Seeing Kane on the Big Screen

[Michael O'Hara]

Well, last night was the big night. The Palace Theater in Albany is quite nice. The entire downtown was decorated with Christmas lights. A stranger to this town might think it’s a nice locale, but unfortunately if you travel about 3 blocks west of the theater you enter a run down slum with a healthy amount of random violence.

They restored the marquee of the Palace a couple of years ago. Seeing it illuminated and announcing the arrival of Kane was quite thrilling. The interior is a tad run down, but it has retained a vintage look that adds to its charm. Nothing inside screams 2006. Nice architecture. A grand ceiling. You know, the usual old time theater essentials. It takes you back to when entertainment was respected and people had more class.

I was not sure what sort of print they would have. It turned out to be a very watchable one, although with a lot of dirt and debris. It looked like the “News on the March” newsreel footage some of the time. During the snowy scenes outside the Boarding House it looked like little Charles was standing in a black sleet. But that was fine with me. I’ve been spoiled by DVD. It’s a nice change of pace. I don’t know if this is the 50th anniversary re-release print or not. It certainly looked dirty. As for the brightness, it was darker than the DVD, I suppose, but I could still see Joe Cotton quite clearly in the projection room. The sound system was strong and the voices and music echoed through the vast theater. The screeching bird sent most of the audience jumping out of their seats.

The screen was a decent size. I remember when the title came on and feeling a little bit of electricity run through me, since I had never seen it displayed so largely. The film was projected in a manner to utilize as much of the screen as possible, but the end result was valuable information being lost at the top and bottom of the screen. I’d say about 10% of the picture was off the screen. It was a tad distracting at first, but I got over it. They were doing the best they could.

There was a decent amount of people there. A good showing for a Wednesday night. Plenty of people with taste in this town. A couple of lines got a rumbling of laughter from the audience. “You’re too old to be called anything else” and “I’m drunk”. They were also amused by the breakfast scenes illustrating the decaying of the Kane’s marriage.

When we reached the scene when we enter Mr. Thatcher’s library I heard a distant melody begin. But no, this was not the sweet sound of Bernard Herrmann’s score; this was some lowlife slime bucket down in the front with a cell phone. Can you believe the nerve? I was irate. But it was over soon enough, so I pushed it out of my mind and enjoyed the show. The next interruption was an intermission, which brought the film to a screeching halt right in the middle of the Kane/Leland scene following the election. The scene was literally split right down the middle. A happy animated reminder to go to the lobby came on. I didn’t mind a touch of old fashioned goodness, even if it did disrupt this vital scene (“I told you I was drunk”).

Later, we were in the bedroom following Susan’s suicide attempt when, once again, this time from behind me, some rat fink with a cell phone again! The audacity! I can understand being irresponsible during Scary Movie 4 or something, but c’mon, this is CITIZEN KANE! Why not go urinate on the Mona Lisa while you are at it? I really can’t stand these people who are so self absorbed that they think their phone calls and their worthless, unimportant conversations are more important than the viewing pleasure of hundreds of others!!!!

I got my emotions back under control and enjoyed the rest of the film without incident. All said, it was a terrific experience and I’m glad I went. The theater also gave me their film schedule for the next 6 months. Many more classics are on the way. On the Waterfront. Rear Window. Apocalypse Now. Looks like I’ve got somewhere to go on Wednesday nights for a while.

[Terry]

People leave their cell-phone on because

a) they're waiting for a call and don't give a fart about you or that old film

b) they meant to turn it off, but forgot to do so

c) they meant to turn it off, but they don't know how.

[Michael O'Hara]

Yes, well, I suppose it could have been a mistake on someone's part and maybe they aren't the narcissistic, technology obsessed, yuppie slime that I make them out to be. But if they don't know how to turn it off then they shouldn't bring it into the theater in the first place.

I could hear the first part of the conversation: "Hello?"......"Watching a movie". And they say it like they're in their living room or something. If you are going to a see a film wouldn't you not want to be distrubed?

I wouldn't bring a phone in there. I don't even own a real cell phone. I have a Tractphone (the kind you buy minutes for with a card) that I keep in the car just in case I break down along the road. I won't ever turn into one of these phone people, talking to an invisible man in line at the grocery store. 10 years ago someone acting like that would have their head examined. And these nuts out on the road with all their gadgets in their hands putting my life at risk. But I understand that people need to go with the hip trends, even if they cause cancer of the brain. Fate will deal them a worse hand than I or any movie house usher ever could.

But what can't wait 2 hours? Civilization has managed to survive for thousands of years without the ability to contact anyone at anytime for any reason (although Ambersons didn't).

It doesn't matter. Not even an occasional interruption could ruin the thrill of seeing Kane on the big screen. Maybe I can whisper in someone's ear and get Ambersons shown.....

[Terry]

Maybe it's just what Tarkington was predicting, the change in men's minds wrought by automobiles, the people who travelled faster and had less time to spare. The attention deficit disorder editing on all tv programs and most films compounds the matter. A person with a horse-drawn buggie and no tv set wouldn't be tainted by the nervous edginess of NOW NOW NOW. I gave up going to the cinema or to live music concerts years ago because people always ruined it for me. It's worse to pay 60 bucks for a concert ticket and be sandwiched by drunks who came to hear themselves talk (until alcohol is banned at concert venues, I'll never waste my money on a ticket again.) There's a great radio blooper of Jon Anderson from Yes announcing that the next Yes tour is called "The Shut the Fuck Up and Listen Tour." I couldn't agree more, but unfortunately no one ever did either.

[Michael O'Hara]

Oh yes, the concert experience. I try to get to at least one concert a year. This year I won free lawn tickets to the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young show (which was phenomenal, by the way), but as usual, I'm crammed up against the barricade trying to claim my territory and people just smush right up against you and you spend most of the show getting elbowed in the back by some foul mouthed teenager and his posse of inebriated ghouls. I know we’re all different and we all enjoy ourselves in our own ways, so I don’t take issue with them. What can you do? You can’t control the world. It’s just kind of sad that there is less respect for one another these days, and less respect for ones self. People seem to have no problem airing their dirty laundry in public or spewing a blue streak of profanity with complete disregard of everyone in the vicinity, even little children.

I still get to the cinema as much as I can, and most of the time it’s a good experience. Once in a while there are some snickering nincompoops chattering away behind me for the whole show, but that’s a rare thing. I tend to go to a less popular mall where the crowds are a little tamer.

I like your Tarkington analogy. Maybe someone can make an updated Ambersons where the problem isn’t the automobiles, but the coming of the cellular phone and the Internet and how it changes our way of life. Aunt Fanny puts all her money into an Internet Service Provider that turns out to be a bust.

“Cell Phones are a useless nuisance. Never amount to anything but a nuisance. They had no business to be invented.”

“But Cell Phones have come. And almost all outward things are going to be different because of what they bring.”

[Glenn Anders]

That's a nice extrapolation, Michael.

Two observations about your experience.

1) Just as there is a problem with cell phones running into the future, there is a problem with dwelling overmuch about films in the past. If we could simply try to see a film with fresh eyes, and overlook little imperfections. Theater goers in the old days did that, and few complained unless the film caught fire -- which, back then, might send them to hospital. For instance, if you were seeing CITIZEN KANE for the first time, you would not notice Joseph Cotten in the screening room. In fact, if you were seeing the picture in 1941, you probably would not be able to recognize Jo Cotten, nor would you care.

2) I am pretty certain that they must be showing 16mm prints on two reels for your classics series because I used to do that in the classroom, and I always had to change the reels at the point you remark. The kids always asked, "What'd he say?"

If the showing was a 16mm print, it answers a lot of our questions. Those have not been used commercially in 40 years.

Check with Todd Baesen. He used to smuggle them in from Canada.

But, anyway, I'm glad you had a good experience. CITIZEN KANE is the best American black and white film ever made, or pretty near.

Glenn

[Michael O'Hara]

Thanks for that info. I am glad that I got to see a classic print of the film. I was afraid it would be some DVD projection, and that's something I can see at home. Not very special.

You're right about the audience distractions. It's part of the experience. I will try not to let it get to me so much. I liked the imperfections of the film quality. I was hoping for a true experience, and I got it. I wanted the real deal, not a digital approximation.

I never minded seeing Joe in the projection room, and the common man probably doesn't notice it. But since there was some talk about it earlier in this topic I made a mental note to watch for it to see if the DVD brightness is to blame for his unveiling in the darkness. It is not. He's seen just as easily here.

I plan on returning to the theater for Rear Window in January. There was much discussion regarding the merits of the recent restoration found on the current DVD, so I'd be interested in seeing what it really looks like, assuming that the theater will be showing an old 16MM of it too.

Who do I have to bribe to get "Lady From Shanghai" shown?

[Glenn Anders]

Mike, others here, such as Roger Ryan can fill you in on restoration. It's not so much that you are seeing REAR WINDOW as "the real thing" on a 16mm print, but that you are seeing it as people did see it for many years. The restoration process, at its best, tries to give patrons today a film as it was when it came out. Sometimes the technicians get it right, sometimes they don't. It is always possible that your theater's owners will get a newly struck print of the restoration of REAR WINDOW, but from your description, I doubt it. They sound as if they are film buffs, like ourselves.

THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI may be tough. Todd Baesen has gone straight for years. At times, like when he bonded so quickly with Kruel Karl Kickery, the bartender at the Ha-Ra Club, I've suspected that Baesen is in a witness protection program. The influence of Whitey Bulger has spread far and wide.

I'll ask Larry French what he can find out.

Glenn