Mixed Tape Productions

By Joe Scott

Between May and July of this year, we comic book fans are living in a time of nerd fantasy.  And no, I am not referring to a non-stop convention of women who dress up as Princess Leia with the outfit she wore in Jabba’s Palace. I’m talking about the Ultimate Comic Book Movie Summer of 2012.

Growing up in the ‘80s and ‘90s, like many of my fellow fanboys, I suffered through the indignities of Joel Schumacher’s Batman movies, Dolph Lungren’s “The Punisher,” Nicholas Cage’s thank-God-they-killed-it-in-pre-production Death of Superman film, as well as the rumors in Wizard Magazine that Fabio was “in serious negotiations” to star in a movie based on “The Mighty Thor.”

If a time traveler were to go back to those years and tell me A) that Hollywood produced no less than five movies based on Marvel Superheroes who were not Spider-Man or Wolverine, all of which led up to a massive team-up Avengers film, and B) that a talented director was allowed to present a bold, daring vision of Batman in one of cinema’s greatest trilogies ever made*, I would probably have said something along the lines of “Holy f_ck, you’re a time traveler!”

In all seriousness, though, being alive for the Ultimate Comic Boom Movie Summer of 2012 feels like a waking dream. Now that we’ve made it this far, the ridiculous things we never dared to hope for could come true. Anything is possible! For instance, Quentin Tarantino could be hired to write and direct a Wonder Woman movie with copious shots of her bare Amazonian feet. Marvel could cash in on “The Walking Dead” craze by producing an alternate universe Marvel Zombies film. We could even see a six-hour DC vs. Marvel crossover movie event directed by none other than Terrance Malick himself.

Okay, so maybe I went too far with the last one, but the point I’m trying to make here is that while our society has yet to conquer world hunger or invent a flying car, in terms of producing comic book movies, we’ve come a long way. Things we used to only dare utter in online forum discussions are now playing on thousands of screens across the globe. Best of all, we get to watch our children grow up sans memories of nipple-suited Batmen who drive cars powered by disco lights.

The Mayans supposedly believed the world is supposed to end this year. So long as this happens after July 20^th, I think we can all agree that the humanity’s time on this earth ended on a high note.

Enjoy.

Joe Scott is the Creative Director of Mixed Tape Productions and the co-creator of the Mixed Tape Film Series.

By Joseph Wade

Stand By Me may have come as something of a surprise to audiences in 1986.  At the time, Stephen King was the top dog in popular horror, with film adaptations by Brian De Palma and Stanley Kubrick, and a solid library of bestselling horror novels.  Based on King’s novella “The Body,” Rob Reiner’s Stand By Me was something different. It was a coming-of-age story dripping in  ’50s nostalgia and encompassing all the insecurities that come with adolescence, with not a vampire or demonic car in sight.

 

Gordie (Wil Wheaton), Chris (River Phoenix), Teddy (Corey Feldman) and Vern (Jerry O’Connell) march through the backwoods of Castle Rock, Oregon thinking they’ll be heroes for discovering the body of Ray Brower, a kid their age who was hit by a train. Not far behind them is a high school thug named Ace (Kiefer Sutherland) and his gang of bullies, who want the recognition for themselves.

 

As Gordie and his friends navigate train tracks and leech-infested swamps, the boys air their grievances with the world one by one. Small talk like whether Mighty Mouse could beat up Superman gives way to deeper issues, such as Chris’ hatred of his family’s bad reputation, and Gordie coming to terms with the death of his parents’ favorite son.

 

While the film succeeds at recreating a 1950s setting that feels like a darker shade of Mayberry, its true strength lies in building the relationships between Gordie and his friends. Stand By Me lives and dies by the performances of its four leads, and each one gives their character considerable depth. These kids are forced to do a lot of growing up on their weekend journey, and while each confronts their problems in markedly different ways, the bond amongst the group grows noticeably deeper with each passing moment.

 

Stand By Me illustrates some of life’s harder lessons through trivial exchanges and minor trespasses. Vern, for example, learns that “two for flinching” means absolutely nothing; if someone wants to slug you in the arm, they’ll do it regardless of The Rules.  Teddy, on the other hand, has a hard time dealing with his father being institutionalized, and even the slightest insult sends him in to fits of rage.

 

Nobody wants to be called a weakling, and everyone wants to be a hero, or at least recognized as a tough guy. It’s not until late in the film that our boys understand the true meaning of masculinity. They do everything from taunting junkyard dogs to dodging trains, but eventually realize that being a man means more than acts of violence and hurled insults. It means standing up for yourself and those you love, even in the face of certain death.

 

Rob Reiner would go on to adapt another Stephen King story to much more chilling effect with 1990′s Misery. Of the two films, though, Stand By Me has easily fared better over time.  It’s a basic cable staple for lazy weekend afternoons, and continues to connect with new generations even today.  The 1950s may be further behind us, but the bond between friends and the trials of growing up will never become outdated.

Joseph “Jay Dub” Wade is a film critic from Greensboro, NC. He is a paid contributor for the movie news website www.SomethingAwful.com.

By Joseph Wade

During the 1991 awards season, no film could match the raucous energy of Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas. Even up against the pedigree of Francis Ford Coppola’s third Godfather film, Goodfellas clearly outmatched the competition at every turn. As charming and witty as it was brutally violent, the film turned the harsh light of day on one of cinema’s most alluring genres, and created one of its most enduring masterpieces in the process.

Goodfellas tells the story of Henry Hill (Ray Liotta), an idealistic kid who tells us, “As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.” During the 1960s and 1970s, Henry works his way through the ranks of the Lucchese crime family along with his associates Jimmy Conway (Robert De Niro) and Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci). Together, the three take on a number of heists and jobs that cement their status as wiseguys. Over time, that status is put to the test as Henry, Jimmy and Tommy fall victim to the many excesses offered by the Mafia lifestyle.

More than anything, Goodfellas is a much-needed demythologizing of the American gangster film. In the wake of such sweeping crime sagas as The Godfather and Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America, Scorsese’s film makes no attempt to gloss over the realities of the mob lifestyle. Heists are committed quietly and efficiently, and rats are disposed of just as easily. A single act of disrespect can get someone killed, while a well-placed bribe can grease just about any wheel. The film opens with Tony Bennett belting out “Rags to Riches,” and after witnessing Henry Hill slide ever deeper into the lifestyle, it closes with Sid Vicious howling through Frank Sinatra’s “My Way.”

By no means Scorsese’s first foray into crime drama, Goodfellas infuses the genre with a more modern sensibility than the director was known for at the time. Implementing quick cuts, a contemporary pop soundtrack and an often meandering camera style, Goodfellas eagerly thrusts its audience right into the thick of Henry Hill’s world. It is a colorful, energetic film that hooks viewers early and refuses to let go until they’ve seen what this world does to the people inside it.

Goodfellas earned six Academy Award nominations that year, including nominations for Best Picture, Best Direction, and Best Supporting Actress for Lorraine Bracco. The film’s only win of the night was awarded to Joe Pesci, beating out fellow gangsters Andy Garcia and Al Pacino for the honor of Best Supporting Actor.

Since its release, Goodfellas has found itself on numerous Best-Of lists, including the American Film Institute’s “100 Years, 100 Movies”, Time Magazine’s All-Time 100, and Roger Ebert’s “Great Movies” series. It has even been inducted into the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry. Having inspired scenes in such works as Swingers and The Sopranos, and parodied in everything from the Grand Theft Auto games to NBC’s Community, Martin Scorsese’s film about life in the Mafia remains an American classic that’s as popular as ever.

Joseph “Jay Dubs” Wade is a film critic from Greensboro, NC. He is a paid contributor for the movie news website www.SomethingAwful.com.

Before I review “The Hunger Games,” I want to promise my readers that I won’t accuse this film of ripping off the Japanese thriller “Battle Royale.”

I also want to assure the fans of the young adult novel by Suzanne Collins that I am one of you. Despite the seemingly random appearance of werewolves and the author’s frequent use of the word “stuff” as a catchall wonder-noun, I enjoyed the book a great deal because of its engaging, tough as nails female protagonist and potent theme that love and creation are far more challenging in this world than hate and destruction.

That said, I completely hated this movie. Its greatest failure comes from the fact that in trying to cram all of the plot details of a 384 page book into a 142 minute film, they rushed through the story, omitting its meaning as well as the reasons that made me care about the characters so much.

There’s no need to recount the plot as I’m certain most surface dwellers already know it by heart, but a crucial difference between the book and the film is the timespan in which the titular child-on-child televised bloodsport takes place. In Collins’ novel, the Hunger Games that Katniss Everdeen endures is no less than a two-week ordeal and surviving it requires our hero to be put through the wringer. She’s burned, she’s dehydrated, she’s stung by mutated bees with trippy LSD stinger venom, she loses her hearing in one ear, she watches a close ally die like a stuck pig, she watches another ally lose his leg to savage dog-beasts, and she gets cut in the face by a sadistic opponent. That she endures all of these setbacks and still manages to emerge from the Games with some shred of her humanity intact is something to applaud.

The Hunger Games that Katniss must endure in the film seems trivial by comparison. Katniss (played by Jennifer Lawrence) endures no more than three days of PG-13 rated turmoil and emerges co-victor with her District 12 buddy Peeta (played by the miscast Josh Hutcherson). Even worse, the movie omits the detail that concluded the novel so deftly: That Katniss is unsure of her true feelings for Peeta and only pretended to love him during the Games in an attempt to curry favor with the live TV audience.

Why would director and co-writer Gary Ross leave out this detail, which sets up the main conflict for the entire series? Were they worried it would alienate mainstream audiences? My guess is that the financiers who ponied up the cash for this film wanted to play it safe – the same strategy behind the movie’s key offense.

By choosing to play it safe, the film was clearly shot with a more commercial PG-13 rating in mind. Problem is, this is a story about children who are forced to kill each other with knives, arrows, blunt objects, and swords. Collins knew this when she wrote the book. She spares few visceral details when her child combatants meet their gruesome ends.

In shying – or cutting – away from the cruelty and savagery of their actions, Ross’ film takes the terrible act of children forced to murder other children and does something unforgivable by making it look casual. Brazilian filmmaker Fernando Meirelles understood this risk when he made his unflinching child gang war epic “City of God.” I can imagine right now that there are children reenacting the events from “The Hunger Games” as if they were ‘fun’ and ‘cool,’ thus replicating the worldview of the soulless Capitol dwellers from Collins’ novel.

This is why I can’t say that “The Hunger Games” is a rip-off of the superior “Battle Royale.” Despite the Japanese thriller’s tongue in cheekiness, there’s a pervasive awareness throughout the film that what is taking place is one of the most horrible scenarios ever imagined. Part of this has to do with the film’s special effects makeup, which is gory without feeling exploitive. The bigger reason the games in “Battle Royale” seem horrible has to do with Fukasaku’s insistence that we view his combatants as more than just pieces in a game, they are fully realized characters with back stories and hidden motivations for their behavior onscreen.

With “The Hunger Games,” it seems that characters are a luxury, something the filmmakers cannot afford to give us as we quickly leap from one plot point to the next. And while Peeta’s ultimate desire is to be more than just a piece in this heartless game, the real tragedy of this cinematic failure is that this is all he’s allowed to be.

In 2012, the Force will be with Greensboro!

That’s when the Mixed Tape Film Series and ACME Comics will present the international filmmaking experiment “Star Wars Uncut” on the big screen at the Carolina Theatre.

This exclusive screening is a fundraiser for the Masonic Children’s Home in Oxford, North Carolina. Before the screening, there will be a silent auction for original Star Wars artwork created by local and national comic book artists, painters and fiber artists. Also, members of the Carolina Garrison of the 501st Legion Star Wars costuming organization will be attending this function dressed as Storm Troopers and other characters from the Star Wars movies.

The show begins at 8 p.m. Thursday, January 26 at The Carolina Theatre on 310 South Greene Street. Tickets are $10 or $7 for college students with I.D. and 100% of the box-office will be donated to the Masonic Children’s Home at Oxford.

For tickets and information, call the Carolina Theatre’s http://vimeo.com/6788001-http://vimeo.com/6788001 at (336) 333-2605.

Check out the trailer by clicking here.

Since the release of the comprehensive DVD they produced for “Rushmore” in 2000, the Criterion Collection has played an integral role in shaping the cult of filmmaker Wes Anderson.

So when Mixed Tape programmed a 35mm presentation of Anderon’s “The Royal Tenenbaums,” we reached out to Criterion to ask if they would be interested in sponsoring our screening of the film. Before they even responded to our message, they shipped this package to Mixed Tape Productions:

All five Wes Anderson films on BluRay or DVD? Holy Crap!

So it’s with irrepressible joy and excitement that I am announcing that Mixed Tape will present a WES ANDERSON COSTUME CONTEST before Thursday’s screening! We’re going to be giving away all of these Criterion discs to one lucky winner. All you’ve got to do to win the prize is dress up like a character from any of Wes Anderson’s films (i.e. “Bottle Rocket,” “Rushmore,” “The Royal Tenenbaums,” “The Life Aquatic,” “The Darjeeling Limited” or “The Fantastic Mr. Fox”).

We’ll be playing the movie twice on Thursday at 7:30 & 10 p.m. We’ll be hosting the contest before the 10 p.m. screening, but everyone who sees the movie at 7:30 p.m. is welcome to stay and compete and see the results.

The screening takes place at The Carolina Theatre in Greensboro, NC. Tickets are only $6 or $4 with a student ID. Tickets can be purchased online at www.CarolinaTheatre.com.

If you want to win the contest, here are some suggestions you might want to consider:

 

1. “Tree of Life” (dir. Terrence Malick) – So many people go to the movies hoping to know all of a film’s secrets upon first viewing. They want to ‘get’ its hidden meaning and be aware of all references and in-jokes for the sake of feeling as smart – if not smarter – than their peers. In short, they don’t want to know movies so much as they want to conquer them. The problem with applying this approach to Terrence Malick’s “Tree of Life” is that the movie is unconquerable.

The film is an ambitious attempt to capture the vaporous sum of memories and happenings that shape a person’s life as well as the world around them. That’s not to say the film ‘doesn’t have a plot’ as so many of my colleagues have said in their underwhelmed estimations of Malick’s achievement. The plot is actual simple to detect for anyone who pays the slightest attention. Sean Penn plays Jack O’Brien, a financially successful but socially detached man still coping with the memories of a childhood spent with an overbearing father and a younger brother who committed suicide. As the characters wonder why such a terrible event transpired, Malick and his crack team of editors launch into one of the most ambitious digressions in film history – an exploration into the origins of life on Earth, the indifference and cruelty of nature, and the evolutionary progression that leads to life as we know it today.

I would be lying if I said I understood every moment of the film, especially the final act where a solar flare wipes out all life Earth leading to an exploration of what might happen to our consciousness after all that we have seen and known has been destroyed. This is my interpretation, but I don’t need to be right to know that “Tree of Life” is the best movie of the year as well as one of the best and most beautiful films I have ever seen.

The biggest accolade I can give “Tree of Life” is that it makes me look forward to growing old. The reason being, because like life itself, I am certain that my understanding of this film and its meanings will change over time. To proclaim “Tree of Life” the best movie of the year is not a statement of intellectual superiority so much as an act of surrender to the joy and power of cinema.

2. “Drive” (dir. Nicholas Winding Refn) – When I saw Nicholas Winding Refn’s 2008 film “Bronson,” I was certain the Danish-born filmmaker was on his way to becoming one of the great directors of our time. With “Drive,” the Church of Refn has expanded, and for good reason. Oozing with a sense of style and class absent from crime thrillers since the ‘70s, the movie follows the life of Driver (Ryan Gosling), an unnamed sociopath who makes his way by driving cars legitimately as a stuntman for movies and illegitimately as the wheelman for robberies.  The film is a neo-noirish tragedy as Driver gets his shot at becoming “a real human being” (to borrow an oft-repeated lyric from College’s song “A Real Hero,” which is replayed throughout the film) when he befriends a young woman (Carey Mulligan) and her son. But alas, a scorpion is but a scorpion, and when a heist turns sour, Driver lunges into on a hammer-wielding, skull-stomping rampage.

Gosling delivered great performances in two other movies this year, “Crazy Stupid Love” and “The Ides of March,” but his performance as Driver is coolly iconic on the level of Travolta in “Saturday Night Fever.”

3. “We Need to Talk About Kevin” (dir. Lynne Ramsay) – If Tilda Swinton doesn’t take Best Actress at the Academy Awards this year, then to hell with them. Playing Eva, the mother of a high school-aged mass murderer, Swinton actually outshines her own Oscar-winning performance in “Michael Clayton.” Motherhood doesn’t suit Eva too well. Of course it doesn’t help that her son Kevin is a wretched manipulator with early signs of psychosis. We expect mothers to love their children, and Eva is so bound to this expectation that when she finally verbalizes the suspicions she carries about Kevin, she is rejected by her husband, played with goofy affability by John C. Reilly. Even more heartbreaking is the scene when after Kevin has been jailed for a horrible crime, Eva clings to the vestiges of her motherly duties because they are the only thing she has left.

4. Melancholia (dir. Lars Von Trier) – Lars Von Trier eschews the formulas of traditional narrative filmmaking in order to broadside us with a surprise left hook the size of a planet. Told in two acts, the first half of the movie will test your patience while the second half will reward it. I admired the film as a disaster movie a la “Armageddon” or “2012” and populated with actual human beings. And while a group of oil drillers led by Bruce Willis never step in to save the planet from certain doom, the film’s conclusion is probably as upbeat as it gets for the usually dour Von Trier.

5. “Undefeated” (dir. Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin) – After seeing the tear-inducing trailers for Spielberg’s “The War Horse,” I approached that film hoping it would make me cry buckets. The movie failed in that regard, but this high school football documentary from directors Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin more than picked up the slack. As the coach for an all-black high school football team in a financially depressed city in Tennessee, coach Bill Courtney is for his young players what no one was for him as a kid: A father. Seeing him mold and shape these kids into responsible and mature young men is one of the most inspiring stories I’ve ever seen. Due to its subject matter, the film will invite comparisons to the racist neo-conservative fantasy “The Blind Side,” but Courtney or the filmmakers avoid the critical error of reducing the personhood of these young athletes. This is not the story of white folks helping a kid because he can help them win football games. It’s the story of one man helping a group of kids because he knows their struggles and knows that being there for them will help them win at life.

6. “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” – The synchronicity between art and life was never more apparent than with the release of this prequel to “The Planet of the Apes.” Literally on the same week that our elected officials failed to solve the nation’s budget crisis came this story about apes oppressed by corporations and utterly failed by ineffective liberals (James Franco and John Lithgow). How do these apes respond? Revolution! Watching this film with an audience, I noted a certain electricity in the room as we all turned on our own species, rooting for these apes led by Andy Serkis in a brilliant mo-cap performance in their fight to be champions of their own destinies. A couple of weeks later, our species caught up with the fictional apes with the staging of the occupy movement. Due to the way studio blockbusters are made, there’s no way these similarities could be intentional, but “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” was clearly an example of the right movie at the right time.

7. The Future (dir. Miranda July) – Miranda July is one of the most creative storytellers alive. And with this film, she delivers a critique of the selfishly precious hipster douchebags July’s work is so unfairly criticized for embodying. The film follows a thirtysomething couple played by Hamish Linklater and July herself, who realize their prolonged adolescence (and perhaps life as they know it) will soon come to an end. One person responds by retreating into society’s notion of what an adult is supposed to be like while the other attempts to cling fiercely to his decaying ideals. I imagine the film sounds utterly depressing; however, it is lifted by July’s unique sense of humor and a lovable cat puppet narrator named Paw-Paw.

8. “The Descendants” (dir. Alexander Payne) – I thought Alexander Payne’s “Sideways” was one of the most overrated movies I had ever seen, but with “The Descendants” he delivers the goods.

9. “Hugo” (dir. Martin Scorsese) – If I ever have a kid, I look forward to sharing this movie with him or her. Adapting the massive and massively enjoyable picture book “The Invention of Hugo Cabret,” Martin Scorsese creates a family film steeped in the love of silent filmmaking. The movie also sports the best use of 3-D I have seen to date, using the technology to deepen and enhance his canvass with texture.

10. “Super” (dir. James Gunn) – Many people avoided this film because it looked a lot like the god-awful movie “Kick Ass.” I’m here to say this film is to “Kick Ass” what “Observe and Report” was to “Paul Blart: Mall Cop.” Also, in a year when we were bombarded with no less than five comic book movie adaptations, Rainn Wilson’s The Crimson Bolt was my favorite cinematic crimefighter in 2012.

A new Mixed Tape lineup! And with it comes some great news. Each of these films were selected based on your personal votes for which films we should play. Also, each of these films will be presented in 35mm!!

One last note before we unveil the films, after hearing many requests from the public, I spoke with the people at The Carolina Theatre, and they have agreed to allow us to try hosting a second screening at 10 p.m. This should be great news for all of you Mixed Tapers out there who work in the evenings or have late classes.

Now without further adieu, here is the lineup:

January – Millennial Flashback

 - 7:30 & 10 p.m. Thursday, January 12 – “The Royal Tenenbaums”

Wunderkind director Wes Anderson helmed this Salinger-esque dramedy about a waning patriarch (Gene Hackman) who feigns terminal illness in a last-ditch bid to reconnect with his estranged wife (Angelica Houston) and eccentric children (Ben Stiller, Luke Wilson, and Gwyneth Paltrow). Also starring Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, and Danny Glover.

- 8 p.m. Thursday, January 26 – “Magnolia”

Never has Tom Cruise delivered a more electrifying performance than he did for director Paul Thomas Anderson in this ensemble drama about lonely souls wondering in and around the entertainment industry of Southern California. Backed by fantastic original music by Aimee Mann of Til Tuesday fame, this movie’s knock-out cast includes Julianne Moore, William H. Macy, John C. Reilly, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jason Robards, and Luis Guzman.

February – Valentine’s Month

- 7:30 & 10 p.m. Thursday, February 2 – “Groundhog Day” (Special Goundhog Day Screenings!)

Bill Murray plays a jaded, sarcastic TV news anchor who mysteriously finds himself re-living the same day of his life over and over again for an eternity. North Carolinian Andie MacDowell co-stars in this brilliant romantic comedy that was written and directed by Murray’s fellow “Ghostbusters” alum Harold Ramis. A perfect way to kick-off Valentine’s month!

-7:30 & 10 p.m. Thursday, February 9 – “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”

The theme of time travel and romance continues with this wildly inventive film from famed French director Michel Gondry and Academy Award-winning screenwriter Charlie Kaufman. Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet play two former lovers who undergo a brand-new procedure to erase their memories of their relationship and each other from their minds. But what happens if they fall in love again? At the time of its release, acclaimed Greensboro author Orson Scott Card declared “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” to be the best science fiction film ever made.

- 10 p.m. Friday, February 24 – “The Room” (Special Friday Night Screening)

A Mixed Tape tradition finally makes its debut at The Carolina Theatre! For those who didn’t have the greatest Valentine’s Days this year, we offer cinema’s greatest instance of schadenfreude. Writer, producer, and director Tommy Wiseau created this tragic love story as a star vehicle for himself in hopes that it would elevate him to fame in fortune in Hollywood. Little did he know (or did he?) that he would create one of the most hilariously bad movies ever made! Mixed Tape completes this unique cinematic experience with audience participation, in-movie games, and free spoons for audience members to hurl at the screen.

March – The Fantasy Film Festival

-Thursday, March 8 – “The Neverending Story”

Continuing its Fantasy Film Festival for the second year in a row, Mixed Tape presents a film that will make you believe a giant dog can fly! A story within a story, a young boy picks up a large and mysterious fantasy book about a young warrior named Atreyu who must save the kingdom of Fantasia from an all-consuming evil force called The Nothing.

-Thursday, March 15 – “The Dark Crystal”

 

Director Jim Henson’s original foray into fantasy filmmaking, “The Dark Crystal” is the tale of a small creature known as a Gelfling who must embark on a quest to find a magical crystal that will restore balance to his dying world.

April – Scorcese and De Niro

-Thursday, April 5 – “Taxi Driver”

BRAND NEW PRINT! “Are you talking to me?” When Robert De Niro mutters these improvised lines in front of a mirror, both the actor and director Martin Scorcese were elevated to immediate cinematic stardom. A wild and violent move created at the height of American filmmaking, “Taxi Driver” stars De Niro as Travis Bickle, a mentally unstable cab driver who grows increasingly weary of the decadence and sleaze he finds in New York. Dancing closer and closer to the edge of his sanity, what will push him over? Also starring Peter Boyle, Albert Brooks, Jodie Foster, Harvey Keitel, and Cybill Shepherd.

-Thursday, April 12 – “Raging Bull”

Mixed Tape’s tribute to Scorsese and De Niro continues with “Raging Bull,” a classic black and white drama based on the life of disgraced prize fighter Jake La Motta. De Niro famously pushed his body to extremes in this film, first bulking up the muscle, then taking a month away from production to a record 60 pounds of flab for the final, heartbreaking act of the movie.

-Thursday, April 26 – “Goodfellas”

The film that should have won Marty his Oscar, “Goodfellas” is the mafia epic starring Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, and Joe Pesci as a trio of gangsters who rise from the ranks of small-time wise guys to the top of the Mob’s hierarchy. Question is, how long can anyone stay in their world until someone tries to take them out?

May – “Iconic Nostalgia” 

-Thursday, May 2 – Stand By Me

In a film that is as touching as it is funny, Rob Reiner directs the greatest cast of child actors ever assembled. River Phoenix, Wil Wheaton, Corey Feldman, and Jerry O’Connell play four young boys who sneak away on a weekend excursion to find the dead body of a local boy. Based on a novella by Stephen King and with pitch-perfect narration by Richard Dreyfus, “Stand By Me” went on to inspire TV’s “Wonder Years” and the 1993 film “The Sandlot.”

The following is Part One in a series of articles about The Mixed Tape Album Project presents “The Soft Bulletin” by The Flaming Lips, which premieres at 8 p.m. Friday, November 4 at The Carolina Theatre (310 South Greene Street, Greensboro, NC). Click here to buy tickets.

Director’s Note:
In the summer of 2011, I finally left the West Coast. In my 25 years on this earth, I had only been as far west as Alabama and that was on a mission trip with my church when I was about 16 years old.

When I was asked to create a video for The Album Project, I was very reluctant to choose to film my trip due to fear that my camera would be damaged or stolen and also because I am fully aware of the burden that a camera can be on a trip in which the sights are the main attraction. It’s hard to focus on the tiny LCD screen in front of your face when just in front of it is the first desert sunset that you have ever been able to witness first hand.

In the end, I am thankful that I was able to document my journey and share it with you all.

-Matt Hayes

Producer’s Note
When Matt pitched the idea of documenting his nearly two-month-long adventure to all four corners of the country, I immediately thought this was a great idea. The only challenge I had to face was getting him to believe his idea was great, too. He had a lot of legitimate concerns. His camera could be stolen or damaged. Also, there was a possibility that he might run out of footage in the middle of his journey.

But the greatest of his concerns was that audiences might not think the video was interesting enough to watch. It was at this point that I shared my perspective. I told him that I currently work a day job, chained to a desk pretty much every day of the year. Getting the chance to see his cross-country adventure condensed into a 4-minute video would be amazing to me as well as so many other people who, for whatever reason, can’t go on a similar adventure right now. I’m glad Matt listened. Now every time I watch his video, my heart swells with joy as I watch my entire country flash onto the screen in a short, visual blast. The film is also a cinematic document of the damage that occurred after the tornadoes in Alabama and the ongoing recovery taking place in New Orleans with references to “Blue Velvet,” “Alien,” “Exit Through the Gift Shop,” and “Rocky” to boot. I couldn’t think of a better way to start the project.

-Joe Scott

Let’s just hope this “Paranormal Activity” franchise is just a trilogy. The series that began admirably with director Oren Peli’s minimalist “found footage” horror film “Paranormal Activity” and continued with the surprisingly strong follow-up “Paranormal Activity 2” takes its first misstep with the overwrought and occasionally goofy “Paranormal Activity 3.”

This third outing was directed by Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman, the two douchebags who attempted to publicly expose one of the many pathological liars who lurk on Facebook. That film was only accidentally good due to the fact that the filmmakers opted to appear on-screen and proved to be greater phonies than the one they were pursuing. This being the duo’s first attempt at a narrative feature, “Paranormal Activity 3” finds Joost and Schulman in way over their heads. They so clearly want to up the scares, but in doing so, they negate what made the franchise successful in the first place.

Yoked to a gimmick that is beginning to look threadbare, the film opens with home video footage of Katie (Katie Featherston) and Kristi Rey (Kristi Rey), the tragically haunted siblings who are the through-line of the “Paranormal Activity” universe. Kristi is painting a room in her house which was haunted in the second ‘Paranormal’ film, and Katie asks if she can drop off a box of old VHS tapes that were left behind at her grandmother’s house. A day later, there’s a mysterious break-in at Kristi’s house, and the tapes that Katie left have vanished.

Where did the tapes go? This is an important question for a sequel to a found footage horror film. After all, the first two films inform us via subtitles that the footage we just watched was discovered by law enforcement officers. This is not the case with PA3. The tapes were simply stolen by God knows who, then in the next shot, we suddenly find ourselves watching the footage they allegedly stored.

And while they were most definitely filmed on some sort of high-res digital cameras and cropped seamlessly into a 16×9 aspect ratio, we are asked to believe the mystery tape footage was made in 1988. Here we see Katie as a pooch-bellied pre-teen and the younger Kristi as a snaggle-toothed child with an overactive imagination that includes an invisible friend named Toby who seems able to slam doors and knock over furniture in the girls’ bedroom. This footage is shot by Dennis (Christopher Nicholas Smith), a wedding photographer that’s shacking up with the girl’s mom Julie (Lauren Bittner).

Dennis seems like a nice guy for the most part. But like all the male protagonists of the PA series, he’s hopelessly devoted to pointing his camera – which so clearly represents a phallus, thus the sexual proxy tool of choice for waning patriarchs in western society – at anything that moves. This of course leads to many setups where a camera lingers on its subject before startling the audience with a sudden bump in the night. The only problem here is that unlike the previous PA filmmakers, Joost and Schulman have no interest in lingering. They are too restless to attempt something minimalist and effective like lull an audience weaned on frenzied editing techniques into a subdued frame of mind so that when something frightening happens, it really scares the crap out of them.

Rather than do what made the franchise effective thus far, Joost and Schulman opt to jump around from room to room, looking for the scariest ‘activity’ they can find, and boy do they ever. Besting the previous PA protags by a long-shot, on any given night, Dennis’ cameras capture a video goldmine of supernatural occurrences. Tables flip over on their own accord, Dennis’ friend gets clawed in the stomach, and a chubby girl goes flying across the room (!). We also see an actual ghost wearing a bed-sheet go traipsing across the room before vanishing into thin air. Forget the Ghostbusters, if Dennis called the producers of ‘80s tabloid shows A Current Affair or Hard Copy, he could have sold these videos for a hefty fee and even appeared on The Today Show.

I will give the film props for ending with a visual allegory about women ascending to higher rungs in society while men become paralyzed by their love of technology. So at the very least, I can say that the film isn’t so bad. We were promised to learn about the origin of the franchise, and that’s pretty much what this movie gave us without stumbling too badly. I just hope Paramount – who has profited greatly from the low budget franchise thus far – considers themselves fortunate and leaves us with this conclusion that’s not as satisfying as previous films, but is also not a disappointment on the level of “Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2.”

But of course now that “Paranormal Activity 3″ grossed the highest opening weekend for a horror film to date, we can expect “Paranormal Activity 4” in theaters by next year.