Holiday Event Performance Schedule

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Re: September 30th Film Night w/ Jake Swanson by Richard Harbaugh

FOREVER

Film night last night was Jean Luc Goddard’s Strawberry Fields. As Michael R. commented, every shot in the film is a work of art, with lighting worthy of a Rembrandt. 

I first saw the film in 1967, without subtitles, at a tiny, dingy, musty old theater that was later torn down to make way for a drive thru dry cleaning service, that was later torn down for a parking lot, and then became the East lobby of a local bank, which was later taken over by a multinational conglomerate, and will probably soon be shipped to China. That’s what I get for having sixty years of memories, and no subtitles.

And poor Professor! He has at least twenty years on me.

The story line is of a stuffy old doctor and his rather circular adventures on the day he is to be honored by his academic peers and betters. Demanding, rational, self-willed and absolutist, he stores all his feelings in an old pocket watch. His terrifying cadaverous mother keeps it for him, along with a box of old toys and photos. The watch has no hands, and it is made of gold.

Memories and dreams, like a crowd of over-aged children at the beginning of their Grand Tour, race through and around his day, poking holes in the shell of his self-satisfaction, until at last the whole crustacean edifice cracks and collapses. He is left wide-eyed and child-like, drifting through the scheduled form and ritual. He accepts the funny hat, the lapel pin of academic achievement, and the blank scroll of paper tied with a ribbon, honors to be taken to the grave. But as he is glad-handed across the stage, his heart is lifting, free and careless of the honored wreckage. He steps down from the stage, away from the light of the podium, his mind and heart filled not with honors, but with the jubilant, reckless everyman progress across the great stage, the procession, not of honored old men, but of joyful absurd frolicking dancing singing children.

In the end, he learns the value of kindness over rationality.

It is a great movie, not only for the Rembrandt lighting, but also for the plot of redemption and enlightenment. I got the lighting part when I was seventeen. All these years, all these years, and at last, I also have sympathy for the elderly. The honors mean nothing. It is all in the glow of loving eyes.

Sept. 28th Art Mixer & Open Jam

NEW PHOTOS AND VIDEO COMING SOON!

Re: September 23rd Film Night w/ Madison by Richard Harbaugh

Jurassic Park was the film tonight, and as the man kept saying, hold onto jur ass. It's a Hollywood fun ride, and seeing it on the big screen wall is such a treat. You really don't get the same feeling from high def.

Does anyone want to see The Trilogy of the Ring again? It is totally needy of the big format. You just can't get it from any kind of TV. I think I may be able to coax a directors cut from a good friend......

Did you miss The Batteries live at the "She and Him" Art Opening? PHOTOS from Tammy Goodale are posted. Thanks Tammy!

Re: August 26th Art House Movie Night with Jake and Madison by Richard Harbaugh

Movie night last Thursday was a real treat…..Jean Luc Goddard’s “Weekend,” (1967) in which this reviewer sees presented a world of sociopaths, wherein people care more about clothing and accessories than they do about each other. One woman survives a fiery car crash which kills several of her companions. Ignoring the mutilated corpses, she becomes hysterical because her fashionable handbag is lost to the flames. Allegorically, and usually violently, the film explores what we value, mainly by hacking into our most sacred and taboo places. Rape? Cannibalism? Rape followed by cannibalism? If it really sucks, you can probably find it here.

But it is funny! Why did I laugh (or more like a snicker through a sneer), when a lady poet is set on fire because she recites poetry rather than give road directions? Is poetry that important? Or is being set on fire that unimportant? I don’t know any more. We are all caught in the endless traffic jam that opens the film. Burned out or burning cars and bodies litter the landscape, but no one in the film (or in the audience) is disturbed or even interested by that. Instead, everyone seems to have their own individual goal in mind, only coincidentally and temporarily on the road with anyone else. Is this a prediction? More than forty years later (the film was released in 1967) I watch the daily news as gang rape and genocide crawl across a ruined industrial landscape on our high def big screen flat television, while famine, drought, flood, fire and horrific violence compete with each other on a global stage for our helpless attention. Funny? Please pass me another kneebone.

I am grateful for our little island of sanity here in Duluth at WSAC. We can meet in relative calm and discuss both our prophecies of doom and our hope and faith in each other, and for our common future.

Thanks for being here. I hope to see you in September at Thursday Film nights in the performance space at 8 pm. You really shouldn't miss this!

Band Performance and Art Show!

Friday, September 3rd 6PM - Opening Starts 

 8pm Live Performance by the Batteries.

 

To hear music visit their Myspace page. http://www.myspace.com/davefrankenfeld

Check out Jessica's blog. http://ifeedonleafygreens.blogspot.com/