2007-09-17
I've attended every one of the annual Estes Park Film Festivals, which means that last weekend's was my second. The films are mostly below the radar of the larger film festivals, such as the one at Telluride, which I last attended about 15 years ago. They're all a bit rough, but about a third of them were terrific anyway, and, with two exceptions, I enjoyed even the bad ones.
Looking over the list of my favorites below, I see that they're all comedies. The serious films didn't seem to work, at least not for me.
- Super-Anon, the support group for the neglected children and siblings of super heroes. Sadly, the daughter of Wonder Woman and Superman can't even tear a plastic bag open. The Flash's brother is v-e-r-y s-l-o-w, but he's working on it.
- Last Stop for Paul, the almost-believable adventures of two guys on a low-budget around-the-world trip. They scam free hotel rooms by pretending to be from Frommers.
- Sleep in Heavenly Peace, about a man who loses both his arms trying to dig a grave for a dog, but carries on anyway. I don't mean carries on after weeks of rehabilitation; I mean carries on within minutes. Amazingly little loss of blood... maybe that's all the special-effects budget allowed.
- Life With Fiona, which is what a man lives through when he finally hooks up with Fiona, the girl of his dreams.
- Geocache, about weird, obsessed geocachers, who use GPS devices to locate buried treasure. (Billion-dollar satellites help them find Tupperware containers.) The best (worst) of them can find over a hundred in a day. From David Liban who also directed last year's Carhenge (Stonehenge made of cars in Alliance, Nebraska).
The chief beneficiary of the festival is the Park Theatre itself, which is badly in need of new paint. As if to spur ticket sales, they were painting it during the festival. Not an easy job, as the tower is about 65 feet high.
The Park Theatre claims to be the oldest theater west of the Mississippi built to show films that's still showing films. It was never a movie palace... just a big, wooden box. The theater was built in 1913 and the tower was added in the 1920s. Today the theater shows first-run films (such as The Bourne Ultimatum), but the seats are hard, the screen is small, far away, and torn, and the sound is murky. Everybody loves the Park Theatre anyway, especially at the festival.
The theater's most unusual feature isn't the tower. It's the lobby that sits between the projection booth and the auditorium.
In this picture, taken from just inside the front doors, the projection booth (1) is to the right. It projects across the lobby, through glass (2) into the auditorium (see below), which is to the left. You can just see the image on the glass. Some of the image is reflected back onto the opposite wall (3), which means you can follow the movie while you're buying popcorn at the refreshment stand (red-and-white awning to the right of the entrance). You might think that this arrangement compromises picture quality but, on the screen they have, it doesn't really matter.
It's great that the Park Theatre's in Estes Park, that it's still operating, and that it hosts the Film Festival each year. It's on the National Register of Historic Places, so it will be around for a while (although being on the Register is no guarantee of preservation). But I wouldn't want to see The Bourne Ultimatum there. (I saw it at a brand-new theater in Boulder... terrific movie.)
What the Park Theater really needs, even more than that long-overdue paint job, is a purpose besides the annual Film Festival and the occasional wedding. Keeping it around is a luxury that the Estes Park community can easily afford, and fortunately, they (we) seem to be doing OK, although I haven't seen the books. I just wish the theater could be self-sustaining, instead of a charity. It's in the best part of town, and land prices in Estes Park continue to go up...
(2023 Update: Quite a while ago the theatre went to digital projection and Dolby sound, and they're now playing first-run movies, with excellent projection. I live in Estes Park now, and we love going to the Park!)