Exploring Carleton’s On-Campus Movie Theater

Carleton’s Very Own Cinema

It’s nice to have something to look forward to at the end of each week. Classes screech to a halt for an extremely welcome two days, but once you’ve gotten all of your homework done, one can often feel directionless. After structuring your schedule around academics for five days straight, something else must fill the void left by the lack of classes. The weekend is long, and as Phineas and Ferb so eloquently put it:

“The annual problem, for our generation, is finding a good way to spend it”.

The Student Movie Organization (SUMO) is dedicated to this task. Every Friday and Saturday night, at 7:00 and 10:00 PM, a film is screened in the Weitz Cinema. Hand-picked by student representatives, the movies are often recent releases, creating an experience that emulates what one might experience outside the seemingly frozen-in-time-bubble of college. At the beginning of the term, the schedule for screenings are posted around campus—meaning you can plan ahead for which movies you won’t want to miss each week. Or you could go in blind—but it might mean you unknowingly stumble into Longlegs when you were expecting Inside Out 2.

As a film ‘connoisseur’ myself—yes, I do have a Letterboxd, thank you for asking—I’ve attended my fair share of Weitz screenings over fall and winter term. SUMO organized most, but a few were screened by the Carleton Film Society, a student-run club that supplements the mainstream movies hosted by SUMO with lesser-known or independent films. I’ve decided to rank (from worst to best) and briefly review each movie I’ve seen during my time at Carleton—not only to give you a glimpse of my impeccable artistic taste, but to demonstrate some of the variety of media that you might see playing at the Weitz.

Videodrome

As a horror film lover, I felt disappointed by this cult classic. It follows a man whose reality begins to distort after he finds a disturbing videotape. Maybe it’s just old, and my attention span is fried. But in any case, I found it a bit boring, and, despite the lots of general body-grossness present, quite tame.

I Saw The TV Glow

I have to admit, I’m definitely not the target audience for this film, but I still found myself enjoying bits and pieces of it. It’s a slow burn, technicolored fantasy-horror about someone’s reality falling apart after watching a strange TV show. Now that I think about it, it does sound a lot like Videodrome…

It’s not the kind of film that you put on to turn your brain off, or chomp down on some popcorn with your friends on a night out. It’s beautiful, slow, (frankly, also a little boring), and contemplative. I didn’t enjoy it all, but I respect the film a heck of a lot.

Cure

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s gloomy Japanese detective story was a breakout hit in the US, jump-starting the Japanese horror trend that rocked America in the early 2000’s. It’s another cult classic, and another slow-burn, but I appreciate the grimy atmosphere the cinematography conjures, and the amazing performances from the leads. It leaves you with more questions than answers, but if you’re a fan of ambiguity and atmosphere, Cure will certainly deliver.

Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure

Now we’re getting somewhere!

In the biggest stylistic switch ever, the next film down is Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Remember when I mentioned movies that you can turn your brain off while watching? Nowhere has that sentence been more applicable than Bill and Ted. It’s very dumb, but sometimes something dumb is all you need after a stressful week. At the screening, my friends and I laughed, cried, and pondered the nuggets of wisdom that the film graced us with. As Ted says:

“All we are, is dust in the wind, dude”.

Longlegs

If Cure was a plodding detective noir, Longlegs is Silence of the Lambs cranked to eleven. Nicolas Cage plays a bizarre killer with connections to the occult—and his performance is worth the entry alone. I found it terrifying, and if you’re okay with seemingly unending feelings of dread (yay!), then watch Longlegs. Preferably alone. At midnight.

The Substance

Finally, we have The Substance. You know of it by now. The body-horror film that was nominated for five Oscars this year. It’s absolutely, positively, off-the-walls insane. Everything is maximalist: from the editing, to the over-the-top performances, to the extreme makeup effects, to the punchy soundtrack. After my friends and I exited the theaters, half of us thought it was the best movie we had seen this year, and the other half thought it was absolutely abhorrent. If that doesn’t scream “watch this film!”, then I don’t know what does.

As you can tell, the Weitz plays films from a wide range of genres—there’s something for everyone. I really do believe the screenings are the perfect way to cap off a long week.

For now, I’ll leave you with some wisdom I learned from my good friend Bill:

“Party on, dudes.”

Inigo (he/him/his) is trying very hard to turn interests in subjects like film, english, and psychology into a manageable course load. Originally from Somerville, Massachusetts, he can often be found running in the Cowling Arboretum (and getting passed by everyone on the cross country team) or rock climbing at the bouldering cave in the evening. He loves Carleton’s walkability: it didn’t even matter that he forgot to bring his bike to campus. He considers bad horror movies to be the ultimate form of entertainment.