"Happy Christmas" (The Moore is Over)

The Unknown with Portastatic

Friday June 16, 9:00pm The Moore

Portastatic’s approach to Tod Browning’s The Unknown last night at the Moore was not entirely meritless. I was struck by the perverse nature of the story drawn out by the accompaniment, reminiscent of some sickly, deranged cabaret or drunk and staggering carnival band. The audience for the most part must have been fans of the group, rather than the Lon Chaney film. Their response revealed a gross misunderstanding of the story, characters and their circumstances, largely resulting from a bizarre interpretation of the film established by the musical performance. I found one or two moments of interest, but the annoying wah-wah guitar sounded like a bad porn soundtrack and long momentum killing pauses between each musical number ruined the continuity. A cover of The Rolling Stone’s Wild Horses used for the final scene, which features, (how clever) circus horses, was an embarrassing and lazy choice.
Surprisingly, I was far more disappointed to learn the movie would be digitally projected. The Moore’s projection booth (not original to the theater) was removed when the upper mezzanine was restored and there is no longer a permanent means to project films. This seems to indicate any future screenings would also be digital (SIFF hauled in it’s own projector and set up on the first mezzanine). Fairly light ticket sales may also indicate this was a one-time experiment.
The opportunity to sit in the rickety wood and iron, tightly spaced seats and hang out, visit, and enjoy being back in this theater after so many years was my primary enjoyment of the evening. The ambience of the Moore, built in 1907, is entirely different from anywhere else in town (that survives). Tall and narrow, the auditorium is just under eighty feet across and has a wonderful feeling of brittle elegance that only comes with age.