More from those crazy Nickelodeon guys -- Andy and Isaac

Read on to hear our final thoughts on the festival and to  enter to win the official Sundance Film Festival bag!

After a week to decompress from the festival, Andy and I had the chance to finish the final day out strong seeing films like Magic Magic (also w/ Michael Cera).  Looking back at the festival, we wish would could have eaten better things than granola bars, and had more sleep, but the real reason was to see films so we could help bring better options to the Nickelodeon. 

Andy and I both agreed with the Sundance Jury in that Fruitvale needed to win an award for its brutal honesty, and dynamic storytelling. In the end  it won the coveted U. S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic, and we know we will be seeing this film at the Nickelodeon sometime later this year.

One of the great surprises of this year’s festival was Chad Hartigan’s This is Martin Bonner, Andy mentioned it earlier in a post, but we loved the film, and audiences agreed.  The film took home the Audience Award in the “Best of NEXT” category.  Again, if you have a chance to see his first film, Luke and Brie are on a First Date, we recommend it highly. It played at Indie Grits, and the film also features the wonderful Ronnie Gunter (briefly). 

If we had to guess other films that should eventually make their way to our screen, we would guess In A World..., Crystal Fairy, Afternoon Delight, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, Spectacular Now. Of course, we are in the transitional limbo where films are being bought and distribution being set before we know what we will be available to bring to Columbia and when these films will arise.

Thanks for reading our blog, and as an added bonus, if you share this article with your friends on Facebook or Twitter and tag the Nick AND Jasper (@nicktheatre , @jasperadvises) you’ll be automatically entered into winning the Sundance Festival bag filled with the Sundance program, water bottle and other postcards!

We’ll see you at the movies, Andy and Isaac

More from Andy at Sundance

 

Yesterday the Convergence wrapped up and it always feels like the last day of camp. Kind of. You're all kind of exhausted, do a few more panels, get your picture taken and then pile on to a bus. But, the fun part is most of the delegates head over to Park City for Sundance. It's about a 30-minute drive to Park City and then we were dropped off at festival headquarters. Talk about a big shift in pace. From the quiet solitude of the Zermatt resort where the Convergence is held, the festival headquarters is always bustling. It took us a little while to get our credentials and then make our way to the condo. We're sharing a place this year with Landee and Cory from Maiden Alley Cinema in Paducah, KY and Lawren from Aperture Cinema in Winston-Salem.

After unpacking we made the 20-minute trek down to the Yarrow Hotel to see how bad the walk will be.  It basically involves a crossing a snowy golf course without clearly marked paths. We were too late to catch the first film of the evening so we headed down to Park City's Main Street where we ate at one of our favorite festival spots, the Wasatch Brewery.

After a quick meal we took the shuttle back up to the holiday cinema which is where most of the press and industry screenings are held to catch our first film of the festival : Crystal Fairy and the Magic Cactus and 2012.

The film features Michael Cera as a 20-something American on an extended drug vacation in Chile. His mission to try a hallucinative cactus leads to arid trip with three Chilean brothers and an over-the-top new age American hippie named Crystal Fairy (played by Gaby Hoffman). Directed by Sebastian Silva (whose last film The Maid played the Nick a few years ago), the film is filled with terribly awkward moments (not a big surprise for a Michael Cera movie). Overall it seemed to be a real crowd pleaser.

Jasper's love affair with The Nick, Christopher Walken, and Frank Capra

We have no idea why we love Christopher Walken as much as we do, but we know why we love The Nick, Columbia's very own art house - plus theatre.

Walken is funny, sure. The characters he's created on SNL alone have made him an American comedic icon -- think The Continental, Behind the Music record producer Bruce Dickinson during a recording of Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" and, our favorite, Colonel Angus.

And he's a highly skilled dramatic actor, winning an Oscar for his role in The Deer Hunter and renown for majorly memorable scenes in such films as Pulp Fiction (a soldier, he delivers a watch to the son of a dead comrade in arms explaining to the boy how many men had hidden the timepiece in their rectums over the course of battles), and the Sicilian scene in Tarantino's True Romance.  He was nominated for a Tony for his role in Martin McDonagh's Behanding in Spokane.  And, he can dance.

Sure, he never turns down a role and has appeared in some pretty hideous films, Joe Dirt and American Sweethearts not even being the worst of them. He says it's because he and his wife of forever never had kids and if he's not working and someone offers him something, he'll take it -- he's an actor.

All this brings us to why we love both Chris Walken and The Nick.

After having mentioned in passing to the good folks at The Nick several weeks ago that we'd love to see Walken's new film, A Late Quartet in which he stars with Philip Seymour Hoffman and Katherine Keener, at the Nick, we got a message this morning from Nick director of marketing, the lovely Isaac Calvage, saying that the film will be screened there January 4 through 10!

It's nice when a wish comes true. And even nicer when a person takes a hot second to let you know that it has,  the way that Isaac did this morning.

This is an example of one of the many reasons we love The Nick. Other examples include Hitchcock (12/21 - 1/3) and, seriously, they're showing It's a Wonderful Life (12/22 - 12/24). And let's face it, showing a film like It's a Wonderful Life on the big screen -- a film that you can purchase at Target for a few bucks -- is, in our opinion here at Jasper, pretty much just an act of love. Love for the film -- by anyone's account one of the best and most beloved films of all time (the newel post alone gets us in the gut every time) -- love for the art of filmmaking and the art of film-viewing (let's talk about that sometime), and love of the theatre's clientele who have the opportunity to walk right off the city sidewalk and into the theatre, buy a box of popcorn, and settle in for the show just like viewers did in 1946. (Except that you can also buy some vino or a brew to go with your corn.)

Sigh.

Thus ends our love letter to The Nickelodeon, but not our love for the theatre or for the enigmatic Christopher Walken. We may not know why we're so crazy about Walken, but with the Nick, it's pretty clear.

Note: Here's what The Rolling Stone says about A Late Quartet. It should also be noted that the director of photography is one Fred Elmes, who also did the beautifully filmed Broken Flowers (starring another one of Jasper's enigmatic art crushes, that bad boy Bill Murray) and the kinkily filmed Blue Velvet. And, while the actors learned a bit about playing their musical instrument props in the film, the lion's share of the music was performed by the Julliard-heavy and exquisite Brentano String Quartet.

-- CB

On the Road with the Nick -- 5th and Final Post in their Guest Blog Series

Our Friends at the Nick have taken to the highway and are out on one of the greatest of American adventures – the ROAD TRIP! Happily, they’re sharing their news from the road with us via the Jasper blog. Below is the final installation from the great adventurers’ travel(b)log. Thank you everyone for reading about our travels this week.  We couldn't have had this amazing experience without Leveraging Investments in Creativity (LINC), and we couldn't have had a better outlet to share our story with than the wonderful people at Jasper.  If there is one thing this trip has taught us, it is that an art scene is necessary for any city to truly be great.  Columbia has a wonderful art scene, and we know that Jasper plays a big role.

Our final official day of the trip happened at the awesome Belcourt Theatre in Nashville.  We all got to spend time with our counterparts at the theater, learning how we can be better, and how we can bring new knowledge to the Nick!

Andy started the day off before all of us. He went in early to hang out with Stephanie Silverman, Executive Director of the Belcourt.  He learned a lot, and is eager to get back and start getting all of us to try some new things.  He even had the opportunity to talk about programming with Toby Leonard, who is also a former Indie Grits juror.

Heather wasted no time, hanging out with Melinda Morgan, the Director of Operations.  So much so that she volunteered to scoop popcorn and fill drinks for two of the showtimes!  Claire had a lovely time with Elle Long, their membership coordinator.  (unfortunately no picture exists).  We even ran into another juror at the offices of Janus Films Nashville (in the Belcourt).  It is always a pleasure to see Sarah Finklea, she is a really fantastic person, and we were thrilled she had moved to Nashville and was conveniently located at the Belcourt. We were able to unwind with a nice meal at Southern where Heather got to pick out her steak!

Today we head back to Columbia, and I think the staff all needs a little down time to take in everything we saw.  Thanks again to Jasper, and we look forward to the future of the Nick!

On the Road with the Nick -- Part 4 of a Guest Blog Series

Our Friends at the Nick have taken to the highway and are out on one of the greatest of American adventures – the ROAD TRIP! Happily, they’re sharing their news from the road with us via the Jasper blog. Below is the fourth installation from the great adventurers’ travel(b)log.  

Today, our wait to see the Belcourt officially ends! We were so excited to get to Nashville that we left a little bit early, which led us to do some Nashville sightseeing. After we checked into the hotel, we immediately left to go see the incredible Third Man Records.  We are all big fans of Jack White's work across a variety of bands, so we went into the shop, which is about the size of our ticket booth.

From there, we decided to see some of Nashville's true history, while some of us thought that may be the Grand Ol' Opry on the sprawling Gaylord Opryland estate....

I think all of us felt an even greater special connection at The Duke's of Hazzard museum.

We ate at the fantastic restaurant City House for dinner, however the food was so good, it would be shameful to share the pictures with you. Again, today is going to be a fantastic day with the Nickelodeon Staff learning from the incredibly talented Belcourt staff.  If you can't stand the wait, visit their website and see what we are talking about. Until tomorrow, Your Nickelodeon Staff

On the Road with the Nickelodeon -- Part 1 of a Guest Blog Series

Our Friends at the Nick have taken to the highway and are out on one of the greatest of American adventures - the ROAD TRIP! Happily, they're sharing their news from the road with us via the Jasper blog. Below is the first installation from the great adventurers' travel(b)log.

Hello Columbia!

It is a pleasure to be writing this from the road in Memphis, TN.  We would like to thank the wonderful staff at Jasper Magazine for allowing us to take over their blog for a little while. This week, Andy Smith, Heather Bauer, Claire Sumaydeng-Bryan and myself (Isaac Calvage) are currently on a tour of southeast film courtesy of a travel grant from the amazing people at Leveraging Investments in Creativity (LINC).  The goal of our trip is to gain some knowledge of how other film festivals of similar size are run (Indie Memphis and River's Edge Film Festival), and to learn how one of our favorite peer theaters works in Nashville (the Belcourt).  We are hoping this trip will provide valuable insight to make everything that happens at the Nickelodeon Theatre, a little bit better.  Here is a mini travelogue of our trip so far...

Our day kicked off at 6am out of Columbia.  We were very tired, and even had to get ourselves a pick up meal at Bojangles.

Which promptly had everyone asleep afterwards.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

We then powered on to Birmingham, AL to meet up with Heather Bauer's friend and eat at the legendary Saw's Soul Food Kitchen.

Along the way to see Graceland Too, for which the proprietor was out, (sad face), we saw a sign that already had us homesick

After the initial disappointment, we finally pushed through to Memphis and checked into our hotel.

We then went to the Indie Memphis Film Festival and had the opportunity to see a film called SUN DON'T SHINE last night which stars Indie Grits alum, Kentucker Audley.  Today, we are going to try to go back to Graceland Too, so Andy Smith can become a lifetime member, like Hardy Childers (you have to go three times). Then we will continue our quest to see some other good films, and hopefully find a few that may even play at Indie Grits 2013.  What is next for the coming week?  Hopefully some more pictures with people, and a lot of new knowledge coming our way.

Until then, signing off from the Road,

         -Isaac Calvage, for the Nickelodeon Theatre

(ed. note: Tune in tomorrow for another installation in the travel(b)log of those wacky film aficionados - On the Road with the Nickelodeon, right here at What Jasper Said.)

Nickelodeon Celebrates New Home With 33 Films From 33 Years

by Christopher Rosa, Jasper Intern  

The movies are moving.  And it is causing a swirl of emotions.

The Nickelodeon Theatre, Columbia’s flagship local film theatre, and one of the most acclaimed in all of the Southeast, will be moving to a new home starting on August 31, 2012. The theatre will be taking a trip down Main Street, from its original 937 address to 1607. The move, according to Nick marketing director Isaac Calvage, has been in the works for several years now. “The Nickelodeon Theatre simply has needed to expand our offerings and capacity.  We currently have a maximum of 75 seats in an aging building, and we needed to expand. In our current location, we simply do not have space to grow.”

Physical expansion was certainly a top priority for Nick leaders as they planned this move; however, the new space will allow them to artistically expand as well. “The move will also allow us to delve deeper into experimental film, and also show more mainstream independent films. The Nick is also really excited that we'll own our space. We're currently just renting this building.”

The move from 937 Main to 1607 Main is quite the financial endeavor. What sealed the deal for the move were two generous donations from the Ford Foundation and the Nord Family Foundation. Both were integral to the Nick’s journey up the street. “We could not have been more excited to receive grants from such truly inspiring organizations. The fact that they really want to invest in creative place-making, further encourages us that this move is absolutely the next step for the Nick. These prestigious organizations are making it possible to make our move,” Calvage said.

Picking the spot to move was a difficult decision, but 1607 was eventually chosen for its already rich cinematic past. “1607 Main St. was the former home of the State Theater, and then later the Fox Theater.  It is also the only remaining theater that was left on Main St. All of the other spaces were either demolished, or completely changed into other spaces.  We want to save the cinema history of our city, and also provide a new space on Main Street to help revitalize downtown,” Calvage notes.

Calvage also believes that the new location will have a positive economic impact on the surrounding area. “When we open, we will be open 7 days a week providing a space that is open not only in the daytime, but also at night, and we're projecting that we'll welcome 60,000 unique visitors to Main Street each year, which means that those folks are also spending money in our downtown restaurants and shops.”

The new space is going to be innovative in both its interior and exterior. “We are expanding to offer media education and filmmaker services in the future.  Once the capital campaign is fully finished, we will also be opening a second screen, which has a capacity of 192 seats,  and which will allow us to offer two different films at one time. We have improved concession areas, bathrooms outside of the movie theater, and greatly improved offices for our ever-growing staff,” Calvage beams.

The new Helen Hill Media Education Center is of particular interest. Calvage cites the digital age as the primary reason for the center’s inception. “In this modern age, where media is thrust at us from every direction, it is important to be able to analyze and interpret these messages, and their roles in our lives.”

There is only a little over a month left in the old space. “We are feeling great, but are quickly realizing how little time is left here.  We are so proud to be offering the  33  films. 33 years retrospective at our current location, and we hope the community will use this as a time to say goodbye to this theater,” Calvage says.

The 33 films. 33 years event is a commemorative cinematic experience that pays tribute to the dozens of movies shown at the Nick.  One film from each year that the Nick’s doors have been open to the public will be screened. Titles and dates are as follows:

'79 - Sunset Boulevard - Friday, August 10 at 5:30pm

'80 - Casablanca - Friday, August 10 at 8:00pm

'81 - The Seventh Seal - Saturday, August 11th at 5:30pm

'82 - Annie Hall - Saturday, August 11th at 8:00pm

'83 - Breaking Away - Sunday, August 12th at 3:00pm

'84 - Rashomon - Sunday, August 12th at 6:30pm

'85 - Weekend - Monday, August 13th at 5:30pm

'86 - Monty Python's The Meaning of Life - Monday, August 13th at 8:00pm

'87 - Rear Window - Tuesday, August 14th at 5:30pm

'88 - Touch of Evil - Tuesday, August 14th at 8:00pm

'89 - Heathers - Wednesday, August 15th at 5:30pm

'90 - Do the Right Thing - Wednesday, August 15th at 8:00pm

'91 - Cinema Paradiso - Thursday, August 16th at 5:30pm

'92 - Slacker - Thursday, August 16th at 9:00pm

'93 - Like Water for Chocolate - Friday, August 17th at 5:30pm

'94 - Orlando - Friday, August 17th at 8:00pm

'95 - Three Colors (Blue/White/Red) - Saturday, August 18th at 3:00pm (Blue) 5:30pm (White) 8:00pm (Red)

'96 - Bottle Rocket - Sunday, August 19th at 3:00pm

'97 - Waiting for Guffman - Sunday, August 19th at 5:00pm

'98 - Smoke Signals - Monday, August 20th at 5:30pm

'99 - Buena Vista Social Club - Monday, August 20th at 8:00pm

'00 - Timecode - Tuesday, August 21st at 5:30pm

'01 - Yana's Friends - Tuesday, August 21st at 8:00pm

'02 - 8 Women - Wednesday, August 22nd at 5:30pm

'03 - Bowling for Columbine - Wednesday, August 22nd at 8:00pm

'04 - Lost in Translation - Thursday, August 23rd at 5:30pm

'05 - Junebug - Thursday, August 23rd at 8:00pm

'06 - The Squid and the Whale - Friday, August 24th at 6:00pm

'07 - Volver - Friday, August 24th at 8:00pm

'08 - Man on Wire - Saturday, August 25th at 2:30pm

'09 - Let the Right One In - Saturday, August 25th at 5:00pm

'10 - A Single Man - Saturday, August 25th at 8:00pm

'11 -  The King's Speech - Sunday, August 26th at 2:30pm

'12 - The Artist - Sunday, August 26th at 5:00pm

The last screening will be followed by a party on August 26^th to officially say goodbye to the 937 address. The new Nick will open its doors on August 31^st. “We cannot believe the success we have had. It is our goal to become more than a movie theater, and really be a community center, as well as a resource for filmmakers and film education in the realm of media literacy,” Calvage says.