Plaza Classic Film Festival 2017: A Brief Preview

I am slightly wary about this year's Plaza Classic Film Festival.  Last year was not an experience I will look back on with undiluted pleasure, to quote Her Majesty.

This year, though, I will be more optimistic.  I have nine films I plan to review out of the ten I plan to see (National Lampoon's Animal House, which I've never seen, is the only one I plan to watch for the sheer enjoyment of watching).

In fact, if everything goes correctly and I do end up seeing all the films I have planned to see, it will mark the first year where every film I see is one I'll see for the first time.  Even better, four out of those nine will be free, and the grand total should be $25.

They are, in alphabetical order:

• Abbott & Costello Meet the Invisible Man
• Ashes and Diamonds
• The Atomic Cafe
• Cronos
• The Heart Outright
• Persistence of Vision
• The Rescuers
• Xanadu

There is also the PCFF's traditional short film anthology series, The Good, The Bad, and the Indie Volume 13, a series I've wanted to attend but never have so far.

One of those films, The Heart Outright, has local connections and has not had a major release that I know of.   I do enjoy finding new films and sincerely hope it are good.

My only worry when it comes to those is that I'll almost inevitably have either an usher or someone involved with the productions essentially 'freak out' should they see me with my notebook or scribbling my notes.  It seems that from time to time at the PCFF, someone sees this and feels compelled to ask what I am doing.  I find this most irritating, and the fact that they genuinely look puzzled when I tell them I'm an actual, legitimate critic is more frustrating.

I don't know why some people genuinely refuse to believe me, and think I'm trying to do something nefarious.  I'm seriously debating whether to let them know before the film starts who I am and what I'm doing, though I figure if I do that, they simply won't believe me.

I've never liked Abbott & Costello.  Apart from their 'Who's On First' routine, I never found them funny.  Perhaps I'll change my mind.  Ashes and Diamonds, along with Cronos, are my forays into foreign-language films.  As hard as it might be to believe,  I've never seen The Rescuers, and am so intrigued by what I've been missing all these years.

Well, that's it, reporting early from the 2017 Plaza Classic Film Festival.  I hope this year, on their tenth anniversary, things go much better than last.