Pleased To Meet You, Hope You Guess My Name

True to my word, I've gone on a full-blown, depression-and-angst fueled, no-coming back movie bender the past several days that has even left me wondering if someone can actually be addicted to cinema. But, it did keep me from cutting myself or writing lame poetry like those mascara-wearing kids who I always see through the windows of the Dennys near my flat.
I would've been bouncing off the walls had I stayed home the night I got back from my road trip, so I went inside just long enough to drop my duffel bag off then headed back out to the New Bev for the last night of their anniversary program, which celebrated the theater's 30th birthday by recreating its original lineup from May '78.


The Bev is pretty much my favorite place on God's green Earth, short of The Turks & Caicos Islands. I've been there so much the past year that I've gotten to know the owner, his co-programmers, the concession-stand operators and most of the other die-hard patrons. I even have a regular parking space: On the sidewalk next to one of the coming attractions posters.

Wednesday night brought a double bill of BEDAZZLED and THE RULING CLASS. I was a little lukewarm on THE RULING CLASS, which started well and featured an amazing performance by Peter O'Toole but meandered toward the end and wore out its welcome with the the extraordinarily dark turn it takes in the third act.
BEDAZZLED, though, was a revelation; So good that it immediately erased all memories of the crappy recent remake.
Dudley Moore is quite brilliant as he plays what amounts to several different characters, switching gears in every misguided wish the Devil grants him. And Raquel Welch in the late '60s may have been the most beautiful woman I've ever seen.
But what I enjoyed most was Peter Cook, who I wasn't familiar with prior to seeing BEDAZZLED. He portrays Lucifer more as a prankster than outright Prince of Darkness, but it was his motivations that were most interesting. His havoc wreaking activities aren't born of deep-seeded evil, but rather the role he's forced to play since God needs a foil and another option so those who choose to follow him do so out of faith. Nothing personal, Earth, it's just his job.
The soul-stealing is his ticket back into Heaven; Nab one billion, Lucifer says, and God will allow him back into Heaven where he'll do things right this time and not get the boot from the Lord.
The cinebender continued the next night at The Silent Movie Theater, a venue I only recently discovered but am falling in love with more and more with each screening there.

I was first there a couple weeks ago when the venue hosted Nicky Katt's birthday party, which lasted until 5 in the morning and featured a strange assortment of films, ranging from JOHNNY HANDSOME to SONG OF THE SOUTH(!)
My favorite features are the rows of couches up in front...

...and the patio out back...

...where they fire up the grill (BYOHD) and have buckets full of beer on special occasions like Nicky's Mug Melter birthday bash and, as it turns out, last Thursday's screening of HOOTENANY HOOT.

This little exploitation quickee that apparently was trying to take advantage of a short-lived folk music blip on the pop-culture radar in the early '60s that I'm guessing four Liverpudlians promptly took a sledgehammer to. More on those guys later...
HOOTENANY was far from good, yet amusing, but only memorable for two reasons:
A. A performance by Johnny Cash, who is on-screen for about four minutes. I'd be amazed if The Man In Black spent more than three hours on set.
B. A pair of performances by Judy Henske, a woman who flat out wails. You'd never guess such a booming voice would come from this gawky brunette when you first see her, but she absolutely steals the film, even running circles around Mr. Cash.
Friday night was devoted to the third of my unholy trio of obsessions, Guitar Hero, briefly interrupted by a red-envelope viewing of IN THE NAME OF THE KING; A DUNGEON SIEGE TALE which isn't even worth mentioning except to say it's sad to see what's become of The Bandit 30 years on.
I was back to it Saturday night at the Silent Theatre for a very interesting double bill from the beginning and end of the '60s.
WHAT'S HAPPENING! THE BEATLES IN THE U.S.A. was an interesting look at the Beatles as they blew through New York City and D.C. like a force of nature to film their landmark performance on the Ed Sullivan Show. I was amazed by how nonchalant the very young Beatles were as they were completely transforming the rock-and-roll landscape, and I imagine they had to know that's exactly what they were doing considering the size of the crowds that mobbed them at every stop.
I was also very interested in getting a glimpse at their personalities. Paul seemed kinda quiet and cerebral, yet very much comfortable as the front man. George and Ringo were the joksters, especially Ringo who seemed to have an endless supply of energy and was having the most fun with his newfound supermegastardom. John was the quiet one, often caught sitting off by himself while the others were cutting up for their entourage.
The decade that the Beatles kicked off with such sunny optimism came crashing to a halt in GIMME SHELTER, which was a brilliant and chilling look at the doomed Altamont Free Concert of '69.
Much of the footage very capably and powerfully speaks for itself, but what I found interesting were the shots of Mick Jagger watching the footage, frame-by-frame, of Meredith Hunter drawing his gun on a Hell's Angel and the biker parrying the pistol away before drawing a knife and wildly stabbing Hunter in the neck; The first in a barrage of injuries inflicted by the Angles that would kill the 18-year-old and, ultimately, the '60s.
Jagger is speechless, which left me wondering what was running through his head. His legacy, which would forever be linked with this kid's murder? His career, which might have been on the ropes following a colossal disaster that had his band's fingerprints all over it? Sadness? Obviously, since only the most calous among us can watch murder in slow motion and not feel for the victim. But was it a combination of sadness and disappointment that an evening of free music from some of the biggest bands on Earth that was supposed to be the world's largest party went so horribly wrong?
I love documentaries, especially those that chroncle the history of rock and roll. It's kind of trivial to label a film the chronicles the end of such an important decade in this country's history as a music doc, but music seemed so much more important back then. Those old enough to remember tell me these angry, disenfranchised days we live in now don't compare to those angry, disenfranchised days becuase we don't have the spectre of the draft looming over our heads. The draft fueled this country's very public, very vocal discontent in those days, and the music, much of which feels relevant again, echoed the sentiment.
(Will there be a FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH that people will listen to when discussing what went so horribly wrong in Iraq?)
With GIMME SHELTER still resonating in my mind, I rolled to the Bev to close my personal triple feature with ZARDOZ.

I'd tell you about it if I had the slightest freakin' idea what assaulted my brain that night. ZARDOZ is a drive-by on your brain, a menagerie of strange images that don't even come close to add up to a film no matter how much you try to find the metaphors.
But, the place was packed, the crowd was hot and the film is indeed an experience, so it was, as the Saturday midnights always are, a phenomenal time.
I mean, how many opportunities do you get to see Sean Connery in a wedding dress?
(Answer: Not many, thank God.)

CURRENTLY LISTENING: Stone Temple Pilots - Core