Calendar: March 5-11, 2021
Our movie and media Calendar appears every Friday/Saturday on C-U Blogfidential and caters to the downstate region anchored by Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, USA.
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MILESTONES | Happy Birthday to You!
3/9: Meredith Dumyahn (producer/director, WSEC-TV (PBS), Springfield-Jacksonville, IL)
3/9: Jason Lindsey (commercial photographer, Jason Lindsey Photography, Champaign-Urbana, IL)
3/10: Danielle Cloutier (administrative assistant, creative production, Netflix, Los Angeles, CA)
FIELD REPORT DU HQ | From Wherever It May Be Said
Ready for a dip into the ol’ déjà vu, friends? Not long ago, I watched Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s monster mash RAMPAGE on television and finally realized earlier this week how it felt familiar, but not because it adapts the classic Bally/Midway arcade game I played when I was young. Considering the cliché-yet-oddball plot, wherein animals become genetically mutated and enlarged by accident due to science gone awry and are attracted to Chicago via radio frequency in order to deal with them, it’s really a loose and high-gloss remake of the low-budget schlock film BEGINNING OF THE END, first released in 1957 and eventually welcomed with open arms by the UI Insect Fear Film Festival crowd.
Not two days later, I happened upon an item in The Hollywood Reporter about a spec script called “Teddy and the Guardians of the Night” being developed for Netflix with Johnson attached as a co-producer. The project is based on a singular piece of DeviantArt illustration by Greece native Alex Panagopoulos; one might honestly mistake it as production art for the 2018 Pens to Lens short film GOOD NIGHT LITTLE KNIGHT, which is about a gallant teddy bear who protects his human child from a wary dragon while she sleeps. Granted, the Panagopoulos image dates from at least 2013, when it was first optioned as a story source by New Line Cinema, and who’s to say whether the imaginative second-grade author of the screenplay turned into LITTLE KNIGHT had ever seen it before? Weird, I know.
And not a day after that, C-U Confidential cover model and real-world librarian Eric Sizemore referenced on Facebook the trials of psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich, whose inventions and papers were destroyed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the late Fifties due to the Austrian emigrant’s claims on sexuality and alleged research methods. This included the so-called Cloudbuster, a machine designed to affect the atmosphere by drawing on what Reich defined as “orgone energy” or “cosmic energy.” Also pointed out by Sizemore is a 1985 music video for the song “Cloudbusting” that stars Donald Sutherland as Reich and Kate Bush as his son Peter. They test the contraption while dark clouds swirl and government forces gather. Of course, it brings to my mind the neat stop-motion animation by Johnny Robinson, DR. ZOND CONTROLS THE WEATHER, which he created with students in New York before moving to Urbana in 2009.
I think, instead of crying “thief” at the ready parallels in these examples, let’s remember that good or novel ideas can be expressed in any number of ways successfully. I’ve never considered C-U Blogfidential a completely original endeavor in the grand scheme of film culture and could spend many minutes pointing out the valued models for every little Confidential thing. Yet as far as my eyes can see, even from this long a distance at the house on the edge of an American small town, there still has not been a contemporary and consistent attempt to relate the cinema directly to Champaign-Urbana and vice versa other than what we’ve been formulating right here since 2006 and overall since 1999. None of us know if there will be another to compliment CUBlog in the near future or supplant it eventually. Maybe our friends and neighbors will find it unnecessary. In the end, that’s not up to yours truly.
In the beginning, however, it all feels vital and fresh just like it did 22 years ago this week…
CONFIDENTIAL ALMANAC | Dates in Film Culture History
22 Years Ago … Wednesday, March 3, 1999: Novice self-publisher Jason Pankoke releases his first title, MICRO-FILM: The Warning Shot, at local merchants in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. The letter-size, 12-page booklet is inspired by twin interests in the latter Nineties: the resurgence of ‘zine culture in the United States and the growing prominence of independent cinema on a worldwide scale. Apart from essays waxing about his experiences with Hollywood media and niche cinematic arts that led him down the path to attempt MF|TWS, the one-off issue features interviews with personalities that Pankoke has met along the way such as Suzanne Twining of Philadelphia and Brien Burroughs of San Francisco, underground filmmakers whose works appeared as part of the local Freaky Film Festival, and Dennis Druktenis, a Chicagoland mail-order merchant of “monster kid” collectibles who edits the quarterly Scary Monsters magazine. Pankoke makes no bones with the faux-aggressive subtitle that loftier goals reside up his sleeve, and he would deliver on the promise several months later in October with a follow-up, the first full-blown issue of MICRO-FILM, revealed at the third annual Freaky Films showcase.
LOCAL FILMS & EVENTS | Support Your Media Storytellers
@ online Zoom
Illini Film & Video virtual meeting (3/8, 8 p.m.) Join mailing list
NOW PLAYING | Champaign-Urbana Area
@ AMC Champaign 13, Champaign, IL
BOOGIE, CHAOS WALKING, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, THE CROODS: A NEW AGE, TOM & JERRY, WONDER WOMAN 1984 (3/5 on), THE LITTLE THINGS (3/5-3/8, 3/10), FATALE (3/5-3/7, 3/9, 3/11)
@ Illini Union, UIUC, Urbana, IL
Illini Union Board presents “Spring 2021 Film Series” feat. LITTLE WOMEN (2019), The Courtyard Café, 1st floor (3/5, 7 p.m.; free w/i-card)
@ Phoenix Savoy 16 + IMAX, Savoy, IL
BOOGIE, CHAOS WALKING, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, BILLIE EILISH: THE WORLD’S A LITTLE BLURRY, THE CROODS: A NEW AGE, THE LITTLE THINGS, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING (IMAX), THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS, THE MARKSMAN, MONSTER HUNTER, NEWS OF THE WORLD, TOM & JERRY, WONDER WOMAN 1984 (3/5 on), UFC 259: Israel Adesanya vs. Jan Blachowicz, more (3/6, 9 p.m., simulcast)
@ Redbox, Champaign-Urbana, IL
ALL MY LIFE, CRISIS, FATALE, HALF BROTHERS, MONSTER HUNTER, SAVAGE STATE, more! (3/2 on) Online rentals
Events featuring locally produced movies are marked with an asterisk (*). Additional “Now Playing” and “Coming Soon” listings appear after the jump!
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NOW PLAYING | The Cities Beyond
@ AMC Classic Village Mall 6, Danville, IL
CHAOS WALKING, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, THE CROODS: A NEW AGE, THE LITTLE THINGS, TOM & JERRY (3/5-3/7)
@ AMC Peru Mall 8, Peru, IL
CHAOS WALKING, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, THE CROODS: A NEW AGE, THE MARKSMAN, NEWS OF THE WORLD, TOM & JERRY (3/5-3/7)
@ The Avon Theater, Decatur, IL
BLITHE SPIRIT, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, TOM & JERRY (3/5-3/7)
@ The Fischer Theatre, Danville, IL
Closed for the week.
@ The Little Lorraine, Hoopeston, IL
Closed for the week.
@ The Normal Theater, Normal, IL
MLK/FBI (3/5-3/7), THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (3/5, 10:30 p.m.), MY SALINGER YEAR (3/11), “Living Room Film Festival” virtual screenings: OUR RIGHT TO GAZE: BLACK FILM IDENTITES, SOPHIE JONES (3/5-4/1), 4th annual Sweded Film Festival (through 3/18), MINARI (3/5-3/7, 7 p.m.-11 p.m.) Purchase
@ The Onarga Theatre, Onarga, IL
Closed for the week.
@ The Princess Theatre, Leroy, IL
Closed for the week.
@ Roxy Cinemas, Ottawa, IL
CHAOS WALKING, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, LAND, MONSTER HUNTER, TOM & JERRY, WILLY’S WONDERLAND, WRONG TURN (3/5 on), THE CROODS: A NEW AGE (3/6-3/7)
@ Streator Eagle 6, Streator, IL
CHAOS WALKING, LAND, THE LORAX, RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON, TOM & JERRY (3/5 on)
NOW PLAYING | Midwest
For detailed and curated listings of Chicago-area film presentations and related events, as well as cancellations and postponements due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, please visit the fine folks at Cine-File and subscribe to their definitive “Cine-List” weekly blast.
COMING SOON | Area-wide Events
3/17-3/21
43rd Big Muddy Film Festival
@ The Varsity Center, SIU, Carbondale, IL
5/1
University of Illinois Student Film Festival
@ Urbana, IL (virtual event)
5/13-5/20
22nd Wisconsin Film Festival
@ Madison, WI (virtual event)
6/10-6/13
31st Onion City Experimental Film + Video Festival
@ Chicago Filmmakers, Chicago, IL
9/8-9/11
22nd Roger Ebert’s Film Festival
@ The Virginia Theatre, Champaign, IL
COMMUNITY & CAMPUS SERIES | Champaign-Urbana area
Illini Union Board presents “Spring 2021 Film Series”
@ The Courtyard Café, 1st floor, Illini Union, UIUC, Urbana, IL, 7 p.m. Fri., free w/i-card
3/5: LITTLE WOMEN (2019); 3/12: FRIDA; 3/19: ABOMINABLE; 3/26: SELENA; 4/2: MEAN GIRLS; 4/9: PARASITE; 4/16: THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION; 4/23: INCREDIBLES 2; 4/30: GHOSTBUSTERS (2016)
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Compiled by Jason Pankoke.
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“Calendar du C-U”
© 2021 Jason Pankoke/C-U Blogfidential