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The EW Skinny
The Evolving Word is designed for three purposes: miscellaneous rambling (a token gesture, as there are a million sites designed for this), my creative publishing, and thoughts and news on words -- origins, differences, anomalies, etc.

Enjoy it, or not; comment, or not; but do not ignore it. Or ignore it. Whatever.


11 Days of Movie Bliss
Posted on Wednesday, September 22 @ 09:58 PM PST by joel

Movies A good 10 years ago (or more, I really can't remember and don't feel like doing the research), Ontario Mills opened. An outlet mall unlike any before it, it promised to be the hub of shopping activity for the western Inland Empire.

This fact alone explains why I felt the need to move.

That issue unimportant at the moment, alongside the opening of Ontario Mills was a new AMC theater and a new Edwards theater. Literally across the parking lot from each other, one had 30 screens and the other 22. 52 screens of movie nirvana. Until it became clear that not one of those screens would be used for anything unconventional. Every single screen would be used for first-run, wide-release movies, completely shutting out anything independent, anything cutting edge.

So I moved. And now I live in a city that hosts its own international film festival. I went from an area where "culture" meant Krispy Kremes to an area where theater, music and film thrive. While I will discuss the other aspects of living here later, I want to spend a few minutes writing about the Mill Valley Film Festival.

We joined the California Film Institute as soon as I figured out that it was the organization that hosted the Mill Valley Film Festival. The Institute exists as a non-profit organization that runs the Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center, the Institute's Film Outreach program and the Film Festival itself. We joined at the Gold Star level, which affords us benefits at the Festival, as well as discounted access to the Rafael Film Center. Taking advantage of this already, we both recently saw Ju-On: The Grudge at the Film Center -- a below average movie viewed in a beautiful venue.

The Festival is in its 27th year of international film exposure. Hosted at several theaters around Mill Valley and San Rafael, it showcases an eclectic mix of documentaries, dramas and action movies. Dozens of movies are shown between October 7th and 17th, evenings during the week and all day during the weekend. Our intent, at the outset, was to sample a few of the movies while we figured out the best way to enjoy the festival in the future.

The best laid plans...

We now have tickets for 14 movies. And I am looking forward to every single one. This is one of the reasons we moved up here, and I am going to take advantage of everything that I can. Following this is a listing of what we will see, with links provided where available, to give you an idea of the types of things we will be experiencing. I will also try to post reviews of each of these after viewing them. No promises, though, as you can look at my recent posting history to see how bad I have been about updating this site.

Friday, October 8
--------------------
5@5: Take These Chains From My Heart (the 5@5 series is made up of 5 short movies at 5pm, loosely organized by theme)

Saturday, October 9
-----------------------
Arna's Children
Sword in the Moon

Sunday, October 10
-----------------------
Cosmic Africa
Primer

Monday, October 11
-----------------------
5@5: I'm Movin' On

Tuesday, October 12
------------------------
5@5: Busted

Wednesday, October 13
----------------------------
5@5: You Are My Sunshine
Snow Walker (which conflicts with the 5@5 above, which was unintentional, due to Snow Walker being a free movie for Institute Members and unavailable at first when I purchased the 5@5 tickets)

Thursday, October 14
-------------------------
A Tale of Two Sisters

Friday, October 15
---------------------
Nothing (how did that happen?)
Actually, we may get tickets to Taina 2 or to the 5@5 for this day.

Saturday, October 16
-------------------------
Black Mor's Island
The Human Touch

Sunday, October 17
-----------------------
Let's Play
Lightning in a Bottle (closing gala event)

This doesn't even include some other movies we wanted to see, such as Finding Neverland, Kinsey, Vera Drake and I (heart) Huckabees. I still think, though, that we have set a very high bar and will be completely satisfied by our Film Festival experience.

And if we aren't satisfied, we may just have to go back down south and check out a movie at Ontario Mills.


 
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Re: 11 Days of Movie Bliss (Score: 1)
by nickel on Thursday, September 23 @ 09:54 AM PST
(User Info | Send a Message) http://nickelarcade.net
Just because you didn't take advantage of them doesn't mean they weren't here. Perhaps the size of the Ontario Mills blocked your view. Or perhaps moving up north has created a wee bit of pretentious snobbery? :-)

http://www.riversidefilmfest.org/
http://www.tviff.com/tviff/ (two weekends ago)
http://www.bigbearlakefilmfestival.com/index.html (last weekend)
http://www.lakearrowheadfilmfestival.com/infoset.htm (this weekend)
http://www.psfilmfest.org/

... and if you're willing to drive to L.A. (which you would do for Lakers games):
http://www.lafilmfest.com/home.html
http://www.hollywoodfilmfestival.com/
http://www.afi.com/onscreen/afifest/2004/



Re: 11 Days of Movie Bliss (Score: 1)
by Admin on Thursday, September 23 @ 05:19 PM PST
(User Info | Send a Message) http://www.evolvingword.com
I did know about the film festivals down there, but can you name one person who ever attended one of those? Up here, in snobby country, almost everyone knows about, talks about, and gets tickets to the festival. It is a cultural tradition up here that doesn't seem to exist where I came from.

A little bit snobbish, sure, but none of those film fests were in my hometown. I am saying that I can roll into a theater 10 minutes from my house and participate in the film fest. None of the film fests you include here were like that for me. Everything in LA is spread out, so if you want to drive 1 hour in any random direction, you can see cool stuff. I wanted something more personal, some place where I could walk into town because that is where people are, and where they want to be.

Besides, if you exclude Palm Springs, the film fests you listed combined have been in existence for less time than the one here in Mill Valley. Which essentially means that they became film fests because the local chamber of commerce saw the money that was brought in by other "destination" film fests and thought that, hey, why not try it too?

In the end, though, even if you disagree with everything else, you have to admit some degree of frustration from the insane number of screens in the Inland Empire and the complete and total lack of anything independent or small market. Or you don't have to admin it if you don't go out to the movies. Either way, it doesn't change the fact that Dumb and Dumberer played on 8 screens between AMC and Edwards and Maria Full of Grace, or Story of the Weeping Camel, played on none.



Re: 11 Days of Movie Bliss (Score: 1)
by nickel on Thursday, September 23 @ 11:32 PM PST
(User Info | Send a Message) http://nickelarcade.net
Hey, as long as some of those screens will be showing "Team America: World Police," I'm there! And you know you will be, too!

My solution: Big screen TV, Dolby Digital or DTS surround sound and Netflix. And, who the heck wants to see a movie about a weeping camel anyway?? :-) Party on.



Re: 11 Days of Movie Bliss (Score: 1)
by KathiK on Wednesday, October 06 @ 06:47 PM PST
(User Info | Send a Message)
My complaint is that even the first-run, wide-release movies don't stay around long enough at the Ontario Mills for some of us free-time-challenged moms to get around to seeing them!

 
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