The 5th annual Turner Classic Movie Classic Film Festival kicks off one week from today, and like many fellow attendees, I’ve been poring over the festival schedule, trying to make my plans. Trying to decide between some of these events has been an absolutely wonderful problem to have. The movie schedule is a great mix of crowd-pleasing hits, lesser-known gems, and everything in between; not to mention all the additional events with some very highly respected historians and people in the film industry. Since this is my first time attending the festival, I want to try to experience a little bit of everything.
My main strategy for planning my TCMFF schedule is to do as many things as possible that I would not be able to do at home. Some movies on the schedule such as City Lights, The Wizard of Oz, and Imitation of Life are movies that I’ve either already seen on the big screen at least once or I know will be playing at theaters at home in the near future. So even though I adore City Lights, I did just go to a screening of it in December, which made my decision to go for Stella Dallas instead on Saturday morning a fairly easy one.
Although I’m trying to do things I can’t do at home, it’s not the only deciding factor. In theory, I would love to nothing but silent, foreign, lesser known titles, and new-to-me movies, but many of the screenings are more than just the movie. For opening night, I’m planning on going to the poolside screening of American Graffiti. Although I went to a screening of that movie a year or two ago, Paul Le Mat, Candy Clark, and Bo Hopkins weren’t there and there aren’t many chances to watch movies poolside in Michigan.
With my mission to experience things I can’t do at home, that means many of the Club TCM events are musts for me. I’ll be spending a good deal of time at there on Friday with the conversations with Richard Dreyfuss, William Friedkin, and Quincy Jones all happening that day.
So, here’s how my schedule is looking right now…
The Hollywood Revue 