Tim's B-Fest mix CD saw us to the
Northwestern campus in good stead, and we got right in without even
having to wait in line to pick up our tickets. I put my name on a
list to re-sell my spare if someone called in needing an extra, but
alas, no takers. Since I was Festing solo, I opted to carry just a
small lunch cooler packed with high-density nutritious food like
mixed nuts, fiber and protein bars, and a couple of Bolthouse
smoothies, rather than a big cooler full of junk food. Traveling
light was nice, as I didn't need much extra seat space for storage,
and eating real food instead of candy bars and Chex mix makes a big
difference in not feeling like utter ass at the end of the Fest.
After a delightful chat catching up
with Dr. Megalemur, the lights dimmed and the show began.
Creature With the Atom Brain:
Some surprising brutality for a 50's flick, together with a quick
pace and a fun script, kept the opening feature cooking along. It's
still not a patch on an 80's Cannon or Chuck Norris actioner to get
the crowd going, but I enjoyed it. Good use was made of the mix CD
driving music gag. I'd still rather listen to the Roky Erickson song
any day of the week though.
Metalstorm: The Destruction of
Jared-Syn: As many of you are
aware, this movie contains no metalstorms, nor does Jared-Syn get
destroyed. What it does contain are a lot of really lame 3D gags, one
reasonably cool cyborg, and a lot of boring bullshit. I'm not sure
how Charles Band managed to make this much post-apocalyptic mayhem so
dull, but he did. It almost surely would have benefited greatly from
having been Italian.
I headed down the
aisle a bit to watch this one with Paul and Skip. We eschewed our
usual down-in-front seats this year to stay nearer the rear exit of
the theater for the reason that it sucks dodging an obstacle course
of sleeping bodies and coats and stuff in the dark when you need the
restroom. It sucks even more coming back in when your eyes haven't
yet adjusted to the light and you just have to hope you don't crush
anyone's fingers or kick them in the face. The downside to that is
most of our crew were still up front, so I jumped back and forth a
lot. Also, Paul's amazing cookies were down there. Dude does great
things with sugar and flour and eggs.
Frogs:
That's more like it. This is one of those movies that I can enjoy
equally from a riffing standpoint or entirely on its own merits. Yes,
it's not strictly speaking a good movie. Then again, neither are
probably 80% of the other movies I love. I care not a whit for your
“quality” nonsense. Give me Ray Milland and Sam Elliot fighting
toads and monitor lizards any day. I did feel a little ripped off
that they shut the movie off before we got to see the little cartoon
frog eating the hand at the end of the credits, though. People can be
so impatient.
Killdozer:
The entry I was looking forward to most this year, I hadn't seen this
flick since I caught it on the Sci-Fi Channel as a kid on my
grandparents' giant satellite dish. I was surprised to discover it
holds up pretty well. Since it's a TV movie, I figured there would be
lots of long boring stretches of talking since talk is cheap, but
there is a ton of bulldozer action. There's a lot to like about this
one, provided you like watching a giant bulldozer smash stuff. Which
I do. Skip and I ended up talking through most of it, but it's an
easy one to watch with only half your brain because there isn't much
to follow. The bit where they bury the guy who tried to hide in a
metal pipe and got run over amuses me because they either buried the
smashed tube with him in it, or tipped the tube up over the hole and
just let the guy sort of dribble into his grave. Either way it's
pretty damn funny.
Another
friend from home was in attendance this year, albeit not as a part of
our regular crew of lunatics. Jacob came over from his seat between
most movies to visit and give his impressions of his first B-Fest. I
particularly enjoyed his reaction to...
The Wizard of Speed and Time:
The stage stomp is Malorie's favorite part of B-Fest, so it didn't
seem right to stomp without her. Even just watching everyone
thundering away on the stage made my thighs hurt.
Plan 9 from
Outer Space: It's been a few
years since I've stayed in the theater for this one, and I felt like
it was time again. The chants, the plates, the Bela, the Tor! The
lineup for the last few years has been so good that any chance for
sleep had to be snapped up, but this year there was a big stretch
coming up later I didn't care about so I took the opportunity to
reacquaint myself with Ed Wood's magnum opus. It's kind of like
meeting up with an old friend you haven't seen for a long time.
There's no awkwardness, no lack of things to talk about. You fall
back into the groove as if you'd never been away.
Black Mama,
White Mama: I had completely
forgotten I'd seen this movie. Playing in the traditional
blaxploitation slot, I was not looking for an Eddie Romero women in
prison movie. Sid Haig and Pam Grier never fail to entertain, but I
started fading about an hour into it. Sid was already dead, I knew
the ending was a bummer, and I was ready for some rest.
Heading out into the lounge area, I had already been beaten to most
of the good sleeping spots but found what I thought would be an ideal
place beneath a picture window next to a heating vent. I figured I
would get some warmth and have a pleasant nap. Two hours later I woke
up shivering because the heat was apparently not on and the cold air
leaking through the window had found its way under my heavy coat
blanket/pillow and froze me out. I stumbled blearily through the
lounge looking for refuge and found that someone had abandoned one of
the couches. Score! I didn't wake up again until 8:00 when the
Starbucks crew turned on their obnoxious new age ambient music. The
longest stretch of unbroken sleep I've ever had at B-Fest still
didn't quite prepare me for the innocuous stupidity of...
Andy Hardy's
Private Secretary: Well, the
last fifteen minutes of it, anyway. To the perverted minds of today,
that title sounds like it should play in the old blue slot where
we've had features like the porno version of Alice In
Wonderland in past years. But
this is gentle family drama with well-behaved upper class youth
hijinks and a hefty side order of sexism. I'm so glad I didn't see
the whole thing.
Can't Stop the
Music: It's a disco musical
dramatizing the fake story of how the Village People came to be. It's
got full frontal nekkid schlong. It's two goddamn hours long. It's
also a lot of fun at B-Fest. Sometimes the stuff you think you'd
rather set your eyes on fire than watch can be the surprise
standouts. Then you hit the 90 minute mark and remember it's two
goddamn hours long. Even B-Fest itself decided it had had enough,
when with about half an hour to go, a power outage not only shut the
movie off but caused the screen to retract into the ceiling. Sort of
the digital age version of when the film would snag and melt and
break on the projector in past years. Sadly the DVD player remembered
exactly where we were and we had to finish the movie once they got
everything turned back on.
Alien from
L.A.: An emotional roller
coaster, going from fun to painful to fun and back again for maybe
half the movie, before it settles permanently on painful and we all
just twiddled our thumbs until it was over. All it really made me want to do was watch Danger Island again. I'm probably going to regret that decision when I get around to it.
Miami
Connection: A terrible synth pop band who sing songs about friendship and tae kwon do, which they are also all proficient at, have to use their martial arts skills against a ninja drug cartel. Oh, and they're all orphans who live together in what appears to be a one bedroom apartment. It's certainly goofy
and stupid and charming, but I think everyone else loves this movie a
lot more than I do. Watching it with the B-Fest crowd greatly
enhances its good qualities, but I don't think I could ever sit
through it alone.
Viva Knievel:
Evel Knievel and Gene Kelly must use the power of all-American stunt
biking to defeat Leslie Nielsen and his drug cartel (sadly no ninjas this time, just some doughy white guys). Some cool
stunts, as one would expect, but that's about it. It would have been
nice to see the kaiju flick in its traditional closing slot instead
of smack in the middle of my nap time. Granted I had watched Yongary
just a week previous, but I'll take giant monsters over lame action
movies any day of the week.
Just like that, it was over. Fond farewells were bid to those not
joining us for the post-Fest trip to Portillo's (24 hours of nuts and
granola left me ravenous for some greasy fried stuff). Tim made a
lovely toast to absent friends, and it got us talking about how
B-Fest is now only peripherally about the movies, and had we not made
so many great and lasting friendships, none of us would probably
still be driving to Chicago in the middle of January to watch some
movies that we could just as easily watch at home. It's not a movie
marathon any more. It's a family reunion.
May Tor bless you and keep you.
May Criswell make his face to shine upon you,
and be gracious to you.
May Bela lift up his countenance upon you,
and give you peace.
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