Gorgeous day in the City by the Bay... balmy, shorts and tee shirt weather!

So what do I do? I go into a darkened movie theater (with Becky and Dana)!

Okay, admittedly, not for long. Becky and I always try to catch shows put on by the silentfilm.org, and today, as part of the JAZZ + SILENT FILM FESTIVAL, the Castro Theatre screened Buster Keaton's 1924 comedy, Sherlock Jr. (click for details on the film), one of Time Magazine’s “All-Time 100 Best Films”.

Sherlock is a hilarious tale which features a hapless projectionist who dreams of being a detective. After being falsely framed of stealing a watch, he dreams himself and the people he knows into the film he's projecting, wherein he assumes the role of the the dashing detective of the film's title.

This movie is nothing short of phenomenal, with visual gags that are so good that you're left wondering how they did them even as you're laughing. In one scene, Keaton dives INTO a suitcase full of disguises being held up by an accomplice—disguised as a woman—who instantly snaps the case shut and walks off, all in one take.

The movie is fairly short (45 minutes), but it was preceded by a vintage Felix the Cat silent cartoon: "Felix Woos Whoopee"

What made this show extra special was the music. The Silent Film Festival always has live music with its films: usually a small quintet or grand piano or the Mighty Wurlizter house organ. This show was accompanied live by the Clubfoot Orchestra, performing their original scores for both films. No quaint old fashioned piano here, this was fun, up tempo jazz music that really brought the films to life.  Felix the Cat never seemed funnier, and the score of Sherlock Jr. was great, featuring a bass guitar doing a James Bondian riff during a chase scene.

(It appears that the film with the score is HERE on Google Video).

Afterwards we went to a bar to have a cocktail, and upon learning Becky's trip to Hawaii had been cancelled because of the Aloha Airlines shutdown, Dana decided that we must have tropical cocktails, and proceeded to program the jukebox with every tropical theme song he could find.

A nice dinner and then a pot of tea on an outdoor patio at twilight brought the day to a close.

Ahhhh...

Posted by molyneaux at 12:01 AM PDT

Updated: Tuesday, 15 April 2008 11:16 PM PDT

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Well, Secret Identity Crisis is listed on the website for the Pink Apple Gay Film Fesitval in Zurich, Switzerland:

The program the film is in is listed HERE.

Or HERE if bad Google translation from German

And here is a page with a screenshot (link).

Looks like it gets screened May 1st.

As I said in a previous entry, we're being screened, but we're not in the competition for prizes...whatever that means.

Still, not shabby for 48 hours plus some follow-up work!

Posted by molyneaux at 11:05 PM PDT

Updated: Tuesday, 19 May 2009 10:20 PM PDT

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...The view out my window at sunset...

Note the Farralon Islands off on the horizon!

Posted by molyneaux at 12:01 AM PDT

Updated: Tuesday, 19 May 2009 10:29 PM PDT

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Well, apparently the shooting of "Milk" has wrapped up here in the bay area. Click here to see an article about it on SFGATE.

BELOW: The candlelight vigil Dana and I marched in. We're somewhere on the edge of the crowd to screen right.

 

ABOVE: From the Gay Freedom Day shoot, Sean Penn gets political and comments on"Sean Hannity, the butt boy of Rupert Murdoch."

 

Posted by molyneaux at 2:38 AM PDT

Updated: Wednesday, 20 May 2009 12:41 AM PDT

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Mood:  silly

A little silliness I did for a captioning contest...

SPOCK: This Grande coffee is frozen. Its temperature is exactly minus 8.24 degrees centigrade.
SULU: Oh my! This tastes almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.
UHURA: I SAID sit your @#$&% down and ENJOY!

Posted by molyneaux at 2:50 PM PDT

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Mood:  silly

 A little something my friend Jennifer did (with my help) 22 Easters ago!

Click the image to view it. This site it slow, so it might take a minute to load.

Posted by molyneaux at 2:42 AM PDT

Updated: Tuesday, 19 May 2009 10:31 PM PDT

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Mood:  irritated

Funny, volunteering for the "Milk" film dragged up a lot of gay history from the 70s, and just the other day Sean Penn, performing as Harvey Milk in 1978, mentioned the Anita Bryants of the world and how they wanted to deny gay people their rights.

Well, today there's another woman spewing the same kind of ignorant, fear mongering vile as Anita 30 years ago: Oklahoma State Representative Sally Kern. Recently, her remarks to a small GOP group were recorded and released on the internet. Her speach was loaded with Archie Bunker ignorance, including propegating the long disproven "gays want to recruit your children" bullshit.

Youtube video of her words.

She even went so far as to claim that homosexuality is this country's greatest threat, "even more so than terrorists or Islam.” She said it's "just a fact” that "the homosexuality agenda is destroying this nation.”

Conicidentally, I'd recently reproduced an old anti-Anita poster as a possible T-short for extra-ing. I updated it for the modern age.

How far we've come...how far we still have to go.
 

Posted by molyneaux at 1:04 AM PDT

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1. Today I read Will Eisner's "A Contract With God", an early graphic novel about life in a New York tenement. While I liked it, I was a little put off by the art, which felt too heavy handed for the material, and the unnecessary sex and violence which distracted from the drama. A good idea, especially in the final tale "Cookalein", but one that needed some editing and polishing.

2. Becky called to tell me that All Things Considered had a segment about the "Milk" shoot. Click here to listen to it (if you have Flash blocking enabled it won't work). You can hear Sean Penn doing some of the lines we heard yesterday. If you know what Harvey Milk sounded like, it's eerie how close he gets it.

3. While poking around archive.org today I found a video from almost 19 years ago: The Computer Chronicles, Atari ST Update. Program # 619U 8/02/89 At 8:55 in, Jim Kent loads an animation element I created and mentions me by name.

Posted by molyneaux at 12:01 AM PST

Updated: Tuesday, 11 March 2008 12:50 AM PDT

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Yay! It’s Daylight Savings Time today! But, booooo, we lose an hour of sleep.

Dana and I are extra-ing for “Milk” one last time today. This time it’s a recreation of part of Gay Freedom Day 1978. It’s on with the 70s clothes again.

Today we’re mostly just acting as a crowd, reacting to what’s happening on a stage set up in front of city hall. It’s supposed to be June, so we’re encouraged to go shirtless. Fortunately, it’s really nice and sunny out, so one can do so without frying. I do it, partly because the synthetic nightmare material of my 70s shirt is hot. Dana remains more demure because he has a few tattoos that don’t look authentic to the period. Not that a lot of our fellow volunteer extras seem to heed any of the instructions...I mean, a white guy with deadlocks in 1978? Gimme a break!

What’s different about today over our previous extra-ing and watching then film is that this time we actually get to see Sean Penn act. He’s giving a speech about how gay people need to come out to their families and friends and neighbors and co-workers, and repudiating the Anita Bryants of the world and those who would take right away. We cheer his words and his and boo the villains and generally make a lot of noise.

Again, I’m struck at how badly this production handles the crowd scenes. As before, their loudspeaker system is weak and a lot of people can’t hear the instructions. They don’t do proper cueing so everyone clearly know when to do what, etc.

I make a mental note as to where we are in relation to what in shots where I could be in short, so I can see if I can spot Dana and I if any of those shots make it into the film. We’re kinda in the back of the crowd, but we’re up on higher than the street. I can see the camera lens over Sean Penn’s shoulder, so I’m sure it can see me. But what’s in focus? The crowd, or Sean’s ear?

The capper of the speech Sean gives as Harvey Milk is the unveiling of the original Gay Pride flag, which is unfurled as a backdrop.

Note the people at the top...that's a big flag!

After a numbverof takes of this with several camera setups, Sean Penn stands at the microphone and doesn't delivery his scripted dialog. Oh no, he starts talking current politics, takes jabs at Fox News and the right, and get the crowd really hooting and hollering as they drop the flag one more time. Clever. He gets to make a poltical statement and get a great shot of the crowd cheering the flag dropping at the same time.

During a break between shots, I notice a woman taking a picture of Dana and me and we're being smoochy, and she comes over and says she's with the Chronicle and asks if she can have our names in case the paper uses a pix of us. We tell her, and she takes more pictures of us smooching. Guess I better read the Chronicle tomorrow... 

With those scenes completed, they rearrange the extras to line both sides of the streets to get some quick shots of Milk’s arrival to City Hall in a previous scene. Sean rides sitting in the sunroof of a vintage Volvo, the car followed by supporters and a marching band. A few takes of this are done, and each time, a nun of roller-skates glides up and gives “Harvey” some flowers.

After these takes, we’re asked to move aside and be quiet as they marching band alone is brought up the street, so they can record the music clean without background noise.

Today's San Francisco Lesbian and Gay Freedom Band portraying the 1978 San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Marching Band and Twirling Corps (whew). Note the mic boom.

Finally, we’re asked to loosely gather on the sidewalk on one side of the street and do three takes of the throng walking as if we’re heading to or from the parade.

At this point, we’ve been out in the sun for 4 hours and we’ve had enough, so we call it day.

Video of this on the SF Chronicle's website here. 

During this, Scott Cummins called to tell me that while it didn’t make it into the competion part of the PINK APPLE FILM FESTIVAL in Zurich and Frauenfeld, Switzerland between 30th April to 12th May, the film was selected to be screened. I guess that means good enough to be shown but not good enough to win prizes. Whatever...not bad for a 48HFP short!

After a late late lunch and a dog walk, we drop in bed and nap for a few hours. When I awake and stumble into the bathroom I see how red my face is. Oops! I forgot sun block.

I’ve gone from mere extra to extra crispy.

Posted by molyneaux at 1:01 AM PST

Updated: Wednesday, 20 May 2009 12:41 AM PDT

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Today I’d thought to take Dana to Point Reyes to watch whales migrating, but I decided to put that off two weeks when I saw a chart that indicated the migratory peak would be then.

With that postponed, Dana suggested that we go see the 1972 film “What’s Up, Doc?” as part of the Peter Bogdanovich retrospective going on at the Castro Theater. Friday night Dana saw “The Last Picture Show” and both Bogdanovich and Cybil Shepherd appeared on stage to talk about it.

So, we go to the theater, and take what are becoming our regular seats in the second to the last row—because those seats are on a riser and no matter who sits in front of you, you can always see the screen. Before the movie, Bogdanovich appears on stage and tells some stories about making it. Afterwards, the lights go down and they start running trailers of other Bogdanovich films.

And then, Mr., Director takes his seat—in the back row—directly behind us! Literally, he was in the seat right behind Dana. It’s funny to watch a movie and know the director is breathing down your neck. Fortunately, it’s a great, funny, charming movie, so there was plenty to laugh at. And, heck, it was funny to hear which parts the director himself laughed at.

If you’ve never seen the film, rent it. It’s a terrific homage to screwball comedies of the 30s, with sharp writing, spot-on acting (including the Hollywood debut of Madeline Kahn, who steals the show out from under Barbra Streisand’s...nose), and an amazing and hilarious chase scene that’s an homage old silent film comedies. Imagine big Harold Lloyd stunts done amongst San Francisco’s hills....you get the idea.

Oh, and it ends with Bugs Bunny. How can you go wrong?

Posted by molyneaux at 12:01 AM PST

Updated: Monday, 10 March 2008 1:42 AM PST

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