Wrapping things up

In case you haven't noticed, there hasn't been much action here on the Movie Blog for about a month.  Part of that is real life has been extremely busy for me. And the fact is, things show no sign of slowing down any time soon. But the truth is, if I were still as enthusiastic about doing this blog as I was when it started seven years and a month or so ago, I'd find the time. But the enthusiasm just isn't there anymore.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the blog during its run - Pamela Zoslov, Charles Cassady Jr., Pete Roche, George Thomas, Matt Finley, Joseph Anthony, Candice Lee Catullo, Eric Sever, Marcie Gainer, Eddie Fleisher, Milan Paurich, Grace Snyder,  Zoe Brown, Edward Mishic, R. J. Justavick, Ben Lybarger, Ric Nimrod, Jeff Niesel, and Wayne Richards.  

 

And of course, thanks to John Ewing and Timothy Harry at the Cleveland Cinematheque, Dave Huffman at Cleveland Cinemas, The Owens Group, Allied, and all the other great PR people, filmmakers, and distributors who provided The Cleveland Movie Blog with advance access to the films covered here. 

And finally, thank you to the readers who visited this site.

With what little free time I have, there are only so many creative projects I can pursue. And I feel as if I've pursued this one as far as I want to. It's been a lot of fun, but now it's time to move on to something else. And it'll be kind of nice to go back to watching movies just for fun, too. Not to mention not having to watch the ones that aren't any fun all the way to the end just because I have to write a review.

I'm still planning on doing a year-end best/worst wrap up at the end of the month, and after that... 

 

 THE END

Sincerely,

 

Bob Ignizio

The Chagrin Documentary Film Festival Tells It Like It Is, Oct. 3-8

The overused label (especially in movie hype) “labor of love” really applies to the The Chagrin Documentary Film Festival. The CDFF premiered eight years ago, as organizer Mary Ann Quinn Ponce’s way to honor her son, filmmaker and Chagrin Falls native David Ponce who died at 20 of leukemia in 2006 during post-production of one of his nonfiction films.

Now the CDFF is a widely anticipated event that unreels in the fall

throughout the village of Chagrin Falls when the place is in full autumn foliage. Screening sites - most of which are all within nice walking distances from one another - range from the Chagrin Valley Little Theater to the old Township Hall on Main Street to the United Methodist Church.

How big is the festival? Serious names in the film industry arriving this year include Colin Hanks, actor-filmmaker son of Great Lakes Shakespeare Festival alumnus Tom Hanks. Two features directed by Hanks the younger will screen, both music-oriented. ALL THINGS MUST PASS is an oral history of the roller-coaster rise and fall of Tower Records, a music-vending chain that helped shape the pop scene as we know it. EAGLES OF DEATH METAL (NOS AMIS) profiles the American hardcore-sound band caught in a notorious Islamic terror attack at a French concert in 2015 and their return to France a year later.

The patriotic alternative to NFL Football is Cinema Wasteland in Strongsville, Sept.29-Oct.1

 I suppose you are all wondering where the Cleveland Movie Blog stands in the NFL athletes-taking-the-knee-against-the-National-Anthem controversy. Well, I am proud to announce that we of the Blog are on the same side as President Trump with this one.

Our reasons are as obvious as the stars and stripes on the Banner We Wave. You see, in schlocky movies, football jocks are almost horrible characters, top of the cruel food chain in cinematic depictions of high school or college.

Usually they are portrayed as dumb school bullies and would-be rapists who hold sadistic hazing rituals. They torment the cool kids - who are, typically, the only ones who know what to do when aliens or zombies invade – and they play stupid pranks all the time. So much so that when a mad slasher starts killing all the kids, for most of the movie nobody takes evasive action because it’s assumed to be harmless mischief by the moron football players with their practical jokes. Until that scene when some innocent girl (usually played by Jill Schoelen) find the bloody bodies of the whole line of scrimmage stuffed into a row of lockers and knows it’s not them making everybody disappear.

John Cleese with Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Sept.27 in Playhouse Square

For some reason the media zeitgeist is making a big to-do about this being the 30^th anniversary of THE PRINCESS BRIDE. But another medieval comedy has Cleveland Movie Bloggers of a Certain Age feeling ready for the old-age home (or, around here, just another crummy minimum-wage job I’ll hold until dropping dead in my late 90s). It’s been 42 years, believe it or not, since MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL.

Now comedy legend and Python troupe alumnus John Cleese is touring live with a revival of the picture. “John Cleese and the Holy Grail” is the name of the program.

In it a screening accompanies raconteur Cleese on stage, summarizing his own wide-ranging career, genesis of the Pythons, and the making of the best-known movie spinoff from the groundbreaking BBC-TV comedy team. 

CIFF Announces Presentations Event Series Line-Up

[Press release from the Cleveland International Film Festival.]

 

The Cleveland International Film Festival (CIFF) has unveiled the first three of its 2017-2018 Presentations event series. The series, now in its second year, celebrates independent film and filmmakers and strives to connect them to audiences. This year’s line-up includes:

Cleveland Cinemas Rock Doc Series

[Press release from Cleveland Cinemas.]

Cleveland Cinemas will be hosting screenings of highly anticipated concert films and rock documentaries starting in September.

 

The films in this series are:

 

SLIPKNOT: DAY OF THE GUSANO

Tuesday, September 6th at 7:30 PM

Capitol Theatre (1390 W. 65^th St., Cleveland)

Admission: $12.50

DAY OF THE GUSANO documents not only a historic Knotfest Mexico City performance of Slipknot, one of the most exciting live bands on the planet, but delves deeply into the lives of the band's fans as well. Slipknot's fans, better known as "maggots", are essential to the band's legacy. This highly anticipated show captures the chaos, excitement and community that has been cultivated over the past 20+ years.

Making Little Movies Great Again, The Indie Gathering in Hudson August 10-13

Let us now examine some of the bloated cinematic corpses from the movie year of 2017. Nobody much wanted to see the live-action GHOST IN THE SHELL. Or Universal Picture's second (count 'em) reboot of THE MUMMY, as a Tom Cruise actionfest. The once-unsinkable PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN sequels stumbled with number five, and movie spoofs of BAYWATCH and CHiPS saw quick cancellation!

Finally...THE EMOJI MOVIE. Bob Ignizio actually saw that one and didn't even bother to review it. There can be no lower praise.

With all that waste of millions in resources, time and talent, how about a film festival that really celebrates the struggling indies of the world, bravely getting entertainment done on a shoestring budget.

The Indie Gathering, held annually in the late summer at the Clarion Inn of Hudson, upholds local/international `microcinema' – shorts and features done by independent filmmakers, today most often working (and working wonders sometimes) in digital video.

TCM Big Screen Classics Series Brings 'Bonnie and Clyde' Back to Movie Theaters August 13 and 16 Only

[Press release from Fathom Events and TCM Big Screen Classics]

WHAT:

Fifty years ago, the most dangerous and famous couple in America wreaked havoc on the silver screen. Fueled by a violent crime spree through Depression-era Texas, the two bank robbers in love broke cinematic taboos with their open expressions of violence and sex, and Bonnie and Clyde became the blueprint for counter-culture filmmaking. Film lovers across the country will have the chance to rediscover director Arthur Penn’s crime-drama milestone as it returns to movie theaters for two days only on Sunday, August 13 and Wednesday, August 16.

Bonnie and Clyde will play in movie theaters exactly 50 years from its original release on August 13, 1967, as a part of the yearlong TCM Big Screen Classics series, accompanied by specially-produced commentary before and after the feature by TCM Primetime Host Ben Mankiewicz. The film features intense performances by Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty, along with a dazzling supporting cast, including Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, Gene Wilder and Estelle Parsons, who received the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for her role as Clyde’s sister-in-law, Blanche.

Cinematheque celebrates 31st anniversary with special movies by Tarantino, Lynch, Lang, et al.

[Press release from the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

The Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque celebrates its 31^st anniversary between August 3 and 6 with a weekend of special movies for film buffs. All have been programmed by the Cinematheque’s co-founder and 31-year Director, John Ewing.

 

Showing during the four days will be:

 

(1)    FLOORSHOW, a shot-in-NE Ohio, 1978 16mm feature by the region’s pre-eminent independent filmmaker, Richard Myers.

(2)    DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME, the latest found-footage assemblage by early cinema archaeologist Bill (DECASIA) Morrison. Cleveland premiere.

(3)    Quentin Tarantino’s RESERVOIR DOGS, shown in a new 35mm color & scope print struck for the film’s 25^th anniversary.

(4)    INDUSTRIAL SYMPHONY #1 & RABBITS, two rarities by David Lynch that were never released to movie theaters.

(5)    Archival 35mm prints of GO WEST with the Marx Brothers and Alejandro Jodorowsky’s SANTA SANGRE.

(6)    A new digital restoration of Fritz Lang’s two-part, 1922 German silent crime epic DR. MABUSE, THE GAMBLER.

 

Detailed descriptions are below.

 

All will show in the Peter B. Lewis Theater of the Cleveland Institute of Art, 11610 Euclid Avenue in the Uptown district of University Circle. Unless noted below, admission to each film is $10; Cinematheque members and those age 25 & under $7. Free parking for filmgoers is available in Lot 73 and in the Institute Annex Lot, both located off E. 117^th Street from Euclid Avenue. For further information, visit cia.edu/cinematheque, email cinema@cia.edu, or call (216) 421-7450.

 

Cinematheque programs are supported by a grant Cuyahoga Arts and Culture.

 

The Class of '82 Reunites! "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" Returning to Cinemas

[Press release from Fathom Events.]

 

It's awesome ... totally awesome!

For two days only -- Sunday, July 30, and Wednesday, August 2 -- Fathom Events and the TCM Big Screen Classics Series are hosting a cinematic class reunion like no other:

It's been 35 years since Fast Times at Ridgemont High first hit the big screen.  Named in 2005 to the Library of Congress' National Film Registry, Fast Times at Ridgemont High is a cultural time capsule, a hilarious comedy, and a still-emotionally-relevant exploration of kids who want to grow up too fast.

Join stoner dude Jeff Spicoli (Sean Penn), naïve sophomore Stacy Hamilton (Jennifer Jason Leigh), her managerial brother Brad (Judge Reinhold), the worldly Linda Barrett (Phoebe Cates), the shy Mark "Rat" Ratner (Brian Backer) and sleazy Mike Damone (Robert Romanus) as they experience the best and worst high school has to offer ... and take a trip back in time to the pre-digital world of 1982!

TCM primetime host Ben Mankiewicz will provide specially produced commentary before and after the feature, which will return to more than 700 movie theaters for two days only:

* Sunday, July 30, at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. (local time)

* Wednesday, August 2, at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. (local time)

Tickets are available now at FathomEvents.com or at participating theater box offices.

Movies from 1967 coming to the Cleveland Museum of Art

[Press release from the Cleveland Museum of Art.]

The Cleveland Museum of Art presents a series of movies from the pivotal film year of 1967 (50 years ago). It begins on Tuesday, July 11.

 

There are also two changes to museum’s film program. As of July, Wednesday night films will be shifted to Tuesday afternoons at 1:30 pm. And there will now be only two categories of admission prices: museum members and non-members.

 

1967: The Summer of (Movie) Love

 

     1967 was the year of the “Summer of Love.” It was also a pivotal year in the history of movies. Arthur Penn’s freewheeling Bonnie and Clyde ushered in a new era of motion picture bloodletting and violence. Mike Nichols’s satiric and sexually frank The Graduate tapped a huge, previously unrecognized audience of aimless, antiestablishment young people. Stanley Kramer’s Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? broached the sensitive subject of interracial marriage. In 2017 each of these three groundbreaking works will receive (or already have received) special 50th anniversary screenings in multiplexes across the US.

      But 1967 featured more than this trio of famous American taboo breakers. Milestone movies emerged around the globe during this seminal year in film. Master filmmakers like Luis Buñuel, Jean-Luc Godard, and Jacques Tati released major works that helped change the face of modern movies. Foreign filmmakers working in the US, like Britain’s John Boorman and Canada’s Norman Jewison, mounted their own assaults on the Hollywood establishment during the year’s cinematic revolution. The movies of 1967 reflected the upheavals that were shaking and shaping culture and society at large. These exciting works inspired a new generation of international filmgoers and filmmakers, film scholars and film programmers, cementing cinema as an art form worthy of serious attention in both the media and academia. In short, after 1967, movies were never the same.

     This July and August we present seven groundbreaking works that mark their 50th anniversary in 2017. All will be shown from 35mm film in Morley Lecture Hall. Admission to each is $11; CMA members $8.

July/August 2017 schedule for the Cleveland Cinematheque

[Press release from the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

 

Alejandro Jodorowsky, the Marx Brothers, and Sweden’s Arne Sucksdorff are the subjects of three film series showing in July and August at the Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque.

 

“Endless Poetry: The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky” (July 13 – August 25) consists of seven films by the Chilean-French surrealist best known for EL TOPO and THE HOLY MOUNTAIN. Included is his brand new feature, ENDLESS POETRY.

 

“Late Marx Brothers” (July 28 – August 31) consists of the rarely-revived-in-theaters last six features by the famous comedy team.

 

“Divided Worlds: The Films of Arne Sucksdorff” (July 6-16) consists of three programs of stunningly shot shorts and features by the late, great, Oscar-winning Swedish nature filmmaker who was born 100 years ago.

 

Screenings of numerous first-run films (including new works by Werner Herzog  and Bill Morrison) and classics (including David Lynch’s THE STRAIGHT STORY, INDUSTRIAL SYMPHONY NO. 1, and RABBITS) will supplement the movies in the above three series. The complete two-month Cinematheque lineup is below.

 

All  films will show in the Peter B. Lewis Theater at the Cleveland Institute of Art, 11610 Euclid Avenue in the Uptown District of University Circle. Unless noted, admission to each program is $10; Cinematheque members, CIA & CSU I.D. holders, and those age 25 & under $7. An added film on the same day costs an additional $7 (or the member price for that film).

 

Free parking for filmgoers is available in Lot 73 and in the CIA Annex Lot, both accessed from E. 117^th Street off Euclid Avenue. Cinematheque programs are supported by Cuyahoga Arts and Culture.

 

For further information, visit cia.edu/cinematheque; send an email to cinema@cia.edu; or call John Ewing or Tim Harry at (216) 421-7450.

 

Can You Check Out Any Time But You Can Never Leave...Horror Hotel in Hudson? June 15 - June 18

Event preview by Charles Cassady, Jr.

At the annual installment of the International Horror Hotel Festival & Convention, you can see a short subject called DICKEATERS: THE MOVIE. Wouldn't it be worth it alone, to say you did that?

After all, the Cavaliers lost; might as well have some takeaway for 2017.

Horror Hotel is an early-summer offshoot of The Indie Gathering, a long-running series of meetings and networking expositions and festivals put on by and for DIY Ohio filmmakers. The Indie Gathering upholds "microcinema," ultra-low budget moviemaking outside the big film-industry system.

The Indie Gathering has a big annual international film festival in Hudson, Ohio, in early fall. But from the submissions that were coming in, the organizers - stunt coordinator Ray Szuch and actress-producer Kristina Michelle, of Cleveland - noticed that backyard filmmakers around the world most often gravitated horror and science-fiction genre shorts and features.

Free passes to the Indie Gathering Horror Hotel convention Thursday June 15th and Friday June 16th

[Free Ticket Giveaway!]

Horror Hotel is coming up again on June 15 through June 18, once again held at The Clarion Inn in Hudson. There are a lot of movies screening with filmmakers in attendance, with this year's fest bringing in filmmakers from as far away as Scotland, Saudi Arabia and China. If you would like a pair of passes for Thursday June 15th or Friday June 16th, send an email to: clevelandmovieblog@gmail.com. We have 10 pairs to give away for each day.

'Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?' brings Hollywood feud back to the big screen at the Capitol Theatre

[Press release from the Capitol Theatre.]

The Capitol Theatre (1390 W. 65^th St., Cleveland) will host two screenings of the Oscar-winning classic WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? as it commemorates the 40^th Anniversary of Joan Crawford’s death on May 10, 1977.

 

Recently back in the pop culture discourse thanks to the success of the acclaimed FX show “Feud” which featured Susan Sarandon as Bette Davis and Jessica Lange as Joan Crawford, WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? remains one of the most unique offerings from the end of Hollywood’s Golden Age.

 

In WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? Crawford and Davis play once-famous sisters now living a reclusive life in their Hollywood home. Davis’ turn as the aged Baby Jane Hudson earned her an 11^th Oscar nomination and revived her career. Crawford had the less showy role and found herself still struggling to regain her star status after the film’s release. It’s a true classic showing two of Hollywood’s greatest stars in their only screen appearance together.

 

'The Fifth Element' returns to theaters for special screening

[Press release from Fathom Events.]

Twenty years ago, audiences were dazzled by the visionary images and epic adventure of “The Fifth Element.” To celebrate the 20th anniversary of director Luc Besson’s groundbreaking film, Fathom Events and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment will present a 4K restoration of the film in movie theaters nationwide for two days only, on Sunday, May 14 and Wednesday, May 17 at 2:00 and 7:00 p.m. (local time) both days. Following its two-day-only theatrical presentation, “The Fifth Element” will debut on 4K Ultra HD July 11.

As an added bonus, the theatrical presentation will also offer audiences a brand-new, exclusive look at Besson’s upcoming film, “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets,” which opens in theaters nationwide July 21, 2017. This new film stars Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne as special operatives who must protect the astonishing city of Alpha from a marauding menace that threatens not just the city but the future of the universe. Besson both directed and wrote “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets,” as he did the enormously influential “The Fifth Element.”

Cleveland Cinematheque's May/June 2017 schedule is here!

[Press release from John Ewing of the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

The Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque’s May-June schedule consists of 43 different film programs in four different film series: “Premiere Showcase” (16 exclusive Cleveland premieres, including new films by Werner Herzog and Bruno Dumont); “A Second Look” (15 second-run films or classics, including THE NEON DEMON, TONI ERDMANN, and ONE-TRICK PONY); “Jean-Pierre Melville 100” (6 films by the influential French director who was born 100 years ago); and “Lina Wertmüller: Five Beauties” (5 films by the groundbreaking Italian director, plus a feature-length documentary about her). All 43 movies are listed and described below.

 

All  will show in the Peter B. Lewis Theater at the Cleveland Institute of Art, 11610 Euclid Avenue in the Uptown District of University Circle. Unless noted, admission to each program is $10; Cinematheque members, CIA & CSU I.D. holders, and those age 25 & under $7. An added film on the same day costs an additional $7 (or the member price for that film).

 

Free parking for filmgoers is available in Lot 73 and the CIA Annex Lot, both accessed from E. 117^th Street off Euclid Avenue. Cinematheque programs are supported by Cuyahoga Arts and Culture.

 

For further information, visit cia.edu/cinematheque; send an email to cinema@cia.edu; or call John Ewing or Tim Harry at (216) 421-7450.

 

Hometown movie Lux in Tenebris premieres in Euclid April 21

A local film production has its debut this week, and no,
it's not THE FATE OF THE FURIOUS.

Branislov Tatalovic, an instructor at the recently
instituted digital-filmmaking courses at Cuyahoga Community
College, premieres his feature LUX IN TENEBRIS at the Atlas
Cinemas Lakeshore multiplex in Euclid.

The drama (with a title translating as "light in darkness"),
was shot in the Cleveland-Akron area and in Belgrade with an
international, multicultural cast, including Oscar-nominated
thespian Eric Roberts. LUX IN TENEBRIS centers on two
sisters calling upon spiritual strength in trying to overcome childhood traumas and dark shadows in their past.The screening will be followed by Q&A with the filmmakers and an after-party.

The cinema address is 22624 Lakeshore Blvd., and the phone
number is (216) 731-1700. Tickets are $10 and the material
carries an R-rating.

Black Girl in the Cle presents a newbie's thoughts on the Cleveland International Film Festival

[This post is courtesy of Shana Black of the Black Girl in the Cle blog.]

by Shana Black

This year, I finally checked the Cleveland International Film Festival off my bucket list, although I admit planning was a little overwhelming in the beginning. Even when I got my hands on the program guide, I had difficulty choosing movies because there were so many. I’d never heard of any of these movies, and since they weren’t your typical Hollywood type, they didn’t come with lots of buzz (or at least any that I was aware of).

The program guide is the CIFF Bible. It includes everything you need to know about the festival from film summaries to hotel info, if you're an out of towner. I thought if I read it cover to cover, I'd be ready to make my plan. Definitely a wrong move for a CIFF newbie!

'Saturday Night Fever' Dances Back to Movie Theaters This May

[Press release from Fathom Events.]
 

In 1977, Saturday Night Fever became a cultural touchestone like few movies before or since, and this May fans can catch the fever again when the influential classic returns to the big screen for two days only in celebration of its 40th anniversary.

Director John Badham worked with Paramount Pictures to restore the film using the original negative and update the surround sound mix to further enhance viewers’ enjoyment of the incredible soundtrack. During this process he added scenes to the theatrical R-rated version that round out character and plot, making this new Director’s Cut the definitive representation of his original vision.