Page 147 – Spectacle Theater

EPHEMERA: ACT NATURAL

Posted on June 8, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

EPHEMERA: ACT NATURAL
1949-1972.
Approx. 80 min. USA.

SATURDAY, JUNE 8TH – 7:30PM
SATURDAY, JUNE 29TH – 7:30PM

No outlet served post-war American culture’s ebullient pride and prosperity better than that of the now-infamous educational film. Today these didactic artifacts are relegated to sideshow status by the likes of Pee-Wee’s Playhouse, Weird Al, MST3K and Adult Swim, all of whom freely lampoon these easy targets for their comically dated sensibilities.

Our monthly EPHEMERA program aims to present these documents to a contemporary audience in perhaps a more even light, ideally free from the ironic framing that can easily overwhelm some of their more interesting details. Fortunately, the humor is irrepressible.

June’s installment ACT NATURAL compiles moments from the common theme of psychological and emotional unease, particularly in adolescence. How best can Tom, Dick and Jane navigate the rough terrain of daily social interaction, family dynamics and self-actualization? If there must be something wrong with me, are things ever going to be okay?

Preceding the feature collage will be the short WHY DOESN’T CATHY EAT BREAKFAST? (1972, 4m, Color, USA), a puzzling and surreal PSA that manages to eerily dance around its core theme of childhood body consciousness.

Sources for ACT NATURAL include: Angry Boy (1950), Boy With A Knife (1956), Facing Reality (1954), Habit Patterns (1954), Jealousy (1954), Keeping Mentally Fit (1952), The Outsider (1951), Self-Conscious Guy (1951), Stage Fright (1949) and more!

Special thanks to the Internet Archive, Rick Prelinger and everyone at the Prelinger Archive.

Rick Prelinger began collecting “ephemeral films”—all those educational, industrial, amateur, advertising, or otherwise sponsored—in 1982, amassing over 60,000 (all on physical film) before his Prelinger Archive was acquired by the Library of Congress in 2002. Since then, the collection has grown and diversified: now it exists in library form in San Francisco and is also gradually being ported online to the Internet Archive (http://archive.org), where 3,801 of its films are currently hosted (as of this writing).

Of course, the content of the Prelinger Archive’s films varies in accord with the variety of mankind. Historic newsreels, mid-century automobile infomercials, psychological experiments, medical procedurals, big oil advertisements, military recruitment videos, political propagandas, personal home videos, celebrity exposes, amateur narratives, scientific studies, war bulletins, instructional films, special interest op-eds, safety lessons, hobby guides, travel destination profiles and private industry productions all sit comfortably together in one marginalized category.

AN EVENING WITH IAN SVENONIUS

Posted on June 8, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

AN EVENING WITH IAN SVENONIUS

FRIDAY, JUNE 21ST – 8PM
ONE NIGHT ONLY!

Ian Svenonius, legendary figurehead of the D.C. Punk/DIY scene as well as noted author, will be appearing IN PERSON at Spectacle to present his newly completed short film entitled WHAT IS A GROUP?. According to Svenonius himself, the film “will dismantle previously held ideas about all society’s dearly held conceits. Not for the faint hearted!” Don’t say we didn’t warn you!

Afterwards, the floor will be open for discussion, pressing questions, or fanboy/girl musings!

Ian Svenonius was most notably a member of the bands Nation of Ulysses The Make-Up, Weird War, and Chain & The Gang; author of Supernatural Strategies for Forming a Rock ‘n Roll Group, Psychic Soviet, and host of the VICE talk show Soft Focus.

THE PATRIOT GAME

Posted on June 6, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

THE PATRIOT GAME
Dir: Arthur MacCaig, 1979.
99 min. Ireland/France.

MONDAY, JUNE 17TH – 8PM
ONE NIGHT ONLY!

Special Thanks to Icarus Films and Donal Foreman

How to wield a camera in the service of a struggle? Not only to analyze, but to further it? How to implement montage as a weapon? To aid the insurgents, narratively and materially? Most importantly, how to get organized? How to win?

These are the critical questions that haunt The Patriot Game, through the historical lens of the Irish nationalist movement. It is not only the story of a people fighting for autonomy, but also of a documentarian following the irresistible call towards becoming a partisan.

“In The Patriot Game we try to show what is, in reality, happening in Ireland, to show what is certainly the most extensive, determined working-class struggle in Europe. And apart from the Basques and their organization ETA, it is the only struggle in which the entire population, armed and mobilized, has successfully faced up to the most sophisticated and brutal counterinsurgency techniques ever experimented with in an industrial, urban society.” -Arthur MacCaig, director, 1979

“This extraordinary and moving documentary reviews ten years of armed warfare by the IRA and places today’s headlines in their proper political and economic context. Through vivid footage of street battles and interviews with participants, THE PATRIOT GAME forcefully debunks the twin myths that the IRA is a ‘terrorist organization’ fighting ‘a religious war.'”—Kevin J. Kelley, The Guardian

“Informative, vivid, and partisan. The footage of urban guerillas is extraordinary. I’ve seen a number of films on Northern Ireland, none have depicted the situation this graphically.”—J. Hoberman, Village Voice

SWEET 16 PRESENTS: SYBIL

Posted on June 3, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

SYBIL
Dir: Daniel Petrie, 1976.
198 min. USA.

SUNDAY, JUNE 16TH – 6:00PM
ONE NIGHT ONLY!
ON 16MM!

Based on a book almost as heavily groped by teenage girls as “Go Ask Alice”, the made-for-TV movie Sybil stars Sally Field as the titular split-personality basket case. Substitute teaching in New York City, Sybil finds the blackouts that have afflicted her for her entire life are coming on stronger – one minute she’s leading a game of Follow the Leader, next she’s knee-deep in a Central Park pond.

Her tendency of putting her wrist through windows lands her in the hospital and in the care of Dr. Cornelia Wilbur (Joanne Woodward, herself a multiple personality alum with The Three Faces of Eve) who quickly realizes she’s going to need a bigger band-aid. Quickly the other personalities start to emerge – Peggy, the frightened child; Vicky, the francophonic sophisticate; and Marcia, the suicidal artist, among others. Dr. Wilbur gets them talking, and here your own nightmares can begin as we’re introduced to Hattie, a mother that makes Joan Crawford seem straight-up cuddly. Actress Martine Bartlett plays the character with such playful menace, like a child torturing a reptile. Shot by cinematographer Mario Tosi, the very same year he did Carrie.

Hosts Tom Blunt and Cristina Cacioppo will guide you through the fugue induced by this three-hour undertaking. There will be snacks and an intermission, so you won’t have to hold your water.

FROM THE EAST

Posted on June 3, 2013July 23, 2015 by spectacletheater

FROM THE EAST
(aka D’Est)
Dir: Chantal Akermam, 1993.
110 min. France.
In French with English Subtitles.

Presented with Icarus Films

SUNDAY, JUNE 9TH – 10:00 PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 18TH – 8:00 PM

From footage gathered in the course of her travels throughout the former eastern bloc, Akerman created FROM THE EAST (D’Est), a still, solemn depiction of the twilight of Soviet society. The film’s pace and rhythm carry a unique message about a way of life that is now lost. By stepping away from the large political narratives of the Cold War and relying solely on the power of images and sequences, she created a film that will forever serve as the antibody to all easy generalizations about communist society.

MERCANO EL MARCIANO

Posted on June 3, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

MERCANO EL MARCIANO
(aka Mercano the Martian)
Dir: Juan Antin, 2002.
73 min. Argentina.
In Spanish with English subtitles.

FRIDAY, JUNE 7TH – 7:30PM
SUNDAY, JUNE 9TH – 7:30PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 20TH – 10:00PM

In this often rude, adult-oriented, breathlessly-paced animated film, after a space-probe from Earth squashes his “dog,” angry alien Mercano flies his saucer to Earth—only to find a place so dysfunctional and illogical that it would give Mr. Spock a nervous breakdown!

The film is a twist on the “fish out of water” and “Martian Invasion” tropes, and uses the spaceman’s naiveté of our greedy and malevolent ways to drive the humor. Stranded in Buenos Aires, the sad and lonely Martian (who looks like a cross between a skinny Charlie Brown and a pickle) wanders through a city that has been devastated by poverty, violence and uncertainty, all the while chased by trigger-happy cops.

In an attempt to “phone home,” the extraterrestrial steals a laptop computer, but instead winds up befriending a Star Trek-obsessed teenager he meets on-line. Meanwhile, the kid’s yuppie-executive father is plotting total global consumer enslavement—and he intends to use Mercano’s outer space technology to get it.

The first independent Argentine full-length animated film in 30 years, MERCANO EL MARCIANO was originally created as a series of shorts for Argentina’s MTV. The film is certainly in a similar vein as South Park and Beavis & Butthead—but not just because of the outrageous gross-out humor, deliberately crude animation and propensity for musical numbers, but as a barbed and absurdist take on contemporary society.

Created while Argentina’s economy was melting down, the film has even greater resonance today with a global recession and nightmarish austerity measures forced down people’s throats ruining social services. “Now after ten years, the whole world started to collapsed and I am not surprised at all,” said director Juan Antin recently.

Featured in multiple international film festivals, MERCANO EL MARCIANO was the winner of the Audience Award at Spain’s Catalonian International Film Festival in 2002, as well as the Special Jury Mention at the Festival du Film d’Animation Annecy 2002 in France.

BETTER THAN JAWS WEEKEND

Posted on June 3, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

Sometimes the success of a film can spawn a whole sub-genre. In the case of Jaws, for all its evil impact it did have one very positive effect:JAWS RIP-OFFS! And this weekend at Spectacle we have the best and most notorious of the bunch.

BETTER THAN JAWS WEEKEND! ONLY AT MIDNIGHT! ONLY AT SPECTACLE!

GRIZZLY
Dir: William Girdler, 1976.
90 min. USA.

FRIDAY, JUNE 7TH – MIDNIGHT
ONE NIGHT ONLY!

The film’s title star will be in attendance for Q&A with William Girdler expert Jon Dieringer of Screen Slate.

In 1975, Universal Pictures released a movie called Jaws. Okay, that’s pretty cool if you’re into the beach, I guess.

BUT in 1976 something really amazing happened. William Girdler (The Manitou, Day of the Animals), a filmmaker with the uncanny knack of improving upon the efforts of others created the masterpiece of BEAR-sploitation: GRIZZLY.

So, basically plot-wise we have … well, have you ever seen Jaws? Well, this is Jaws with a GRIZZLY BEAR — JAWS WITH CLAWS!

Tourists are out in record numbers to enjoy some camping and hiking in a National Park, but deforestation, pollution, and other terrible things that humans do when they go camping have caused this bear to lose its damn mind, and now this 7-foot mother is tearing the arms and legs off nature lovers faster than you can say “pic-a-nic basket.” Now, it’s up to Christopher George (City of the Living Dead, Graduation Day) to convince the greedy park supervisor to evacuate the park and get the grizzly before he saunters up to the human buffet for another helping.

But why is Grizzly better than Jaws? Why do we love the rip-offs more than the originals? Let’s just say William Girdler is our Pierre Menard but his Quixote has more BLOOD, FLYING LIMBS, and ROCKET LAUNCHERS.

In short, GRIZZLY kicks ass.

GRIZZLY is slick, fun, warm, and filled with familiar faces of the ’70s, including Andrew Prine and Richard Jaeckel. Don’t let the gloss fool you, though. This bear has claws, and Girdler’s got the goods when it comes to what we want from a good Jaws rip off: scenes of male bonding and plenty of vicious animal attacks!

Come enjoy this Exploitation-sploitation masterpiece by the master of high-class rip-offs that deliver!

THE LAST SHARK
Dir: Enzo G. Castellari, 1981.
88 min. Italy.
In English.

SATURDAY, JUNE 8TH – MIDNIGHT
ONE NIGHT ONLY!

From hard hitting Italian genre genius Enzo G. Castellari comes the most uncanny of all Jaws clones, THE LAST SHARK (L’ultimo squalo). This one swam so close to the original that Universal Pictures slapped a big fat lawsuit on the distributor and pulled the movie from American screens shortly after its release. Universal cried plagiarism, but we all know the real reason- they were scared!

Why?

Two reasons: this shark is really, really scary and VIC MORROW. That’s right, trash movie martyr Vic Morrow brings his intense presence to the aquatic proceedings as a grizzled shark whisperer. Is he Irish, is he Scottish? Who knows, but he’s got a brogue and he hates sharks. Sound familiar? Well, the similarities don’t end there, trust me.

You know the story, but it’s the style that makes this one shine. Castellari’s impeccable penchant for slow motion, gorgeous photography, and perfectly realized action all add up to a slick, ultra Italian entry into the “hey, this is pretty much Jaws” sub-genre.

And forget John Williams, Castellari’s frequent collaborators, the brilliant De Angelis brothers, provide their signature funky sounds to this baby, including the KILLER theme.

Unavailable on video in the U.S. for years, The Spectacle plucks THE LAST SHARK out of import laserdisc limbo and puts it back on the screen! Kick the summer off right and say “GO TO HELL BIG MOVIE STUDIOS!” The originals may be owned by the majors, but the rip-offs belong to the people!

MR. NO LEGS

Posted on June 1, 2013July 23, 2015 by spectacletheater

MR. NO LEGS
(aka The Amazing Mr. No Legs)
Dir: Ricou Browning, 1979.
86 min. USA.

SATURDAY, JUNE 1ST – MIDNIGHT
ONE NIGHT ONLY!

Set in the ugliest Tampa imaginable, MR. NO LEGS follows two self-righteous police detectives (one with the obligatory porn-stache) tracking dope dealers and corrupt fellow cops, while trying to stay out of the clutches of unstoppable mob enforcer. Mr. No Legs, a martial arts master with many a violent trick hidden up his sleeves—and wheelchair, including shotguns, switchblades and ninja stars!

Meanwhile, racists start a rumble in a bar involving midgets and drag queens, whores get into broken bottle fights, and everyone double-crosses everyone else. Mayhem galore!

Featuring a shameless cast of B- and C-listers, including Richard Jaeckel, Lloyd Bochner, John Agar, Rance (Ron’s dad!) Howard, and real-life double amputee Ted Vollrath as the snarling No Legs.

It’s a convoluted, ultraviolent, tasteless, trashy B-movie actioner that was directed by the Creature from the Black Lagoon! That’s right, director Ricou Browning was the former Olympian who found fame in Hollywood playing the Gill Man for Universal Studios, and later supervised the underwater sequences on the TV show Flipper.

Mean-spirited and vicious, Mr. No Legs is the finest sort of exploitation cinema.

THE WIND IS WHISTLING UNDER THEIR FEET

Posted on May 30, 2013December 22, 2019 by spectacletheater

THE WIND IS WHISTLING UNDER THEIR FEET
Dir. György Szomjas, 1976.
Hungary. 95 min.
In Hungarian with English subtitles.

FRIDAY, JUNE 7 – 10:00 PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 20 – 7:30 PM
SUNDAY, JUNE 23 – 10:00 PM

György Szomjas brings exquisite style and pacing to this elegiac gallows western about a betyár — a brand of 19th century highwayman popular in contemporary Hungarian balladry — set amid the Great Hungarian Plain in 1937. It follows the path of a brooding, aging outlaw newly escaped from prison whose personal revenge quest dovetails with the interests of the landless herdsman who oppose the state’s building a canal through the fields on which they work their trade. He becomes an unlikely hero to unwashed vagabond workers while facing down a mutually-admiring adversary in the form of a forthright squire who had captured him before. Meanwhile, an opportunistic youngster attempts to work both sides to his benefit. As ditches are dug for canals and corpses alike, the state puts increasing pressure on the wistful squire, who realizes the social order is changing and his fortunes are in decline; and yet he remains dutifully attached to his mission.

Along with Szomjas’s follow-up ROSSZEMBEREK, THE WIND IS WHISTLING UNDER THEIR FEET is probably the only example of a “Goulash Western.” Though carefully paced and supposedly based on historical documents, it aims squarely for populist appeal. The autumnal palette, period imagery, and sudden outbursts of hysterical grotesquery recall Andrzej Żuławski’s THE DEVILS. Yet most of all it brings to mind the unlikely grouping of Woody Guthrie, Miklós Jancsó, and Akira Kuroswawa — or maybe Béla Tarr meets Sergio Leone. Whatever the comparisons, THE WIND IS WHISTLING UNDER THEIR FEET is a stirring, forgotten gem in classic Spectacle tradition and not to be missed.

KINETIC CINEMA: SOMETHING GAINED, SOMETHING LOST

Posted on May 29, 2013July 23, 2015 by spectacletheater

KINETIC CINEMA: SOMETHING GAINED, SOMETHING LOST
Dir: David Fishel
Approx. 90 min. USA.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 19TH – 8PM
ARTIST IN ATTENDANCE!
ONE NIGHT ONLY!

With the cinema industry currently in a state of turmoil over funding and over-dependence on CGI, there exists a strong desire to reject modern expectations and to reach toward methodologies of the past. In his program for Kinetic Cinema cinema, filmmaker David Fishel questions current expectations in cinema technology, and whether we are making an unfair trade off in our quest for ever more pristine HD clarity:

“I am routinely asking myself: How does one make work that remains contemporary and embraces the tools of tomorrow without forgetting the techniques and wisdom of the past? Likewise, in a present when access to high-end gear is more common place, is the spectacle of beauty lost? Can one be heard amongst the cacophony of content?”

David Fishel is a NYC based filmmaker/ video-artist who dabbles as an absurdist poet, animated storyteller, experimental sound artist, and obnoxious performance artist. Mr. Fishel is a graduate of University of Iowa where he focused his studies in Cinema and Comparative Literature and Intermedia / Performance Art. Fishel has worked and collaborated with Hans Breder, Phil Niblock, Thinkdance, Luke Murphy, Jason Batemen, John Kolvenbach, and The Hatch-Billops Collection.