Just a day after the official Christmas day release of Grudge Match, a Hollywood contrivance which puts two fictitious boxers, Jake La Motta and Rocky Balboa, “back” in the ring (I haven’t seen it… it might just be wonderful, but c’mon…), MovieNight screened Raging Bull. Not an easy thing to watch, but very superbly directed and acted. This was De Niro at his finest. As we expected, not a huge turnout, but a great evening. On to 2014!
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Our MovieNight Christmas Special was an ironic tribute to Peter O’Toole, who passed away a few days before. Roger Michell’s Venus is a bitter-sweet comedy in which the Peter O’Toole-like character (played by O’Toole) confronts his mortality (or rather attempts not to) by pursuing the affections of a rough-edged, seventeen-year-old Mancunian girl. He achieves a certain amount of success in this pursuit, and life lessons are learned, but in the end… well… there’s “The End”.
We had a lovely crowd this week and, along with our newest recruits, some long-absent faces showed themselves. It was lovely to see you all.
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I first “watched” Carlos Reygadas’s third feature, Silent Light, as a kind of background canvas to a special birthday celebration (mine) upstate, last year. The themed feature that night was to be Woodstock, but by way of making sure the system was working, and keeping the projector primed, we popped the unwatched DVD of Silent Light into the computer… it just happened to be a current “at home” Netflix DVD, and to be honest, I can’t remember exactly why I’d added it to my queue in the first place. During the first part of that beautiful August evening, I found myself drawn to the stunning (silent… we were playing music at the time) imagery on the screen. A month or so ago, something triggered a memory of this movie, and I watched it properly. What a pleasure, and subsequently, what a great MovieNight!
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A relatively compact group of MovieNight guests enjoyed the quirky black comedy, If…. this week. This sixties British classic, set in a fictitious public (read “private”) school, is not widely know on these shores, but it introduced the Michael Shannon-esque (the eyes have it!) Malcolm McDowell to the world. As we promised in the MovieNight email, there was plenty of sex (some imagined, and some implied, often homo-erotic) and violence: lots of older being very nasty to the younger ones, the youngest being referred to as “Slime”. In addition, we delivered some fairly gratuitous nudity, and lots of bare-ass boys. Don’t you wish you’d been here?
Thanks to Olya for (once again) making it so easy for us to stay focused. KnowwhatI’msayin’?
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As is usually the case, our Friday night, post-turkappocolypticâ„¢ screening was well attended (might one say “swamped”, as in “Hey Swampy?!”?) by a lovely crowd. Thanks to Julienne for reminding me how sharp and entertaining Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf is (there are many updates pending on the Successful Suggesters page, when I get a chance, in case you’re wondering). I happened to stumble upon the Benny Hill spoof, Who’s Afraid of Virgin Wool, in the course of making the teaser for MovieNight this week and, of course, had to show it as the pre-movie short. FFS!
As is also usually the case of late, the ‘teen Acres Curried Apple Chutney partnered up with crackers and blue cheese for a late night feast. Sadly/happily (take your pick), no leftover turkey made it to MovieNight this year. Thanks awfully to Sloan (he of the perfect beard) for making the olive dash. Much appreciated!
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Advertising Yella using the subject “Sex and Violence” certainly had the desired effect this week. It put bums on seats, as they say in the theater world. From my safe perch behind the bar, I was amused to see the “plot twist” slowly sinking into our audience. For those of you who weren’t here… it turns out that she was… (I’m kidding, of course. I know how to keep a secret!}
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