Destinta, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Des-tin-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Des. Tin. Ta. I was down there, at Destinta, last Friday night. I had planned a double feature: “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” at 8:35 p.m., “Dawn of the Dead,” at 10:25. Would the times overlap? Would I make it to both and get good seats? I sent a group email to my friends I knew were on campus. I wanted to be captain of a rowdy gang. You know the kind; the kind of rowdy gang of movie-goers that is as excited about a Zombie-movie remake starring the lead of “Road to Avonlea,” as they are about the new mindfuck from Charlie Kaufman. I was super psyched for a night out with my gang. Then reality set in, as I realized that such a gang exists solely in my head. Who values trash in addition to the ingenious? I mean, I thought that everyone did! No? I had tweaked my neck pretty badly earlier on Friday. As the day progressed, my neck pains got worse. As I ate dinner, my neck began going into spasm. It wasn’t fun. It dawned on me that I couldn’t really lead a rowdy gang if I was constantly in spasm. So with my mini gang of Sara and Tom and Chris, I embraced the fact that I would have to become the old captain, who has seen battle many times in his life, and is weary, but still leads. We went to Pelton’s and I got a hot water bottle for my neck. Tom filled it up for me at the theater. And I wasn’t rowdy. I was tending to my war wounds. I was stoic.
The point is, sometimes you have to suffer. I suffered through those two movies, but I’ll be damned if I didn’t have fun. The gang had fun too. And they were rowdy, even though circumstances didn’t permit me to be. And I also want to make a plea for trashy movies. I love ’em. So if anyone wants to watch “Mantis in Lace,” “Mudhoney,” or “They Saved Hitler’s Brain,” with me, I’ve got the DVDs and think that it would be fun, even if my neck gets hurt again.
With that, welcome back to the home stretch. It’s Post-Spring Break (I was not in Cancun) and it’s still cold. Does that surprise anyone? So here’s what we have to look forward to: warmth, eating outside, and summer vacation. I like this time of year because this is when good movies start coming out again, after the painful wasteland of January and February. The season that brought us “Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen,” trades in those six words for six new ones, which form, “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” If you haven’t seen it, you should think about seeing it, and then you should actually see it. And if you can’t make it down to the theater in Middletown that is both my sin and my soul, it’s a safe bet that “Eternal Sunshine,” will be in the Film Series in the fall. Now that’s something to look forward to.
But wait! There’s stuff happening even sooner that’s also worth looking forward to! There is? Sure, sure! Like the movies in the Series this week? That’s right! Gee whiz, Maxi, could ya tell us about them? I’d be delighted to, voice in my head!
To start things off in a counter-intuitive manner, I want to tell you about what’s happening on Wednesday before I say anything about this weekend. Why is that? Well, because we have a very special guest, director David Weissman, coming to talk at the screening his film “The Cockettes.” The film is a recent documentary about “hippie acid freak drag queens.” I want to repeat that: “hippie acid freak drag queens.” That’s cool in my book. The Cockettes were a performance group that began in San Francisco in the late 1960s, and the film chronicles their “complete sexual anarchy.” The campy troupe was made up of gay men, women, and even babies (I don’t know if the babies were gay, though). Word on the street is that Jeanine Basinger, chair of the Film Studies Department, is a fan of “The Cockettes” and saw them perform on three separate occasions back in the day. The group was groundbreaking because their huge popularity made drag highly visible outside of the queer community for the first time. So come see the movie and meet David Weissman. Sometimes we forget how privileged we are, going to school here. Meeting successful filmmakers is a great learning opportunity, especially if you want to make films yourself. Big up to Phillipe Gosselin for arranging to get David Weissman on campus.
“The Cockettes,” screening and director David Weissman: Wednesday, March 31, 8pm, CFA Cinema, $3. This weekend in the Cinema: “Dirty Pretty Things.” This is an excellent new movie from Stephen Frears, who has directed pictures as varied as “High Fidelity” and “Dangerous Liaisons.” This is one of those movies that you watch and it keeps defying expectations. It’s always a step ahead of you in terms of what kind of movie you think you’re watching. It’s a genre jumper. I love knowing nothing going into a movie, and this is one of those movies for which, if you know what’s going to happen, it loses the effect. I like to be surprised, so I don’t want to tell you anything about the plot, other than to say that Audrey Tautou plays a Turkish immigrant. I find her to be so painfully beautiful. Painful because it hurts me to think how beautiful she is. The film also features an outstanding breakout performance from Chiwetel Ejiofor, whom I don’t find to be as painfully beautiful, probably because of his moustache. This is a smaller film and it did not play all over the country, but it deserves to be seen by YOU! This is one of those movies that the Film Series is all about! Yay! “Dirty Pretty Things,” March 26 & 27, 7:30 and 10PM, CFA Cinema, $3. And for free in the Science Center: FRIDAY: “Rocky” Stallone just doesn’t kick ass like he used to. He’s 58 years old! Relive the good old days, the days before “Daylight,” and “Driven,” with this perennial favorite. SATURDAY: “Night of the Hunter” This movie is sooooo good, and soooooo bizarre. This is the only movie directed by actor Charles Laughton (“Island of Lost Souls,” “Ruggles of Red Gap”) and it stars Robert Mitchum, deliriously over the top as a psycho killer posing as a preacher, engaged in a game of cat and mouse with two kids. It features some brilliantly surreal cinematography, the always entertaining Shelley Winters and, even though it’s not a horror film, it may very well give you nightmares.
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