11 Comments

I used to walk the 4 miles to the original West Newton Cinema as a kid. I was lucky. There also were the Paramount in Newton Corner and the Embassy in Waltham where I saw Hard Day’s Night and Help.

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Where can I send you a couple of movie related questions?

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Saw The Return of the Secaucus Seven thereway back when.

On another subject, last night I watched Au Hasard Balthazar on the Criterion Channel. Like EO, I was more affected by the donkey's story than the human's. After watching Balthazar I "Wikipediaed" the movie and read some of the critics' comments. No way did I see the Seven Deadly Sins apparently portrayed in the movie. Also some of the characters place in the movie were hard to follow in the narrative. There is no way I would see this as one of the greatest movies. I prefer Bresson's Diary of A Country Priest as a superior movie. And EO is a far better movie as well. My two cents.

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A few years ago, The Neue Galerie in NYC had a wonderful exhibit of Germany between the wars. Part of the installation included a small screen mounted in a wall showing parts of "M" on a loop. There was always a group of people watching--those who had seen it before and appreciated its greatness and those who had no idea what it was --but were just drawn in by the imagery and cinematography and stayed to watch it until the end of the loop. Still powerful and mesmerizing!

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Love & Basketball is streaming on HBO, not Netflix.

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The last time I went to see a film there nobody seemed to be in the building to take money for tickets. I left my $10 on the counter there and felt bad. It would be great to see that theater reborn.

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"M" is still shocking after 92 years! Another great film is back on Criterion, The Bedroom Window (1987).

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Do you know about renewtheaters.org? They might have some knowledge of strategies that have worked in other communities.

The County Theater in Doylestown had a lot of community funding to bring their theater update. We used to drive over there for movies before The Garden Theatre reopened.

Perhaps a local university or school would chip in? When The Garden closed Princeton University bought the building. Here's an article about the arrangement.

https://www.princeton.edu/news/2014/04/01/renew-theaters-will-operate-princeton-garden-theatre

Good luck with West Newton Cinema.

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Rye Lane is SO delightful and made me completely forget you told us it was a rom-com! LOL. What a wonderful movie for the night. Vivian is really something else and the two of them! Shoop. Shoop!

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