we all need at least one really nice positive thing about the
entertainment business every single day of the year, including weekends.
Sometimes it may be something simple, like a video that showcases
something fun and sometimes it may be a movie poster that embraces the
aesthetic we all want Hollywood to aspire to. Sometimes it may be a
long-winded diatribe. Sometimes it’ll be from the staff and extended
family of CHUD.com. Maybe even you readers can get in on it. So, take
this to the bank. Every day, you will get a little bit of positivity
from one column a day here. Take it with you. Maybe it’ll help you
through a bad day or give folks some fun things to hunt down in their
busy celluloid digesting day.
8.6.10
By Alex Riviello
(Author Page, Twitter Page)
What I’m Thankful For:
Rifftrax and Cinematic Titanic.
Even though I grew up watching cheesy b-movies, it might have been Mystery Science Theater 3000 that made me genuinely appreciate them. One thing MST3K never really gets credited for was how inadvertently great its film criticism was, ripping them apart for their editing, pace, dialogue, and everything else these inept filmmakers did. By showing what made a bad movie it opened up my young mind to what made one good, with plenty of laughs along the way. Crow and Tom Servo may be crappy puppets that broke apart all the time (check out their Poopie reels), but they had more personality and charisma than most tv hosts. Never mind Joel and Mike, two men who both took to the job in their own unique ways and made it their own. The MST3K silhouette has appeared on the bathroom mirror of every one of my apartments, thanks to a decal included in the original dvds and many of the fantastic sets from Rhono and Shout! Factory still line my much-depleted dvd shelf. You never know when you might want to see Space Mutiny, after all.
When the show jumped ship to the Sci-Fi channel and switched focus to entirely genre fair the riffs got a little more vicious, the skits got a whole lot more silly, and the end was sadly near. In 1999 the show aired its final episode, and besides a few fantastic books from its creators (Mike Nelson’s Movie Megacheese and Death Rat are hysterical, Kevin Murphy’s A Year At The Movies a fascinating look into the theatrical experience) it seemed like they were gone forever.
But it was not to be! Both hosts came back in recent years with their own projects, pledging to continue riffing on films for years to come. Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett created Rifftrax– downloadable mp3s that finally saw the trio taking on mainstream hollywood fare! – as well as four episodes of a show called The Film Crew. Joel Hodgson, Trace Beaulieu, J. Elvis Weinstein, Frank Conniff and Mary Jo Pehl stuck to the silhouettes and took Cinematic Titanic to another dimension with their massive cast and live shows.
Late last year Rifftrax had a special live theatrical event where they riffed live on Christmas-themed shorts, and it might have been the best time I’ve had in a theater in years, just punishingly funny, an assault on your facial muscles. Since then I’ve purchased dozens of public domain shorts through their website (where they’re smartly around a buck a pop, and DRM free!) and watched them frequently with everyone who comes over my house. These guys are masters of their craft, still able to make me laugh my ass off with their clever and biting one-liners.
Cinematic Titanic is touring around the country right now, and Rifftrax is about to host another live performance beamed into theaters nationwide on the 19th (none other than Reefer Madness), and I’m not missing either one when it comes to town. You shouldn’t either.