I don't know what the future holds...

maybe movie-going as a mass experience will end, sooner rather than later. Maybe the latest releases will simply drop into our smartphones like a gentle rain to beguile us when we are stuck on the Red Line. That having been said, before the hammer falls, if someone wanted to revive the campy humor-driven "Adam West Style" version of Batman, then I say turn the whole thing over to the "Kingsman" creatives, Director Matthew Vaughn & perhaps Channing Tatum as Bruce Wayne. Tatum would be nigh perfect, he has a dry delivery in his performance toolbox, one that is very "Westian" and wears well on the Big Screen. I can already hear him saying "I'll explain all that later Robin!". I have no casting ideas on Robin (suggestions anyone?) but I know I'd pay good money to see Emma Stone play "Batgirl", I see a light of cinema mischief in that actress' eye! James Franco as "Two Face" anyone? Its the part he was born to play!!! or Katherine Heigl as "Poison Ivy"? I could go on...notional casting is a game I like to play.... The main problem with the "Kingsman" franchise is the films go "pear shaped" in the final reel, but a revival of "Batman '66" solves all that, everything ends with a loopy lyrical brawl with multiple jobbers...simple! I wonder who has the remake rights to the original "Batman: The Movie"?? This will never happen, it plays to too small an audience, and we are lucky even to have gotten two final "West and Ward" animated features out of this, the first true Bat Franchise...but its fun to think about all the same.

Alas,

we read this week of the untimely death of David Pendleton, programmer for the Harvard Film Archive, and if repertory film had a Local Lion, it was ever himself. This is a blow to our Sacred Cause My Friends. Pendleton, had serious film chops, better than my own by any measure, he was a great believer in "The Comprehensive Retrospective" and it is only thanks to him and his willingness to get the content, that I, a mere dabbler Orsonologist could ever see Orson Welles thought-lost "Too Much Johnson Footage" or his infamous television pilot "The Gina Lollobrigida Story". It is thanks only to David Pendleton, thru the auspices of his "John Ford Retrospective" that I finally realized that John Wayne really could act and act well. And in these recent years as I grow older but ever in need of film education, the Harvard Film Archive and it's eclectic summer screenings have become a potent co-competitor with the Drive Ins for my attention & money. In life, Pendleton was a friendly low key man, he had impeccable taste, eminently approachable, not two months ago we briefly commiserated about the challenges of finding good quality subtitled Filipino cinema for revival. Here was a man with big budget and proven track record reviving obscure movies in a classy venue openly communing with the co-curator of an obscure repertory franchise that counts twenty tickets sold as "Success". Sometimes Channel Zero could out program Pendleton, on a one-off basis, but we could never beat him, he was too good at his job. His hard work and depth of knowledge was a solid asset to the HFA, I feel for anyone trying to step into Pendleton's shoes, it'll be a real job to honor the tradition. Film isn't dying, its changing...box office receipts are down for mainstream productions, VOD is pretty much the wave of the future, franchises like Channel Zero have iffy prospects over the intermediate term. Thats what makes David Pendleton's Programming so Important, as darkness falls, he proudly lit things up. Thank you David Pendleton, You Will Be Missed.

Run Don't Walk to the Somerville Theatre

there is still time to see "Mansfield 66/67" (2017) Ebersole & Hughes unique essay film/documentary on the decline and fall of Hollywood Blonde Bombshell, Jayne Mansfield, its a one week run that ends Thursday Night...so HURRY!! Long Before the Age of Trump, Instant D-List Celebrity, the Kardashians, Paris Hilton or "reality television", there was Jayne Mansfield, resolutely Hollywood B-List and the world's first true all up "Fame Junkie", a veritable "notorievore"movies, TV, husbands, kids galore, a dalliance with the Church of Satan, she loved attention...craved it, derived sustenance from it....this film doesn't delve into Jayne's "tormented psyche" it merely dances merrily thru her most picturesque neuroses and nigh operatic bids for adulation. Her sudden violent death in a car accident circa 1967 is the final irony, the family buried her in Pennsylvania, the very place Jayne had been physically, mentally & spiritually trying to escape since she was a 13 year old girl. She was in so many ways the "Jayne the Baptist", the Prophetess of the 21st Century, The Matron Saint of Publicity Stunts. For the Love of Ghod Please See This Movie!!