One of the things I've loved about the upstart Trylon microcinema is that a great variety of films has been featured in just the few months since it's opened: Buster Keaton, New York crime thrillers, David Cronenberg, Frank Capra, and music films as part of Sound Unseen 10. The little theater tucked away on Minnehaha Avenue is slowly but surely becoming a must-visit destination for film buffs in the Twin Cities; it's impossible to walk out of this place without feeling good about cinema. The picture looks great (The Warriors looked especially sharp on 35mm), the sound is clear, and the concession prices are unequaled in the city.Take a weekend date night to come out and support Take-Up Productions and this independent theater space. Here's a look at the variety of classic films on tap for this winter at The Trylon:
Dec 4 and 5 Stairway To Heaven (1946)
A visionary and witty fantasy that finds downed World War II pilot David Niven attempting to cheat death (in the form of Marius Goring's Heavenly Conductor 71) in order to pursue his relationship with an American radio operator (Kim Hunter). While he pursues his romantic destiny on earth, his fate is subject to a celestial tribunal in heaven.
Dec 11 and 12 Black Narcissus (1947)
A highly charged drama set in a convent high in the Himalayas where a group of nuns attempt to establish a school and a hospital. Despite young Deborah Kerr's best efforts to keep things under control, repression turns to obsession as the nuns become affected by the exotic atmosphere and the action becomes increasingly delirious.
Dec 18 and 19 49th Parallel (1941)
A Nazi U-boat is sunk by the Canadian Air Force and all the crew are lost except six men who had been sent ashore before the attack. Starring Lawrence Olivier, Anton Walbrook, Leslie Howard. Winner of the 1943 Academy Award for best writing.
Dec 25 and 26
The Red Shoes (1948)
*Dazzling new 35mm restoration!* A Technicolor classic based on Hans Christian Andersen's tale of magic ballet slippers whose wearer (Moira Shearer) cannot stop dancing, The Red Shoes tracks a ballerina's rise to the lead role in a ballet version of the well-known story. Powell noted of the film's role in a post–World War II free world, "For 10 years we had all been told to go out and die for freedom and democracy; but now the war was over, The Red Shoes told us to go out and die for art."
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JANUARY - In Deppth
Jan 1 and 2 Leave it to Terry Gilliam to film one of the world's most unfilmable novels. The late, great Hunter S. Thompson's legendary gonzo account of sex, drugs, and, well, more drugs in the desert is, in its own, a bizarre, psychedelic road trip into insanity. But, married with Gilliam's truly inspired vision, it becomes a warped evocation of America on acid. Welcome to Bat Country!
Jan 8 and 9 Ed Wood (1994)
Tim Burton has been remaking good movies into bad ones lately, but his finest work is about cinema's worst filmmaker. Ed Wood is the biopic of the legendary director of Plan 9 from Outer Space; it features a giant rubber octopus, a drug-addicted Dracula, and Johnny Depp in a dress in a story that's funny and touching. (Shown in HD)
Jan 15 and 16 Dead Man (1995)
Jim Jarmusch's enigmatic western stars Depp as William Blake, an accountant who travels west from Cleveland in hopes of landing a job. Hauntingly photographed in black and white and featuring a plaintive score by Neil Young, Dead Man inverts a familiar genre, reconfiguring the desolate Western landscape as a backdrop for existential exploration.
Jan 22 and 23 The Ninth Gate (1999)
More weirdness for Depp and a return to the genre for Roman Polanski, The Ninth Gate is a supernatural thriller about a rare book finder in Europe searching for a pair of ancient satanic texts which carry a curse of misfortune. (Shown in HD)
Jan 29 and 30 Cry-Baby (1990)
Full of over-the-top parody of teen culture of the 1950s and a great performance by Johnny Depp’s cheekbones, Cry-Baby has reached cult status like most John Waters films. Some other notable faces in the movie include Ricki Lake, Iggy Pop and Traci Lords. It’s cheese and camp, which is a trademark of any good Waters movie and should be embraced by anyone who sees them.
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FEBRUARY - Godard's 60s
Feb 5 and 6 Made In U.S.A. (1966)
*Minneapolis Premiere!* Trench-coated Anna Karina arrives in Atlantic City (apparently a provincial French town) to track down boyfriend Richard Widmark (a character, not the actor), only to find...and then the bodies start dropping. A (very) metaphorical treatment of the murders of JFK and Ben Barka...and Karina’s swan song for Godard.
Feb 12 and 13
Two or Three Things I Know About Her (1967)
Is she Marina Vlady or Juliette Janson? asks the narrating Godard in a conspiratorial whisper. She’s both: an actress in a film and a housewife from the Paris suburbs who turns tricks in the city to make ends meet. With characters casually addressing the camera, a conversation between complete strangers in a bistro–all underscored by relentless thuddings of a pinball machine–and an unblinking gaze at the cosmic whirls of foam in a coffee cup.
Feb 19 and 20 Contempt (1963)
That’s what Brigitte Bardot has for husband Michel Piccoli–but why? Does she think he used her to get that lucrative assignment from overbearing American producer Jack Palance? Or does she just “not love him anymore?” Given international stars, an Alberto Moravia best-seller, and the biggest budget of his career, Godard still managed to overturn movie conventions while producing a meditation on post-Hollywood filmmaking.
Feb 26 and 27 Band Of Outsiders (1964)
“All you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun.” – Godard.
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Additional/Ongoing:
Sound Unseen
1st Wednesday each month: Dec 2, Jan 6 and Feb 3
Last October, the Trylon was pleased to host five days of Sound Unseen, the annual music in film festival. Now we’ve decided to make it a year-round thing. So this December Sound Unseen returns to the Trylon with monthly screenings. Details.
Dreamland Faces
3rd Wednesday each month: Dec 16, Jan 20 and Feb 17
After supplying the bewitching accompaniment to last July’s Buster Keaton series at the Trylon, the band Dreamland Faces is back to perform accompaniment and otherwise to a selection of 16mm features and shorts. Details.
Trash Film Debauchery - Traumatized Children Series
4th Wednesday each month: Dec 23, Jan 27 and Feb 24
Your friends at TFD will be presenting a series of bizarre and unbelievable children's movies from across the globe. Prepare yourselves for psychological scarring. Night light and blankie necessary. Details.
All films show at The Trylon twice on each date, the first show beginning at 7:00 PM, immediately followed by the second. Tickets for all shows can be purchased online at Brown Paper Tickets as they become available.
The Trylon microcinema is located at:
3258 Minnehaha Avenue S
Minneapolis, MN 55406
Info Line: 612.424.5468
This is all great stuff Dan, and frankly seeing these films in this fashion is far more preferrable than following the new release schedule if time is an issue, as it usually is. Of course the Archers (Powell and Pressburger) line-up is incomparable. That same Technicolor remaster of THE RED SHOES that is coming to Minny is just now finishing a two week run at Manhattan's film "mecca" the Film Forum, and in fact the other three have run there over the past year. Of the four Godards, two of them rank among his greatest films, CONTEMPT and TWO OR THREE THINGS I KNOW ABOUT HER. The Johnny Deep festival is rather unique though, as rarely do you get a retro of a contemporary actor. Of course we do know what the best ones are from that lot.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy, a great time to be had here!
Thanks for the recommendations again, Sam. I've only seen Contempt - recently here at another theater, but would like to see his others. And I'm also really interested to see Black Narcissus, as I've heard so much about the matte backgrounds.
ReplyDeleteGlad to have the Trylon here in town - it's the only way we have any chance of catching up with you in New York.