A few weekends ago, a couple of friends and I went to the Hollywood Forever Cemetery screenings put on by Cinespia. I generally don't hang around cemeteries but I had been invited and it would have been rude not to go. For those of you who have never heard of Cinespia and their Cemetery Screenings, it is exactly what it sound like. Throughout the summer months, movies are projected onto the side of a mausoleum ranging from Hollywood Classics to Cult films and the audience sits (not on graves) and eat dinner.
When I arrived with my friends after an hour in traffic (because you have to drive to get to the outdoors,) I had the overwhelming feeling that we came unprepared. We had stopped by a Fresh and Easy to pick up some snacks (hummus, wine, pasta) but when we got there, people (obviously veterans) had portable barbecues, lawn chairs, coolers, pillows, etc. You pay a $10 "donation" to get in (I put donation in quotes because I always think of donations as optional like, maybe I want to pay $5 this week but $20 the next, but you actually have to pay the $10...which is fine because it goes to the cemetery and upkeep, but still...) Some dj's played some music to entertain us as we set up our blankets and ate dinner. The smell of weed wafted over to our area and as the sun set over the tombstones,our movie began. The Coen Brother's classic: Raising Arizona
Here's a trailer!
It's possibly the only good movie Nicholas Cage has ever starred and it seemed like the audience knew it because he practically received a standing ovation by the crowd when he stepped into frame. That sort of thing is probably the best part of going to a cemetery screening --people go out of their way to get here and watch this movie and as a result, seem to become much more involved in what is going on, making for an overall more enjoyable movie going experience than one might get at the traditional multiplex.
The evening had started out warm but a quarter way through the movie, grew uncomfortably chilly. I tried to imagine I was in an over air conditioned theater but when the bugs started biting, the illusion was broken.
It kind of surprised me, the amount of people who attended this event. It takes a lot of effort to actually go outside of your house in Los Angeles, and then add to that, you have to get out of your car...it doesn't seem very likely. Cinespia feels like a cross between summer camp and a movie theater. Although it was my first time there, I noticed people greeting each other in line, like they were seeing each other for the first time after a long school year. But the screening we went to was the penultimate showing, signaling not just the end of this seasons Cinespia, but the end of summer.
The movie finished and the audience walked back through the cemetery, underlight creepily by multicolor lights....to liven up the place? like zombies walking back to their graves...sorrry. lame joke.
anyways, good times all around
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