Interlude: Movies Are Good

Hi there. I ran out of time to watch The Phantom of the Opera this week. But I had a pretty good reason... or rather, reasons. Let me tell you about it (them).

On Thursday, I attempted to go to a free outdoor screening of Cabaret, but it was rained out, so I watched it at a friend's apartment instead. It was not quite what I expected. I was surprised to see that all of the musical numbers in the film were presented as performances at the titular nightclub, and the characters never spontaneously burst into song, as is traditional in musicals. Is there a term for this subset of musicals? But it was still a pretty good movie.

On Monday, I went to a free outdoor screening of Superman, which was the most crowded and high-energy movie screening I've ever been to. People were cheering and whooping and applauding for pretty much everything Superman ever did, and for the duration of the film, for all of the New Yorkers squeezed together on the lawn at Bryant Park, Superman was a very real hero. Even a momentary loss of sound during a climactic action sequence didn't put a damper on our enthusiasm. In fact, we ended up doing a brief sing-along of the main theme from the movie's score to fill the silence. Superman is so epic, and treats its protagonist with such reverence, that it always feels to me like the world's biggest, most spectacular biopic, and I like it more every time I see it. In fact, I almost like it enough now to forgive the ludicrous flying-around-the-world-in-reverse denouement.

On Tuesday night, I went to a free outdoor screening of Killer's Kiss, Stanley Kubrick's second feature film. It was... disappointing. For the most part, it was surprisingly unoriginal, although there was some creative cinematography and a thrilling, realistic fight scene in a mannequin factory. Watching two men throw body parts at each other seems like the kind of thing that would be right at home in one of the "horror classic" movies, and at no point during the sequence did anything feel choreographed... It seemed like Kubrick just gave the one guy an axe, gave the other guy a fireplace poker, and turned them lose in front of the camera with instructions to try to kill each other. So it was interesting, but not great. Or even good.

As you can see, I've been way too busy watching movies to take the time to watch a movie. But I'll post my write-up of Phantom next Wednesday. And if you ever ever ever have the opportunity to see a movie outdoors, I would highly recommend it. Even if the movie is Attack of the Giant Leeches.