Why is Today’s Photo of a bunch of plastic spoons? Very good question. Firstly, although I took my camera with me when I went out today, I neglected to check that the memory card was in it. Blast. Secondly, I saw the most amazing movie tonight. I know this makes absolutely no sense, but bear with me. All will eventually be explained…
After a day spent being an accompanist (hooray for occasional paid work!), strumming on the guitar (I’m not good enough to actually play it) and generally not very much at all, Alex came over and we had fried rice (which I made in copious quantities) before we went off to Northcote. We met up with Andrew and Tom at a bar called 303 for a comedy show. It was around this point that I realised that I had no memory card and thus was unable to photograph any of the night’s proceedings. Aaaaaargh. Firstly, the bar would have been great to photograph, being filled with the kind of junk you expect in such a quirky place. Also, it would have been great to get photos of the comics there. Oh well.
The first comedian and the MC for the night was Ross Noble. He has a talent for going on about completely random and absurd things for extensive periods of time. I don’t know if he’s ever planned what he’s going to say, but it’s really refreshing to have that kind of spontaneity after comedians who, even if they are quite funny, have it all planned out. Him just bullshitting for ages is amazing. He introduced the next comedian (or comedienne, depending on what we’re allowed to say at this point in the Political Correctness Timeline), who made a few funny observations, but was much less entertaining (I suppose Ross is a hard act to follow– what with his tangents about medieval warfare and sexually perverted gnomes).
After an interval, he went on for a bit more before introducing another lesser-known comedian, who was actually pretty funny, and Eddie Perfect, who also played the piano (I loved his song about environmental hypocrisy). Unfortunately, because this was all going on for so long, we had to leave about fifteen minutes into Tim Minchin’s set, as we were running late for the movies. It would have been to see more of him, as he hadn’t gotten to the piano yet, and his songs are quite funny (see Youtube).
The movie in question was a late screening of The Room, a side-splittingly hilarious D-grade (if that) soap-opera-style drama, called “so bad it’s good” and “the Citizen Kane of bad movies”. Simply put, the movie is atrocious. The acting is abysmal, especially from the lead, who was also the writer and director. The dialogue is worse than daytime television. The sex scenes were ridiculous. Is it night? It is day? The movie cuts randomly from time to time, interspersing scenes with awkwardly lengthy stock footage of San Francisco. But it was so much goddamn fun. We were a bit late and walked into a cinema of people yelling at the screen. It was a bit frightening.
Basically, the movie has acquired a cult following of midnight screenings in which people come and participate by throwing spoons at the screen, for example. There are, for some reason, several shots with a picture of a spoon in the background, so whenever this happens, hundreds of plastic spoons go flying through the air. At the end of the movie, I looked just in front of the screen and saw what looked like thousands of spoons that had fallen behind the barrier. I brought some home as a memento of an absolutely absurd, but fantastically unique experience (hence, Today’s Photo). I would strongly recommend seeing this movie, especially at the cinema (I think the Nova is doing some more Saturday Night screenings), as it is the most bizarre and enjoyable experience that has ever happened to me.
Good night now. I have to get up in less than six hours. Eugh.
Still A Teen 