
@redshirt: I made it a point to see the re-releases during weekday afternoons (was in college at the time). But for the Phantom Menace, I did a midnight showing with a bunch of friends, packed theater, cheering at certain spots… I don’t remember anyone dressed up, though. Still, it was a lot of fun being there with a crowd that was genuinely into it.
stibbert
back in ’78 or so, the university’s Film Forum ran a Warhol triple-feature – Frankenstein, Dracula & Trash. some segments were mildly amusing, but the total effect was more like, “glad i won’t have to do that again.”
Villago Delenda Est
Lawrence of Arabia in full Cinerama glory.
Magnificent.
Mateo
One my most memorable experiences at the movies–and I have many–is recent, watching A Night at the Opera at a drive-in near the NY-Vermont border, as the after-party event for a friend’s wedding. They rented the drive-in and paid for the concession stand to provide unlimited popcorn and soda. I’m a big cinephile, but this was my first time at a drive in and I just loved it.
BTW, DougJ: a bit of trivia regarding Bogart’s bungalow in “In a Lonely Place”…it was the actual bungalow owned by Nicholas Ray, who, at the time, was in the process of divorcing the film’s leading lady, Gloria Grahame
Villago Delenda Est
@redshirt:
“Aren’t you a little short for a stormtrooper?”
SGEW
Either “2001: A Space Odyssey” (with intermission) at the Ziegfeld, or a double feature of “La Jetée” and “Sans Soleil.”
But that’s me.
DougJ
@redshirt:
I just kept waiting for Billy Dee to offer Leah a Colt 45. Works every time.
The Dangerman
Being an extra in a Lindsay Lohan flick; it was a POS (I Know Who Killed Me) and I think I may have been on-screen for all of a couple seconds in the final cut. It was best because, for it being a POS, it was fascinating to see how hard the movie crew worked. No one mailed it in, including LL (who treated everyone, including a “nobody” me, quite nice; I feel sorry for her).
IlsaLund
Seeing Casablanca for the first time at the Brattle theatre. That’s why I’m Ilsa Lund.
Villago Delenda Est
OK, how about The Rocky Horror Picture Show with a full participatory audience while baked?
It’s one of those 70’s things…you had to be there…
Crashman
@DougJ: Somerville Theater in Davis Square, Somerville MA.
Reece's Pieces
Prince’s Purple Rain in Detroit Michigan
the fearless chick that took me and i were the only white people in the entire theatre.
EVERYBODY else knew ALL of the lyrics and BOOGIED and DANCED the entire movie.
i had never even heard of the guy.
i was such a loser.
redshirt
@KG: I made a big effort to see Phantom Menace the first day first showing (Augusta Maine baby!), but left the theater feeling…. I’m not sure. Drunk? Punch drunk? Stupefied?
The first moment of the movie – the title scrawl – was pure magic. The audience was hooting and a’hollering. But then the Japanese Aliens appeared and soon enough we were off on a different trip down mythological lane – the very disappointing prequels.
Heez
Double feature of The Blue Angel and Wings of Desire at a UGA film festival sometime in the early 90s. Yes, the hash oil was so good that I can’t even remember the exact year.
BGinCHI
@IlsaLund: Was just going to mention the Brattle.
When I was a junior in college I moved (from the midwest) to Boston to live rent-free and sleep on a friend’s floor so that I could live in the city and, well, get out of the midwest for a few months. I worked a shitty job and had no money but could afford the double features at the Brattle. I think it was like $5 (this was late 80s).
You could also bring in food and coffee, which I did.
That’s where I saw all of Fellini and a bunch of noirs for the first time. And before VCRs, this was really the only way to see stuff like this, especially if you lived in a small town somewhere.
Kay Shawn
“Mommie Dearest” at a midnight screening in Times Square, the first day it opened…just the best.
Crashman
@redshirt: I’m just trying to convince myself that those movies were actually never made.
Reece's Pieces
another fantastic movie going experience was at an outdoor drive-in theatre that showed PORN !!!!!!!!!!!!
this was in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in the early 1980’s.
a GREAT time was had by ALL !!!!!
redshirt
@DougJ: There’s lots of chatter on the Intertubes about how bad ass Lando was for the movie – talking back to Vader, for example. I don’t see it. For all his cool charms, he still played second fiddle to Solo, in all regards. Now there’s a fuzzball!
daveNYC
In the wayback machine? First time seeing Empire Strikes Back. Luke loses a hand, Darth is his father, and Han is frozen and taken off someplace. It’s a totally insane ending when you’re younger.
Recently? Saw Armageddon in the theaters with a co-worker. Key point is that we were working at JSC down in Houston, so we laughed our way through the entire movie. Don’t think people were too happy about that.
Trooptrap Tripetrope
“Mommie Dearest” at the Castro Theater, with Christina Crawford as guest of honor.
geg6
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yeah, that was fun, too.
Movie going these days just sucks. I won’t do it any more. Can’t stand the idiots around me. Now, if they made it mandatory for everyone in the theater to be stoned, I might consider going back.
erlking
Mine also occurred at the Castro. I saw one of the early screenings of the “director’s cut” of the Blade Runner. My friends and I ate mushrooms before hand–yes, those mushrooms. It was priceless.
catclub
@Villago Delenda Est: Double feature of Lawrence of Arabia and Gallipolli makes Gallipolli look really small.
A double feature of Lawrence with Bridge over the River Kwai would be interesting.
Politically Lost
I was about 12 years old when Raiders of the Lost Ark opened. My mother was trying to get rid of me for a summer day and insisted I go see it. I was so clueless that I said I didn’t want to go see a movie dancing in it.
Anyway, she dropped me off for a Saturday matinee. The movie was absolutely sold out and the atmosphere was highly charged and I got a great seat. I can’t explain how incredible that experience was for me. I was just at the right age to be totally taken away by it. Definitely started me on my way for love of movies.
BGinCHI
I also happened to be at the world premier of Reservoir Dogs in Toronto at the film festival there in 1992. Lots of action, with people walking out and yelling.
redshirt
@Crashman: It’s a damn shame too, because the underlying story is rock solid – topical even. And there’s of course lots of cool PEW-PEW stuff. But just about everything else? Ug.
An object lesson for any artist on the need to always be critical of your own work, and seek others input. Lucas let his merchandising success go to his head, and there’s no stopping him any longer.
Gravenstone
Not a movie theater experience, but the first time I saw Airplane! I was in a room full of pilots/student pilots. Every single in joke thus got hammered on mercilessly. Doubled with Caddyshack, wherein one of our number was actually summer help at the golf course used in the film. He was on the crew that planted all the trees they blew up.
Hunter Gathers
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas with a group of 5 friends on a mixture of booze, bud, shrooms and very cheap acid. Was kicked out 5 minutes before the ending for standing up and screaming something about murderous reptiles and the corpse of Richard Nixon. Like Vegas itself, a movie theater is no place for hard drugs.
greenergood
Need two categories: awesome while wrecked, and awesome while not wrecked (usually art-house experience). Then needs to be opened up into decades: so two films per decade, from, say, 1920? (That leaves you with 20 films up to 2010 – wrecked and unwrecked). Otherwise I’ll have become a gibbering heap trying to name that film.
Gravenstone
@cleek:
I had friends in college who went to see The Wall. They came back to report that some poor fool in front of them was obviously tripping on acid. Bad choice of movies to drop on there, bud.
trollhattan
Jeez. Can’t settle on one, but original theatrical releases of “Holy Grail,” “Bananas,” “Young Frankenstein” and “Night of the Living Dead” have to rank right up there. The first (or was it the fourth?) “Star Wars” changed the sensory landscape from the moment that fricking battle cruiser passes overhead and you slouch in your seat, involuntarily ducking.
Also, too, I learned the hard way never to take a date to a John Waters movie. Nomsayn?
Also, also, too. “Ran” by Kurosowa in a “proper” theater.
Thymezone
“What’s your best movie-going experience ever?”
Making out with Gayle in the balcony of the Fox Theater.
Calouste
Part of the audience (including us) joining in with the on-screen audience in cheering on the gladiators during the fight scenes in Gladiator. Didn’t make up for the craptitude of the rest of the movie though.
Oh, and seeing the restored version of Metropolis with live music.
catclub
Japanese Art films in the Seattle Art Museum on Capitol Hill.
Seven samurai, Rashomon, Yojimbo, Ikiru ( my favorite), Woman in the Dunes, Late spring?
Knowing that key subtitles would come up on glaring white background.
mistermix
Stop Making Sense at the big theater on Michigan Ave in Chicago – forgot the name.
kindness
Blazing Saddles. A buddy of mine & I went to see it one Friday night at Ithaca College. We had no idea what it was about other than it was the new (at the time) Mel Brooks movie. We ate acid & smuggled a big bottle of wine into the auditorium.
We howled through that movie. I would have been embarrassed but most my fellow school mates were just as loud as we were.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
Back in 1984 I was living in Washington, DC and a friend called to say he’d heard there was a sneak preview of a new movie at the Uptown, directed by Rob Reiner of all people (he was still best known as Meathead at the time). We all piled over there, beers hidden in purses, figuring we could leave early if we hated it. As it turned out, we did not hate Spinal Tap. At all.
Randiego
@Villago Delenda Est: Same here. Lawrence of Arabia. Saw it in Phoenix in the late 80’s at the Cinerama when it was restored. The best thing for me was I had somehow never seen it before. I was thoroughly “movied”. It might be my favorite movie now; still not out on blu-ray – maybe next year for the 50th anniversary
Legalize
The first time I saw Pulp Fiction on the big screen. The theater sat about 200 people, and was packed on an opening weekend in a college town. It was something.
Seeing brand new prints of Rashomon, Raging Bull, and Dr. Strangelove back to back to back, at the Ziegfeld was mind-blowing experience. There are no words for how pleasant that was.
EDIT: Seeing Spinal Tap and Snatch in Paris was surreal and hilarious.
trollhattan
@Trooptrap Tripetrope:
Okay, that’s freaking hilarious. I went to a screening of “Scorpio Rising” presented by Kenneth Anger, and when he walked on stages several rows of satanists stood and chanted some gibberish to him, in unison.
Good times.
redshirt
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: That’s awesome. I’d a killed to see Spinal Tap in the theater. The thousand times I watched it on VHS I’m sure don’t compare.
KG
@redshirt: I still can’t read the word “Senate” without hearing Nute Gunray.
I don’t hate the prequels as much as many do. The way I look at it is that it would be hard for anyone to do them well. We all knew what was going to happen, and that makes it tough to tell a story.
catclub
@Randiego: Only watch it on a big screen.
Violet
Casablanca at the outdoor Boulder Outdoor Cinema (the wall of a building) in July. Bring your own chair.
MikeJ
I lost it at the movies.
@mistermix: Stop Making Sense in Harvard Square, Liquid Sky at the Orson Welles just down Mass Ave, Eraserhead at some dingy arthouse in Columbia, MO, Alphaville on VHS in the dorm with my roomie stopping the film every five minutes to make sure we knew what was going on and the rest of us wanting to kill him, because, yes we did.
Violet
@redshirt:
I saw Spinal Tap in the theater. The folks I went with were the type to know every cool thing in town. Except for us, the theater was empty, so it was both fun and kind of weird. We had a great time, though.
JCT
@Villago Delenda Est: Yes! At the Tiffany on Sunset when I was in high school. Many, many times.
As an adult? Pan’s Labyrinth with my 16-yr-old daughter in Manhattan, she was so transfixed (had just learned about Franco in school) that she asked to sit through it twice. We then were out until the wee hours discussing it — one of my favorite parental moments.
redshirt
@KG: I actually like Phantom Menace now, and Revenge of the Sith has some great points. Almost the entirety of Attack of the Clones is just bewilderingly bad – everything not involving Obi Wan.
The best part of the Prequels by far is Obi Wan. And Palpatine.
Davis X. Machina
Late ’70’s. Casablanca, in Harvard Square just before Christmas break. A veritable sea of trenchcoats and picture hats — before Rocky Horror When Victor Lazlo says “Play it. Play La Marseillaise!”, everybody gets up and sings it. 300 people.
Corny, but wonderful.
gbear
Two favorite memories are of A Hard Day’s Night when it came out (I was 9) and 2001 at the Cooper Cinema when that came out. A Clockwork Orange would have been on that list too except we showed up late and missed the first 10 minutes.
Martin
Boy, pretty much anything seen at the Nuart. Great films and a great audience. Always benefits from having a lot of industry people in the theater – there’s just a different feeling to being there, like the movies are much more significant than they seem to feel at the local cineplex.
Thoughtcrime
This is where I had many of my best movie memories, including seeing “Polyester”, with “fresh” new sets of Odorama cards:
http://cinesourcemagazine.com/index.php?/site/comments/gary_meyer_adventures_in_exhibitionism/
Double features for $1, later $2. Oh, and this played before every showing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnpofBtijF8
Violet
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
Somehow I got to be the designated beer-in-purse carrier for the dumbest of dumb movies — The Brady Bunch movie. We were fairly inebriated when we got to the theater and kept pounding the beers while we were there. I have no idea what the film was about, but I suspect it was awful. I recall leaving the theater with the beginnings of a hangover. Why we decided to see that movie, I couldn’t begin to say.
Gravenstone
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: Spinal Tap opened, and closed on one day in our little hick college town. The theater owner simply did.not.get.it.
Did have an amusing experience watching The Dead Zone on campus. My buddy and I had done a couple shots of 151 prior to going (we were ticket takers). Then as we sat and watched the movie, one scene where a character suddenly pops up from a side door in a dark hallway. You couldn’t see the screen for all the people jumping out of their seats – then as the rest of the audience is coming back down, my buddy does an alcohol delayed jump. I was so drunk, I didn’t even twitch.
trollhattan
@redshirt:
I saw it with a friend in a theater maybe a quarter full, half of whom were young wanna-be spandex hair-band metalheads. My buddy and I howled throught the thing, maybe the only ones in the place making a sound. After, the metalheads gathered in the lobby trading “Did that suck, or what?!” notes.
They evidently thought it was an actual documentary.
Moonbatting Average
Sophomore (I think) year in high school, a friend who had a driver’s license and I went to a nearby town to see the sneak preview of Jurassic Park. Subsequent viewings have confirmed that the movie kinda sucks, but at the time, it was mind-blowing.
lamh34
Recently “Dreamgirls”, me and all 4 of my sisters were all living in DFW at the time an we all got together on Christmas Day to see “Dreamgirls”.
We got there late, so we had to scrounge up sits so that we could sit together. We were 1 seat short and this dude gave up his seat for my sister and actually sad on the floor right above a landing where his feet were dangling over the edge (the theatre was packed and prob sold out).
Then during the move the audience knew every song and darn near sang along to each one of them and when Jennifer Hudson sang And I am Telling You I’m Not Going you could hear a pin drop in the whole theatre, and when she was finished, I kid ya not, the theatre started clapping as if it was a live performance.
I gotta tell ya, I’ve watched the movie alone since and it’s never the same as when I saw it at theatre, and I love the movie (even saw the traveling show at Fair Park in Dallas…FAB-U-LOUS!!!).
There is sometimes nothing better than seeing a movie in the theatres. Having an audience of people to commisserate with on some movies can sometimes make the movie better than expected.
Taylor
@Villago Delenda Est:
Lawrence of Arabia in full Cinerama at the Uptown Theater in DC when the restored version came out in the late 80s.
The lines for the water fountains during the intermission were to behold.
dedc79
The Neverending Story – first movie my parents took me to see in a theater – and it was absolutely perfect (or at least seemed that way at the time). A completely magical movie that even had a good lesson about the value/pleasure of reading.
trollhattan
@gbear:
I was waaaay too young to see “Clockwork,” which came out with an X rating (remember those?).
College fixed that.
BGinCHI
@kindness: Taught there for a couple of years in the late 90s-2000. Wine in the office, but no acid.
Regrets, I have a few.
BGinCHI
@Legalize: Could you elaborate on seeing Snatch in Paris?
catclub
@trollhattan: Clockwork was the first movie I saw where I decided it was too disturbing for me.
cmorenc
1) Seeing “Princess Bride” at a movie theater the first time I ever watched it. What a delightfully fun, witty romp!
2) I don’t remember what the movie was, but I remember the hot girl I was dating and um…on a mutual journey of exploration in the dark theater. Who cares what the damn movie was that night :=)
Martin
@redshirt:
The mocumentaries are an odd lot. They are unbelievably good in a packed theater when nobody knows the jokes ahead of time. Because the films deliberately give no cues to the audience and are semi-improvisational, the discovery by the audience becomes incredibly important to the feel of the movie. Without that, it’s really just not the same.
Scott
3. Saw a “Casablanca” re-release, in black and white, on a nice big screen, in a theater with only a few people attending.
2. Saw “The Creature from the Black Lagoon” on a big screen, in 3-D.
1. Saw “What’s Opera, Doc” on a big screen in a room full of cynical, media savvy college students who laughed their asses off and gave it a standing ovation when it was over. The Charlie Sheen/Emilio Estevez feature that followed it was a massive disappointment.
sam
@MikeJ:
“Liquid Sky at the Orson Welles just down Mass Ave”
Dude, that was a long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.
Can’t recall where I saw this, could’ve been Cambridge or Boston, but Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven, as a double-feature. That was neat.
Chris
@Politically Lost:
I saw Raiders at about the same age and it had exactly the same effect, although that was ten years ago when USA was showing the three movies during my spring break holidays in Florida. Can’t imagine what it must’ve been like seeing it on the big screen when it was actually released!
MikeJ
@efgoldman:
Did it reopen for a little while after the fire, or am I remembering wrong?
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Taylor: That WAS glorious. Hey, maybe we were at the same showing. I remember the theater owner saying in an interview in the Post that they’d more than doubled the records for Coke sales.
I also remember noticing that, except for the brief framing scenes, all the women in that movie were either nuns or corpses.
Martin
I think best is going to have to come down to seeing Star Wars when I was 9. That was literally life changing. Everything before was Disney. Everything after was aliens and spaceships and shit. That was like atheist bar mitzvah.
Handsome Stranger
My best movie-going experience ever took up an entire weekend. Los Angeles used to have an annual film festival known as Filmex, and one of the events was a 50-hour marathon of movies. It started on a Friday night and ended Sunday night. Everyone was allowed to bring in whatever food they wanted. Can’t remember what theater it happened in, but the seats were plush and extremely comfortable, so taking naps was not a problem. I remember seeing Woody Allen’s “Love and Death” there, during which the audience was frequently laughing so hard that you couldn’t hear the next two or three lines of dialogue.
RossinDetroit
Seeing Metropolis with live music by The Alloy Orchestra. Three times in one weekend. I frikkin’ adore that movie.
I must be defective because I’m really unmoved by Sunset Boulevard. If you disregard the hype, it’s just an OK film to me.
Suffern ACE
@redshirt: I also went to the Ziegfeld to see those prequels. You must have had a pro-Luke crowd. I remember my crowd being anti-Luke and laughing every time the whiny guy said his lines.
kindness
@BGinCHI: Which department? I was Biology/Chemistry – not one of their more distinguished departments but a good one.
The dates…I was there 75/76 & 76/77 after which point I decided I couldn’t get into a decent Grad program with C’s from P Chem & Organic Chem…..made the jump out here to the left coast.
redshirt
@Suffern ACE: It was the first night of the re-release. Maybe only the “Pro-Luke” factions came out that night. Everyone was SO into it! It was magical.
Amir Khalid
History Of The World Part 1 in the theater. The Malaysian Board of Film Censors had somehow missed all of Mel’s jokes — including the opening scene’s 2001 parody, which ends in the apemen’s circle jerk. Us audience members were delighted.
Montysano
We’re serious movie lovers at Casa Monty, so that’s a tough one. I’d have to say it was when we went to see “O Brother Where Art Thou” on the opening day (we’re big Coen fans), completely unprepared for what we were about to see.
“O Brother” is IMHO about as perfect as a film can be, and George Clooney… who knew?
sam
@efgoldman:
“Most likely the Brattle.”
Yeah, it sounds like something the Brattle would’ve done.
(Damn, but I miss the Square — that would be the Square of the mid-60s-70s. But then, hell, I miss my youth, too.)
karl
First time I saw The Maltese Falcon on a big screen (in college, ’78); watched it twice in a row, enjoyed it even more the second time.
Close second, The Godfather on my 16th birthday in ’72 (big big big screen).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT: Tweety is using his show to shill his new book on Kennedy, and to wank wankily about what Obama can learn from Kennedy. He’s having Howard Fineman and Mike Barnicle stroke him. As I type, he’s talking about the hard time Kennedy had with conservative Democrats, and acknowledging the parallel.
GAH! Barnicle says that Kennedy’s great strength was his friendship with journalists. Tweety’s can barely contain his boner. All that man wants is an invitation to the family quarters (?) in the WH, he doesn’t care from whom
Thoughtcrime
I enjoyed seeing the first screening (in Emeryville, CA) before an audience of Lucasfilm’s latest, “Red Tails”:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0485985/
Violet
Seeing Abel Gance’s Napoleon in a theater with a full orchestra. Absolutely amazing experience.
kindness
@Thoughtcrime: Down at the PiXar studios?
BruceJ
The Russian version of Solaris. That film haunts me to this day. Next would be the vastly under-rated Ridley Scott flick The Duellists.
Third would the seeing The Duel in a theatre, with Richard Matheson in the audience (he was GOH at the con we were at.) That was a made-for-TV flick that is incredibly more suspenseful without the commercial interruptions.
BGinCHI
@kindness: English. I really enjoyed teaching there. I was an adjunct while finishing my PhD. I liked Ithaca too, but was glad to get out of there….
Arundel
Love love love the Castro theatre, it’s a gem. Especially for things like Silent Film festivals (with live accompaniment on the Mighty Wurlitzer!), or series like pre-Code 1930’s movies, or the classics. Like time travel, seeing a movie there. Gorgeous,grand interior. Smells great too- good coffee and fresh popcorn. Sigh, I miss it.
That said, my most memorable and enjoyable moment was being 12 and seeing Airplane! in a packed theatre when it was new. God, it was riotous, group mirth, people rolling in the aisles, popcorn flying. When the boobies came across the screen it was mayhem. It was so great, the whole audience just wild with laughter together.
RossinDetroit
One really stupendous film experience was seeing Branagh’s Hamlet in a theater with great projection and sound. I’m undecided on the quality of the directing and performances (very good, but one for the ages?), but the production and presentation were absolutely top drawer.
kindness
@BGinCHI: Yea. I was raised in the northeast so snow and cold didn’t phase me, but Ithaca winters did. Glad to have to drive to the snow now when i want to play in it.
Montysano
Well, since we’re airing the dirty laundry, I got two more:
I went to Purdue in the early ’70s, and being straight off the farm, went a bit wild to make up for lost time. The first time I dropped acid, I wandered through the TV lounge at the dorm, where “In Cold Blood” was just coming on. Two hours later, I was nearly psychotic.
Also at Purdue, my hayseed room mate and I went to see “The Exorcist” with my girlfriend, who was from NYC and ultra cool. He and I were cowering and hiding our eyes; she was calmly watching the movie and telling us how lame and embarrassing we were.
Kyle
Take pot cookie, add Frameline (gay film festival in San Francisco), add Castro theater, and then add the premier of Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Fabulousness will ensue.
BGinCHI
@Montysano: Purdue grad here too (BA, ’88). You ever go over the river to the theaters in Lafayette? The Mars or the Lafayette Theater? Beautiful places, now sadly gone. Though the Mars is now a concert venue and looks great.
Bruuuuce
I was working about two blocks away from the place where WNEW-FM said to go to get tickets for the NYC premiere of The Princess Bride, so I ran over. Unfortunately, I went alone and sober; fortunately, though, it was an awesome movie and several of the stars (including Andre) were there, and the experience was great.
On the other hand, so was watching Raiders of the Lost Ark from the very first row of the theater (because we got there late). That first bit with the rock almost killed me.
Finally, Batman and Robin was pretty awful, but MUCH better when seen and MSTI3Ked with a friend when both had had mushrooms prior to the flick.
Thoughtcrime
@kindness:
No, unfortunately. That would have been really nice. It was at the AMC Bay 16.
Hawes
Raising Arizona. I laughed so hard I nearly passed out.
PGE
The restored 4+ hour Napoleon, by Abel Gance, in March 1981, at the Chicago Theater, with a 60 piece orchestra. Just an incredible movie and experience. If there’d been a second showing I’d have gladly spent another 4+ hours to see it again.
Villago Delenda Est
@redshirt:
Worst parts? So many to choose from, but you have to wonder how George Lucas EVER got laid when you cringe through the Padme-Anakin romance scenes…
kindness
@Villago Delenda Est: As someone who saw all the Star Wars in the theaters when they came out….the first three (really 4,5 & 6) are really fun movies. The special effects are better in 1,2 & 3, but the plot and the acting sucks.
I probably will buy that BlueRay pack of all 6 they have at Costco though….
RossinDetroit
@Villago Delenda Est:
“Hold me like you did by the lake on Naboo!”
The problem with being a famous film maker is that nobody will tell you when what you’re doing isn’t good enough, or just plain stinks. Jake Lloyd, with facial expressions added with CGI? Jar Jar Binks? Massive audience cringe.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Bruuuuce: I met Andre once at a fancy party. He was a lovely man and gone far too soon.
Since I’m name-dropping anyway – I saw Schindler’s List at the Stag Theater at Skywalker Ranch as the guest of a Lucas-employed friend. The theater was built to make the most of Dolby sound system technology, and in the scene when the train pulls into Auschwitz, it felt like it was running right through my seat. Seeing that movie there was an overwhelming experience, but I wouldn’t exactly call it enjoyable.
Suffern ACE
@RossinDetroit: I am not your sweet Naboo!
Thymezone
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Tweety says that Obama’s problem is that he, unlike Kennedy, doesn’t spend the time schmoozing with the DC cheeses and “playing cards with them.” Therefore, the cheeses don’t like him.
I think the asshole Matthews is wrong on several counts. First of all, I think the deal is that Obama doesn’t like most politicians. I think that is why he bailed out of the Senate and went for a better job. Second, Obama, unlike Kennedy, has a personal family life, and spends his evenings with the kids and not with those shitass politicians.
Last but not least, Kennedy grew up in a millionaire’s compound on the seashore surrounded by privilege and power. You can read about Obama’s childhood is his book, and draw your own conclusions. But whatever your impression is, one thing is for sure: Obama was not going to end up with Kennedy’s view of privilege and power, and those are the coin of the realm on Capitol Hill.
I also think that Matthews The Whore is abusing his position doing this deification of Kennedy thing and using his show to pimp his book.
burritoboy
Rob Nilsson’s Need at the Roxie (SF)
John Huston’s Fat City at the Music Box (Chicago)
Thom Anderson’s Los Angeles Plays Itself at the Egyptian (LA)
Kent MacKenzie’s The Exiles at the Gene Siskel (Chicago)
Sam Fuller’s The Steel Helmet at the Block (Northwestern Un, Evanston)
Bruce Baillie’s All My Life at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (SF)
Julien Duvivier’s Au Bonheur des dames at the Castro (SF)
Mikio Naruse’s When a Woman Ascends the Stairs at the Pacific Film Archive (Berkeley)
Robert Kramer’s Milestones at the Northwest Film Forum (Seattle)
Godard’s Ici et Ailleurs at Facets (Chicago)
Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep at the Siskel (Chicago)
Isou’s Venom and Eternity at the Roxie (SF)
Petri’s Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion at the Siskel (Chicago)
Bruce Conner’s Report at the MOMA (SF)
McDull: Prince de la Bun at the Siskel (Chicago)
Berthold Bartosch’s The Idea at Doc Films (Chicago)
workworkwork
I had to think about this a while but as far as first-run movies, I’d have to say ‘Serenity’. My wife and I saw it opening weekend (we hadn’t been to any of the previews so we weren’t spoiled).
The first shot of the spaceship Serenity in the opening made me misty-eyed.
Plus, after the big finale I always mutter under my breath, “George Lucas can kiss my *ss….”
(I don’t pronounce the asterisk, of course.)
RossinDetroit
@Suffern ACE:
One Padme/Anakin scene occurs right after Anakin has just basically committed genocide, slaughtering a whole tribe of Sand People. We were pretty aghast.
trollhattan
@Suffern ACE:
Good grief, a Peanuts reference!
Gin & Tonic
The Last Waltz, the week it came out, at the Ziegfeld in NY. Opening screen said “This movie is to be played *loud*” and they did.
Villago Delenda Est
@RossinDetroit:
There are several things about Branagh’s Hamlet:
It’s the entire play on the screen, nothing missing.
There are major stars doing bit parts (Jack Lemmon, Charleton Heston, Billy Crystal)
You’re absolutely right about the production and presentation. Most impressive!
Svensker
A friend took me to a small, private pre-screening of Terms of Endearment which for some reason I thought was a comedy. Well, since I cry at Chevy commercials, by the end of Terms I was sobbing uncontrollably. My friend was totally humiliated. My makeup was really messed up, too.
Also created a scene at an Academy screening of the Deer Hunter. At the end I stood up and said, “Even the credits on this piece of crap are pompous and interminable.” I was right, but the movie still got the award.
First time I saw Star Wars, Lawrence of Arabia, Exorcist, The Wind and the Lion,Buckaroo Bonzai,Invasion of the Body Snatchers, all wonderful movie experiences. Also, too, the French version of Tall Blonde With One Black Shoe — laughed my self silly.
Svensker
@Gin & Tonic:
The premiere in L.A. was amazing.
kindness
OK…Now let’s hear the honor roll of movies you’ve seen and can’t remember. Hint – it’s the not remembering part of this story which makes it good so be careful with it.
Tokyokie
My most memorable moviegoing experiences:
1) Saturday kiddie matinees in Sandnes, Norway, in summer 1972. They’d show Marx Brothers films, and the Norwegian subtitles would scroll up a couple of beats before the lines were read, meaning the Norwegian kids were laughing at the jokes before we could hear them — and we had trouble hearing them over the laughter. My brother and I were probably close to 10 years older than the rest of the audience, and it was pretty cool to experience everybody enjoying the Marx Brothers. (Although, thankfully, we didn’t get any of the ones they did made late in their career because Chico was broke again from playing the horses.)
2) Opening night of Chinatown at whatever big-ass cinema it played in London’s Leicester Square. Great movie, but seeing it not just on a big screen, but one the size of the New York movie palaces of the ’40s was something special.
3) Monty Python and the Holy Grail during its initial run at a theater near Southroads Mall in Tulsa. Caught it at an early-afternoon matinee, back when theaters had continuous showings, and, not having anything to do that day, stayed through and watched it a second time. Fully half the audience did the same thing.
4) At Long Last Love at the Satellite Twin in Norman. The movie’s pretty much unwatchable — I believe Richard Schickel described the choreography, accurately, as “so many hikers trying to put out a campfire” — but the other two guys in the theater and I quickly began yelling wisecracks at the screen, then back and forth to one another, and it was a real hoot. Best audience participation experience I’ve ever had at a movie.
5) John Woo’s The Killer at the Sundance Film Festival in 1990. Saw it long before Hollywood copped Woo’s style and turned it into a cliche, and watching it while his techniques were still fresh was a revelation. Lingered in the lobby for a few minutes afterward, wanting to extend the moment, and Melvin Van Peebles was doing the same thing. We exchanged knowing glances, then both shook our heads in amazement.
6) Sitting a couple of rows in front of John Waters at several screenings at Sundance that year. He’s more entertaining than most movies.
7) Seeing The Good, the Bad and the Ugly with a full house of Leone fans at Austin’s Paramount Theatre, probably fall of 1994. The movie holds up well to repeated viewings, but getting Leone right between the eyes with a big crowd that appreciates a big screen filled with Lee Van Cleef’s eyes is pretty damn cool.
Gin & Tonic
@Svensker: Rub it in.
WereBear (itouch)
Best was the restored Lawrence of Arabia in 70 millimeter in an old movie palace. Blew my mind and I was cold sober.
Worst was attending a premiere of that incredibly bad Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club band in a media gathering; you could feel the sympathetic angst filling the theater.
Omnes Omnibus
Seeing Young Frankenstein with my dad the week it opened. Dad wanted me to see American Graffiti, so he and I walked the five blocks to the little one screen theater in my hometown. Am Graf had ended the previous week, so, since we were there, we got tickets to the movie that was playing, Young Frankenstein. We had never heard of it, so we had no expectations. I found it funny; my father cried throughout. He was still crying with laughter the next morning at breakfast. I was nine. Great father-son experience, great movie.
Bruce S
Not the best but the weirdest was watching Exterminating Angel sitting next to a guy seriously stoned on whatever who kept squirming in his seat muttering lines like “I got to get the hell out of here” through most of the film. Sort of the existential equivalent of Smell-O-Vision.
Svensker
@Gin & Tonic:
The cast party after was even better. :)
Tokyokie
Oh, a couple I left out of my already too long list:
The world premiere of Tommy at the Inwood Theater in Dallas. Why was the world premiere in Dallas? That, and “Can you believe this?” were what my pal David and I kept asking each other as limos arrived, disgorging the likes of Ann-Margret, Ken Russell and Roger Daltrey.
Running the projector on an offshore rig in the North Sea, probably 1974, and screening the vastly underrated Charley Varrick. I was the only one who’d heard of it, much less seen it, and I assured all the working-class Southerners that they’d all love the movie. And they all did. To this day, I don’t understand why Universal dumped the damn thing. One of the best and most intelligent action films ever made. (And Don Siegel’s next effort, The Black Windmill with Michael Caine, is almost as good, and got buried even deeper than Charley Varrick.)
Dirk Gently
Opening night midnight for The Phantom Menace was great, Jurassic Park in a hick theater with a literal “Yeehaw!” from the crowd was fun, “The Room”, ….many others.
But I’m going to have to go with this:
Seeing the 20th Anniversary edition of E.T. with my wife at a matinee. Neither of us had seen it since we were kids–hadn’t really even thought about it!–and so, on a whim we went in….and we walked out of that theatre bawling. I mean, you have to be a hard-hearted bastard not to be moved by the last 15 minutes of that movie, from the depths of sorrow (“E.T.’s dead”), to relief and surprise (“E.T.’s alive!!!”), to transcendent joy (escaping with E.T. on bikes, flying through the air), to bittersweet sorrow (E.T. gets in his ship and leaves behind only a rainbow)….all set to John Williams’ amazing score. Holy crap, I’m welling up just thinking about it.
R-Jud
Going in a pack as college freshmen to see Starship Troopers at the Pyramid Mall in Ithaca. Unbelievably campy, terrible film, but all of us who went have remained friends since then, and can trigger a half-hour of giggles just by saying, “Would you like to know more?” in a certain manner.
JWL
It wasn’t “the best” experience, but the most shocking moment I’ve ever experienced in a theatre occurred when I was 8 years old and saw The Great Escape. I didn’t have a clue about Nazi Germany, and the execution scene at the end of the film caught me completely flat-footed. Strange to say (or maybe not), Hitler’s Germany and WW2 later became an era holding a particular fascination for me, and which I’ve studied for decades.
gbear
@Hawes: I’m going to add the Coen brother’s first movie Blood Simple to my list. The film develops so slowly, but the shocks are all the more shocking because of it. So cool because everybody in the audience knows what’s going on, but none of the characters do.
Cat Lady
Fargo the week it opened, and I was the only one in the whole theater on a snowy cold February Tuesday, first showing of the day. I drove home in the snow and fully expected to be kidnapped out of my house since I had just been laid off and was feeling pretty low. That wood chipper scene did me in.
JCT
@Gin & Tonic: Huh– my (much) older boyfriend took me to see The Last Waltz at it’s LA premiere when I was 16, I didn’t know squat about The Band at the time.
I hadn’t thought about that night in years….
Legalize
@BGinCHI:
Well only on seeing the Brad Pitt movie, Snatch. Brad Pitt’s character’s otherwise unintelligible dialogue was subtitled in French. I’m sworn to secrecy on everything else.
Steeplejack
@Violet:
Heh, I might have been there with you. I saw that at the Fox Theater in Atlanta, one of the classic old movie palaces. Incredible experience.
I am really enjoying this thread, and I am having an awful time sifting through my own moviegoing memories. Too many good ones!
Steeplejack
@Tokyokie:
Charley Varrick is a really good movie. Saw it again on TCM a few months ago, and it holds up well. It always gets bookended in my mind with Point Blank, for some reason. Also a movie that holds up well.
Steeplejack
@R-Jud:
Holy shnikeys, that’s Lassiter from Psych at 0:35 in that clip!
Origuy
Who Framed Roger Rabbit at the Alhambra Theater in San Francisco. It had just re-opened after a long renovation of its Moorish Revival interior (see link). Unfortunately, it closed again only a few months later.
DougJ
@Legalize:
It wasn’t in Berkeley, was it? If so, we were in the same theater.
Steeplejack
I’m still a little verklempt with all the old moviegoing memories flooding back, but here’s one:
In 1968 or ’69, in an Air Force base theater on Okinawa, I saw Philippe de Broca’s That Man from Rio (1964). I have no idea how that French soufflé ended up in the mix at a venue that served up a steady diet of All-American action movies, comedies and Hollywooden epics for “the troops.” But it was a revelation. As a sort of precocious high school kid who was learning about foreign movies—mostly from reading the reviews in Time magazine—I was blown away. It was funny, it was charming, it was sexy, it was visually cool—all in ways that I had never seen before. And with people that I had never seen before, with a whole different look: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Françoise Dorléac (Catherine Deneuve’s sister), Jean Servais. It really was like having your first soufflé after being raised on Mom’s lard-based cooking back on the farm. It started my lifelong love affair with foreign movies.
I’m amazed it has a 7.2 rating on IMDB, because it is long out of print. Some hero (ETA: h/t Zhungarian) has posted the whole thing on YouTube, if you want a taste. Part 1 here.
redshirt
@R-Jud: I think Starship Troopers is way underated. I think it’s brilliant – yes, it’s campy, but intentionally so. It’s a fascist farce of sorts, with these gung ho Perfect People getting torn up by giant bugs for no good reason other than to keep society occupied by a war. I mean, Doogie Howser in black NAZI leather should be the big pointer the movie is a critique of fascism, and not a glorification.
Also – and this is blasphemy in certain nerd circles – the movie is WAY better than book. The book is a plodding polemic that spends far too much time going on about those wonderful mech battle suites. Dated.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: Remember, the stories took place a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…. Maybe it wasn’t a cliche yet.
Villago Delenda Est
@redshirt:
I’m in total agreement with you on Verhoeven’s Starship Troopers. It really is brilliant satire, and the entire “Would you like to know more?” with a hyperlink thing is just the bee’s knees.
Also the little kids doing “their part” by stomping on bugs on a sidewalk.
divF
(1) “2001” when it first opened in DC at the Uptown Theater. I had already been a print science fiction fan, and this was the beginning of all that was to follow in that film genre.
(2) “Marat / Sade”, Spring of 1970, Wheeler Hall (I think) UC Berkeley. I was 17, and had never seen anything like it. That same series had other greats, such as Renoir’s “Rules of the Game”.
(3) “Chinatown”, summer of 1975, in a big-screen theater in Falmouth, MA (I was spending the summer at Woods Hole). Again, I was sucked into the visuals, the characters, and the narrative, and shocked at the end.
(4) Countless great double bills at the UC Theater, with its huge screen. The one that sticks in my mind is “Johnny Guitar” and “Kiss Me Deadly” (some years later, saw “Repo Man” there as well).
Paul at Predictable Funk
Best movie experience ever: Princess Bride at a Cinema & Drafthouse on Redneck Biker Night. Pitchers of beer, leather chaps, and a princess named Buttercup. When Inigo killed Count Rogen, there was a standing ovation complete with beer hurled everywhere in the theatre. It was awesome.
sb
Watching Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid for the first time.
tarylcabot
Terminator 2 – saw it opening night (july 2nd) at 10:30 after shots of bushmills with the boys. First time i had seen beach balls at a theatre. a rush of a movie – remember my co-worker almost shouting “no way” when arnold shot the lock off a gate along the Los Angeles river. Some great great set pieces in that flic.
handsmile
Late into the thread, late into the night, but this has been such a thoroughly delightful subject for happy reflections. I’m very grateful to many commenters above whose recollections have kindled wonderful memories of my own.
After some musings, these must be among my favorite experiences while sitting in the dark transfixed by the flickering images on a screen, all seen for the first time:
Andrei Rublev at Harvard’s Carpenter Center.
To this day, my favorite film; its cinematic beauty, depiction of secular and sacred mystery, and narrative ambition is unlike anything I’ve ever seen.
The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover at the Angelika Cinema in NYC.
Utterly dazzled and chilled by Greenaway’s masterpiece. This film, like its director, now mostly forgotten.
Aguirre, the Wrath of God at the Orson Welles Cinema in Cambridge.
Madness and genius intertwined, as true for Herzog as his fictional hero. The image of monkeys overrunning the drifting raft still haunts me.
Close Encounters of the Third Kind at a theater in Washington, DC on the weekend of its release.
Tears streaming down my face at the film’s final scenes. In those days, optimism seemed a reasonable choice.
Casablanca, my freshman year at Wesleyan at its on-campus cinema.
As revelatory as I found the movie, the cherished memory is being part of the full-house audience that night.
centerfielddj
Great, great thread.
Well, I finger-fucked my first girlfriend for about 20 minutes in the back row while the multiplex theatre played “The Goonies”…that overtook my many viewings of Mel Brooks and Monty Python movies as my best movie-going experience for a while.
Then I saw “Do The Right Thing” with my next girlfriend in Santa Cruz, a college/beach town in California. It was a Saturday summer matinee; the tiny arthouse screening room had only 40-50 seats, and every single one was full. Every audience member was made tense by the heat of the day and the small, packed room- and then we saw this extraordinary, challenging, lyrical, funny, brutal film. We walked out, sat down at the park across the street, and talked and talked about the perfect match of movie and theatre, what we had experienced, what each of us thought about it. I wouldn’t have known it years before, but that was a much more intense, intimate connection than getting my finger wet. Thank God I became wise enough to make her my wife many, many years later.
But then, a few years later…
Monty
1. The Right Stuff(1983) I Wanted to See it because I thought it was a SciFi Thing like Star Wars but 10 min into it my 9yo self turned to my parent and said “This was real!!!”.
I have a Pilot’s License and I tell my mom it was her fault because she took me to see that movie.
2. Return of the Jedi. It was the first Star Wars Movie I saw in its full silver screen glory and “Its a Trap” Actually made me Gasp.
3. Raiders of the Lost Ark. Indy Jumping on a White Horse and Chasing off after Marion was one of those bounce up and down moments.
Bill Jones
1971. Dropped acid and went to see Fantasia with friends. Not sure if I’ve come down yet.
modulegirl
1. I saw Star Wars whn I was 10. My parents came to me and my younger sister one Saturday afternoon and said, “We’re going to see a movie now.” I looked outside and said, “We can’t go to the movies, it’s not dark yet.” I had never been to a theater, all my movie watching experiences had been from the back seat of the car at a drive-in (The Poseidon Adventure and re-release of Midway come to mind). The theater was so crowded I had to sit alone in my seat against the wall while my parents found three seats together.
2. During a period of family turmoil, my father had me and my sister to himself for most of the summer of 1981. We saw a lot of movies that summer, but there’s one and only one that I will always remember every moment of. I had fallen madly, hopelessly, desperately in love with Han Solo in The Empire Strikes back the summer before to the point of driving my father to distraction. But my sister was sleeping over at a friend’s the night the theater in town previewed Raiders of the Lost Ark. For some reason, despite being highly disapproving of my obsession with Harrison Ford, my father took me to see Raiders. The tickets cost $2.50 a piece – an exhorbitant price in 1981 on a Navy salary – and sodas and popcorn drove the total price of the night up to $9! OMG, $9! If the movie sucked, I was terrified I would never hear the end of it. $9 was a lot of money and oh my god Daddy doesn’t even like Harrison Ford! And needless to say the movie did not suck. I think my father saw Raiders four times that summer, by far the most times he ever saw a movie in the theater. Thinking about it now, that night may be the best memory I have of my father, a complicated and flawed man.
3. Another crowded theater the following summer. ET was dead in his little coffin and you could barely hear the dialogue for the crying in the theater. I was sitting up front by myself again, surrounded by strangers. When ET’s heartlight went back on, I was a wreck. The man sitting beside me pulled out a Kleenex and handed it to his wife on his right and then pulled out another one and handed it to me on his left. I sobbed, “Thank you!” as I drenched the tissue instantly. He whispered, “I’ve seen it. I came prepared.” The movie didn’t age well for me but the memory of seeing it is golden.
4. In 1991, I had seen Glory three times I think. The Lyceum at my university in north Texas was showing it one night. I had seen several movies there and had generally been by myself but for a few die-hard cinephiles. Not tonight. The theater was full for some reason. I was forced to sit farther back than I generally care to, in front of a row of footboall players and their girlfriends. Cut to the end of the movie when the soldiers bodies, black and white, are being dumped into the mass grave after the battle. Again, lots and lots of crying, but I had come prepared and I had seen the movie before so I was rather more under control. The guy directly behind me had apparently not seen it. He was sobbing and crying like a baby. I distinctly heard, “They can’t be dead.” Whenever I think about Glory, I remember that guy and his child-like denial of the reality of what was happening up on the screen.
Also, Sunset Blvd was the first movie where I realized that off-screen sex was happening. And what a kept man really was.
centerfielddj
Great, great thread.
Well, I finger-fucked my first girlfriend in the back row of the multiplex while “The Goonies” played (hormones overcame art). At the time, that beat out my multiple viewings of Ponty Python and Mel Brooks movies as my best movie-going experience.
My next girlfriend and I saw “Do The Right Thing” the first month of its release on a hot summer afternoon in California. The tiny screening room only held 40 to 50 seats, and they were all filled. The heat and claustrophobia of the room were perfectly matched to the plot. Afterwards, we talked for a couple of hours about our responses to this challenging, lyrical, brutal, funny film. The intimacy and richness of that discussion gave me more than I got from getting my finger wet. Many years and experiences later, I was fortunate enough to marry her.
A few years later, I went by myself to the Roxie in San Francisco. The art theatre in a rich middle-class neighborhood had an Abel Ferrara retrospective all day. I saw the director’s obsessions with extremely dark Catholicism as reflected by:
– China Girl. A retelling of Romeo and Juliet/West Side Story, with the Chinese and Italian crime syndicates going to war because a couple of hot New York teenagers needed to fuck each other;
– King of New York. Christopher Walken playing a particularly interesting Robin Hoodesque drug boss, with a deep cast swimming in his waters (Lawrence Fishburne, Wesley Snipes, David Caruso);
– Bad Lieutenant. My introduction to Ferrara and one of my Top 10 movies, with Harvey Keitel joining Abel in extending their shared obsessive film personas to their absolute limits, and the use of the early 90’s Darryl Strawberry as a stand-in for the temptation of the Devil himself;
– Dangerous Game. Movie within the movie: Keitel’s character directs actors Madonna and James Russo, with a series of increasingly violent arguments meant to express Keitel’s misanthropic feelings about his own marriage. Watching multiple scenes of Russo screaming the vilest things to Madonna at great length, I found myself thinking “Fuck, Ferrara REALLY hates Madonna and got her to be in his movie so he could express that.” Or maybe he just wanted to express his hatred of women in general- either way, perverse and an extremely unpleasant experience.
Ferrara had been advertised as participating in audience discussion at the theatre that night. The manager came out and said that Abel had called in and would be 20 minutes late, but he would be there. I kept my ticket stub, went to the bar next door and had a drink. About the time the director was due in the theatre, he showed up at the bar, acting sullen despite having a companion and his own bottle of liquor. I went back to the theatre, and he finally made it to us after another half-hour.
The audience came at him a bit, and he came right back at us. “What’s your problem?”, he told us when a few people complained that he was late. “Why are you hassling me?” One of the last audience speakers said, “You can’t blame us for being tense and confrontational- we’ve just experienced your tense, confrontational film.” He didn’t give an inch, and didn’t have a pile of insight to explain What’s It All About- he made them, we watched them, no epiphanies offered.
Life imitates art, or the other way around?
Steeplejack
@centerfielddj:
Nice post.
Never be afraid to come in late on a thread. Someone will read it. (Or so I tell myself.)