Category: Dallas

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THE WORLD’S END at the AGFA Secret Screening #79 at the Richardson, Texas Alamo Drafthouse, 10/7/2020

Edgar Wright’s pub crawl comedy oddball was the first movie ever screened for the public at the opening of the Alamo Drafthouse location in Richardson back in 2013. As of October 7, 2020, it’s also the last movie that they’re going to show for awhile because all North Texas Alamo locations are closed up again. The announcement came that same day.

Hey, it’s 2020 and we can’t have nice things. Hollywood aren’t taking chances with their hyped releases in theaters during a pandemic and the crowds aren’t ready–or haven’t yet been convinced–to come back. Many Alamos in the US remain open, as of this writing, but in North Texas, they’ve decided to step back into indefinite hibernation. It’s just temporary, they say, but who knows?

So, host and local Alamo creative director James Wallace treated Secret Screening #79, the show’s seventh anniversary to the day, like it was the last.

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DISMEMBER THE ALAMO at the Richardson, TX Alamo Drafthouse 10/26/19

So, you like horror movies, but can you sit in a theater for a ten-hour marathon of them? And can you do it even when each one is kept a secret so you don’t know what the hell you’re gonna see?

Sure, you can! It’s like trick or treat. All you know about this show is that your butt’s going to be numb when it’s all over and you’re going to see a lot of people die. Also, the coolest thing about it is they don’t show anything that this theater has shown before, which means that they have to dig deep and go for the weird stuff.

It gets you in the Halloween spirit.

Me, I’m a broken-down old creep. I don’t really do Halloween anymore. Maybe I’ll put on a Cramps record or watch some old horror movie faves (Arrow’s new An American Werewolf in London Blu-ray restoration should be in my hot little hands this week, says Amazon) in October, but I don’t carve pumpkins or wear costumes. I mostly enjoy the fall weather and rationalize eating some candy. That’s my idea of a party.

So the annual Dismember the Alamo horror-o-rama pretty much IS Halloween to me. Everyone’s in a good mood. Anticipation fills the room. Some people show up in costumes. Next thing you know, even a little introverted mosquito like me chit-chats with the guy in the next seat about the movie we just saw and what the hell might hit us next. (This year’s theme was creepy-crawlies. Snakes and bugs and worms, oh my!)

In other words, it’s a great show. It’s the kind of show that blasts your brain with movies like THESE:

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The Great Dallas, Texas Blackout of June 2019

Blackout selfie

Blackouts can be fun. I learned this back in in 1988 or ’89 when God decided to kick the shit out of the city one summer night with one of the angriest storms I’d ever seen in my life. The rain landed like bullets on the roof of our house and the wind could have carried away your grandma. Somewhere in that assault our electricity conked out and we–my mother, my younger sister and I–had to step away from the TV and gather together by candlelight. The whole night after that was made up of firelight and faces and lots of pitch black space that we filled with conversation.

Nobody had a cellphone that was in desperate need of charging. Nobody had essential information sitting on a now inaccessible computer. All that we lost were the lights and the TV and the refrigerator and we could live without those for a spell. What we had was each other, and that was worth more than what we’d temporarily lost. We were in good shape.

I would have been 11 or 12 at the time and I think that night was formative in my present day love of the baddest of bad weather. An ice storm approaching. An evil black cloud taking over the sky in the middle of a spring day. Thunder. Lightning. Frantic reports from the weatherman.

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A DECEMBER TO DISMEMBER at the Richardson, TX Alamo Drafthouse,12/8/18

The best thing about Christmas is the day off from work.

The second best thing about Christmas are Christmas horror movies. I’m decrepit enough to remember when Silent Night, Deadly Night was a major media controversy, mostly for its poster that some felt was too disturbing for the kids of 1984 to see. At the time there were also very few Christmas horror movies (there was pretty much just Black Christmas and maybe Christmas Evil, when it came to what you could find at the video store back then). Exploitation filmmakers just didn’t go there often.

Whole different story today. Now, kids come out of the womb already jaded and no one bats an eye at a Santa slasher or a few severed heads rolling under the Christmas tree anymore–and we have about seven thousand holiday hack-’em-and-slash-’em flicks for your approval.

Where to start? The creeps at the Alamo Drafthouse in Richardson are here to help with their SECOND annual Christmas horror mini-marathon. My kinda holiday party.

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DISMEMBER THE ALAMO at the Richardson, TX Alamo Drafthouse, 10/27/18

You know what the weirdest thing is about sitting in a movie theater for nine hours to watch five horror films in a row?

When it’s over and your eyes feel like poached eggs and your ass is numb and your legs are stiff and you sorta zombie-walk back to your car and all of the popcorn, beer, milkshakes and pizza that you’ve taken in are starting to do weird things in your stomach… you kinda still want to sneak in one more movie. (Whether you prefer that sixth movie at home or in a theater depends, I guess, on your feelings about using public restrooms.)

It’s insane, but when the show is good and you lived through it, you become a proud weirdo.

And these Alamo Drafthouse bastards do this thing well.

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ALLIGATOR and CRUEL JAWS at Tuesday Night Trash at the Texas Theatre (7/3/18)

 I have no 4th of July plans this year, so Tuesday Night Trash was sort of my unofficial barbecue pool party minus the barbecue and the pool.

Instead, I got a double-feature of low-budget Jaws rip-off films, a full bar and a good crowd at the best movie theater in Dallas. And that’s better, if you ask me.

I don’t want to hang out by a swimming pool anyway until I’ve lost about fifteen (okay, twenty) pounds. What I need is a nice, dark room.

In any case, this show put me right in the Independence Day spirit.

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BLOOD SUCKERS FROM OUTER SPACE at “Tuesday Night Trash” at the Texas Theatre, 6/12/18

I’ve got to stop sleeping on these Tuesday Night Trash shows. And I mean literally sleeping. As I slide further into the “old bag” stage of life, your humble reporter prefers to be in bed late Tuesday nights with a book in his hands and two cats sleeping on his legs like the old woman that he never thought he’d become.

That said, I’ve been to Tuesday Night Trash before. I saw Blood Freak for the first time there. And Decoder. It introduced me to Roller Blade. And it was where I finally got to see Plan 9 From Outer Space on a big screen. And those are just a few of the favors that Tuesday Night Trash has done for me at absolutely no admission charge (it’s a FREE SHOW, folks).

For the most part though, I choose to stay in instead of hitting I-35 toward Oak Cliff come Trash night to make the usual 9:15 start time.

However, maybe it’s time to change my ways because last Tuesday’s screening of Blood Suckers From Outer Space was hilarious fun. Inspiring, even. And I want to do it again.

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