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It is Second Saturday Silent Cinema day! The best Saturday!

The Music Box, the little indy cinema near my place, does silent films every second Saturday of the month, with live organ accompaniment. I'm not well-versed in early cinema, particularly, but of course the best way to learn is to do, and so I go. It's a good time, everyone there is a dork like me, and I get popcorn with fake butter, which I love.

Someone the other day, when I wrote about Going On Adventurs, suggested I should make a book out of Adventuring, sort of an Introvert's Guide To Getting Out More, and I think it's kind of a good idea. But there's no reason I can't be instructional on the blog, as well.

Most independent cinemas survive through grants and special events, because attendance at independent films is not really always all that great. Music Box does a lot of events; Second Saturday Silent Cinema is just one of them. One very easy way to Get Out More, if such is your desire (there's nothing wrong with Mostly Staying In) is to go to movies at independent cinemas, because there's a much higher ratio of people-going-alone to people-going-with-family/friends/partners, and it doesn't feel as weird to be buying a single ticket. And because most events cater to specific interests, like National Theatre Live or Silent Cinema, you're more likely to be with people who dork out over this stuff like you do. Seriously, when I went to the summer sunday Disney matinee, there were way more grownup Disney dorks than there were parents with children. When I went to the National Theatre Live, which was showing Frankenstein with Benedict Cumberbatch, I believe I may have sat directly behind the entire LJ Sherlock fandom in Chicago.

Plus you're supporting independent small business, and independent filmmaking, which is sometimes pretentious but often less strangled by convention than studio films. So check your local independent movie house, and see what's playing!

And with that, I'm off to the picture show. Be good while I'm gone. No throwing Milk Duds.

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And he's back from the moving pictures.

I saw Show People, which is a really remarkably funny film -- a silent picture made after the talkies had already started up, but not long after, and honestly I don't know that it would be improved by being a talkie. It makes really good use of the text frames as transitions; I wanted to share the film with you guys but I can't find it online, but you can see a great use of transitional text frames about halfway through this clip. The faces are funnier on the big screen; Marion Davies does some of the best mugging I've ever seen, especially later in the film when she's trying to school her features into an upper-class sneer.

The film is notable for having a ton of big stars who did cameos in it, including Charlie Chaplin. I've seen pictures of Chaplin without the traditional Chaplin Face, and I've seen Chaplin films, but I've never seen him out of makeup in a film. I think I know why he used to wear really baggy clothing as a costume: it's to mask the fact that he has a great big giant head. Seriously, it's huge. You can see a clip here (forgive the voiceover) where he asks for Peggy Pepper's autograph and she has no clue who he is.

It's interesting too the different vibe you get from seeing this kind of film in this kind of setting. There's no pre-show slideshow or ads; the organist, who also runs the Silent Cinema series, gets up and does a little talk about the film, and then we just jump right in. I know in old movie houses there'd be a newsreel, a cartoon, maybe a trailer, and then the feature, but it's just so different from the popcorn ad - fifteen trailers - silence-your-phones announcement - Anti-Piracy ad - MPAA Rating - finally-the-film setup that you get now.

Next time I'm totally going in character as someone seeing a film in the twenties -- not outwardly, just in my head. Gee whiz! A new picture! Say, I better see if I have an extra dime for a Nehi soda. I ain't JP Morgan, yanno.

Because secretly I am nine years old and love playacting.