Another lovely weekend
This was the last weekend of the CAPA Summer Movie series. This is a bunch of classic movies played at the Ohio Theater - an 80 year old beautiful venue all done up in baroque style where the symphony concerts usually take place. The tickets are $3.50, but Christin had a coupon, so we got them for $1.85. Unfortunately, we kept forgetting to use them - so we did this weekend. We saw Once Upon a Time in the West on Thursday, The Third Man on Friday, and Shall We Dance on Sunday.
Once Upon a Time in the West is a spaghetti western - the first I had ever seen. It had 15 pages of dialog for a 3 thour movie. I think I don't really like spaghetti westerns - it was nothing but staring! Tension kept building, but it didn't seem to build towards anything. Charles Bronson played a character with no name - which I hear is typical.
The Third Man was interesting. I already knew the big twist, on account of a Pinky and the Brain episode. I think it might have been a comedy. In the most intense moments of the film, comedic style soundtrack started playing. Much of the movie consisted of the main character mispronouncing people's names. Other than that, the main character was a bit of a doofus, and he got people killed. It was not good. It was an odd film, all told.
Shall We Dance was the 1937 Fred Astair and Ginger Rodgers film, not the recent Japanese film or its American remake. I had never before seen a Fred Astair and Ginger Rodgers film, and it was good fun - although the end made no kind of sense. But it was one of those films that was made before you needed to have plot.
Saturday was the all-day meeting of the Columbus Area Board Gaming society. In the morning we went to the Farmer's market and got squash and tiny tiny eggplants, which I will put in pasta sometime this week. It's full-on squash season, and that is making us very happy. Now if only our plant would get its act together ;) Oh well. The board gaming society was good fun, as always, and we got a chance to play Last Night on Earth. It's supposed to be the most realistic zombie game ever devised - and it is almost impossible for the humans to win. Which is right and proper. It's actually a really good game. Joel-Henry and I now want to try to design a game based specifically on "Night of the Living Dead." It should be good fun.
We left the boardgaming society early to go catch the Columbus Children's Theater production of Sweeny Todd. Most of the actors were actually undergraduates in College - which is good, because that play enacted by people under 13 would worry me. Also, it's hard to find basses at that age. The lead actor was fantastic - actually, the whole production was really great. And a girl from my department was in it - huzzah! It was a very small theater - black box, really - so the chorus was all up the aisles for the ballade scenes, so the sound just surrounded you. It was an awesome effect. But even though the audience was so close, they never broke the fourth wall. It was extremely well done. And there were things in it I've never seen before - like Lucy singing a lullaby melodically based on "Poor Thing" at the end there... It was all around awesome. Because we had to run from the gaming society, we hadn't had dinner, so after the show we went to TeeJaye's for breakfast and one of their awesome hot fudge sundays. By the time we were driving home, Joel-Henry had smiled so much that it hurt his face. Oh, what a trouble to have :)
Basically, an awesome weekend.
Once Upon a Time in the West is a spaghetti western - the first I had ever seen. It had 15 pages of dialog for a 3 thour movie. I think I don't really like spaghetti westerns - it was nothing but staring! Tension kept building, but it didn't seem to build towards anything. Charles Bronson played a character with no name - which I hear is typical.
The Third Man was interesting. I already knew the big twist, on account of a Pinky and the Brain episode. I think it might have been a comedy. In the most intense moments of the film, comedic style soundtrack started playing. Much of the movie consisted of the main character mispronouncing people's names. Other than that, the main character was a bit of a doofus, and he got people killed. It was not good. It was an odd film, all told.
Shall We Dance was the 1937 Fred Astair and Ginger Rodgers film, not the recent Japanese film or its American remake. I had never before seen a Fred Astair and Ginger Rodgers film, and it was good fun - although the end made no kind of sense. But it was one of those films that was made before you needed to have plot.
Saturday was the all-day meeting of the Columbus Area Board Gaming society. In the morning we went to the Farmer's market and got squash and tiny tiny eggplants, which I will put in pasta sometime this week. It's full-on squash season, and that is making us very happy. Now if only our plant would get its act together ;) Oh well. The board gaming society was good fun, as always, and we got a chance to play Last Night on Earth. It's supposed to be the most realistic zombie game ever devised - and it is almost impossible for the humans to win. Which is right and proper. It's actually a really good game. Joel-Henry and I now want to try to design a game based specifically on "Night of the Living Dead." It should be good fun.
We left the boardgaming society early to go catch the Columbus Children's Theater production of Sweeny Todd. Most of the actors were actually undergraduates in College - which is good, because that play enacted by people under 13 would worry me. Also, it's hard to find basses at that age. The lead actor was fantastic - actually, the whole production was really great. And a girl from my department was in it - huzzah! It was a very small theater - black box, really - so the chorus was all up the aisles for the ballade scenes, so the sound just surrounded you. It was an awesome effect. But even though the audience was so close, they never broke the fourth wall. It was extremely well done. And there were things in it I've never seen before - like Lucy singing a lullaby melodically based on "Poor Thing" at the end there... It was all around awesome. Because we had to run from the gaming society, we hadn't had dinner, so after the show we went to TeeJaye's for breakfast and one of their awesome hot fudge sundays. By the time we were driving home, Joel-Henry had smiled so much that it hurt his face. Oh, what a trouble to have :)
Basically, an awesome weekend.