Sounds classy, skews trashy.
The summer rooftop movie series.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Rooftop movies (5 years old) Rating: Awesome.
That's right, we're Cinéma sur le toit, and we're here to make you watch awesome movies on the roof and think about nothing at all but your beer and your movie and how awesome DC in the summer can be when it's not 100 degrees and stuff.
And next week, Thursday the 25th, that movie is SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD. So round up your fake high school girlfriend, or your seven evil exes, or anyone else you care to bring, and show up on the rooftop. I'll totally be in lesbians with you forever if you come.
In High Fidelity, Rob and Barry have a conversation about Evil Dead 2 that's not REALLY about Evil Dead 2 (watch it here). It's actually about whether Rob's ex-girlfriend is going to sleep with another guy. Also, Barry seems to be confusing Evil Dead II with its sequel, Army of Darkness.
But all that is beside the point, which is that, just like Barry says, it's a brilliant, funny, violent film, and everyone should see it. And if you've already seen it, you should see it again. In either case, you can see it up on my roof this Thursday, July 28. And I promise that being outdoors 10 stories high is actually significantly cooler than at ground level. So beat the heat while enjoying the movie. Also, for the uninitiated who've never seen ANY of the Evil Dead movies and are afraid of being lost, seeing the first Evil Dead is entirely unnecessary, because Sam Raimi was kind enough to re-shoot a synopsis of the first movie and put it at the beginning. So now you have no excuse. See you Thursday!
Yes, you read that right, we're tempting fate and trying for Big Trouble in Little China again. Either that or I'm doing my part in drought abatement by using this movie to try to coax wet weather into the area.
In any case, I'm determined that we're going to show this movie on the roof this summer, so we'll give it a go on Thursday, July 7, and you can see if I finally manage to make it happen, or if I just keep on tilting at windmills.
At the first screening of the 2011 Cinéma sur le toit season, for the 1991 Muscles from Brussels opus, Double Impact, our distinguished guest speaker here gives us a stirring and informative introduction. Sadly, my phone ran out of memory about halfway through, so the rest of his comments about the Van Dammage we were about to witness are lost to all but the memories of the lucky individuals gathered on the rooftop last night. You can, however, find a full transcript here.
DC's fickle weather does not seem to want to see Big Trouble in Little China, so I'm going to postpone that screening and see if changing titles breaks the string of cancellations.
One of Cinema sur le toit's most loyal attendees has been lobbying me for at least one season now to show a little damme love for the muscles from Brussels, and this week, I'm going to grant that wish, with a 20th anniversary screening of Jean-Claude's dual role as separated-at-birth twins who are reunited just in time to join forces to defeat a Hong Kong crime syndicate in Double Impact.
I'll leave it at that, because our featured guest for the evening, Mr. Chris Klimek, will be introducing the film, and is sure to have plenty of insights into just what makes this masterpiece tick. (Apart from having the best action-movie tagline in history with "Double the Van Dammage!")
Do your best anti-wind, anti-rain dance and join us on the roof on Thursday, June 16.
EDIT: Marginally high winds forced us to scrub last week's launch. So we've pushed things back to the following Thursday, June 9.
Honestly, I can't believe it took us this long to think to screen this movie up on the roof. It's got everything that we look for in an idea screening candidate here: a blend of action and humor, inexplicably bizarre events, and a wisecracking superhero. (If only he was wearing white sweatpants; but not every film can be a Gymkata.) When I saw a lonely copy on the picked-over shelves of the Friendship Height Borders during the final days of their going-out-of-business sales, I had two thoughts: 1) Why have I never owned this? and 2) This is leading off the rooftop movies this summer.
Director John Carpenter re-teamed with his The Thing and Escape from New York star Kurt Russell, this time going for big-budget action comedy rather than the dark sci-fi horror or post-apocalyptic action of those two flicks. Russell plays Jack Burton, a wisecracking truck driver who manages to land himself in the midst of a war between rival factions in San Francisco's elaborate Little China, as he tries to help his buddy Wang Chi rescue Wang's fiancee, who has been kidnapped to be sold into the sex trade.
The Little China of the movie is a vast underground, steeped in mysticism. The original writers took the trippy martial arts movies coming out of Hong Kong in the late 70s as inspiration for a martial arts western, and then Buckaroo Bonzai director W.D. Richter came onboard to rewrite the script with a more modern setting and a dash of the same brand of self-aware quirk that typified Buckaroo. The result was, predictably, an absolute failure with audiences, but a cult hit on home video. Again, the sweet spot for rooftop fare.
So BTiLC will open up this season this coming Thursday. If you're a longtime Cinéma sur le toi devotee, you know the drill. For those of you perhaps new to the experience, here's the deal: We get started around 9pm, or once most of the people we're pretty sure are coming have arrived; you're welcome to bring whatever snacks & drinks you'd like; we generally have plenty of chairs, but if you have folding chairs/camp chairs that are easy to bring along, feel free, that way we don't hoard too many of the chairs on the roof from other folks up there; lastly, keep an eye on the forecast. I know it's been hot this weekend, but you never know with early June: it could always get cool at night, especially up on the roof, in which case you may want to be sure to have a hoodie or something to wrap around your shoulders.
