This weekend saw a lot of movie-related activity on my part activity (see previous post), so I thought it right to provide a little recap for the events of the past couple of days.

NYCIFF, Night 1: As part of my coverage of this week long event, I attended my first screening, the World Premier of 10 Rules for Sleeping Around, a rather derivative ‘screwbally’ romantic comedy set in NYC (it gets props for that) whose highlight(?) for me was figuring out that at least some of what the “Brazilian Bombshell” was saying was actually Spanish.

This week, I have a few more screenings lined up; stay tuned to this space for my thoughts and reflections.

Man of Steel: The idea is that my thoughts will be posted in a separate and increasingly lengthy piece later today or early tomorrow (fingers crossed I can keep to that schedule).

Twenty Feet from Stardom: What more can I say? I LOVED LOVED LOVED THIS FILM. I cannot begin to explain how well this documentary – that chronicles among other things, the evolution and career ups and downs the people (mostly women) who end vocal support to some of today’s top musical acts. At the center of the story is Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee (2011) Darlene Love. Born with a lead vocalist’s chops, her story is an amazing one, that by the time the closing credits roll at the end of the 90 minutes, you fully appreciate and understand why such an honor was given to perhaps one of the best known backup vocalists of her era.

Other highlights in the film included:

• “Seeing” the voice behind the Rolling Stones classic Gimme Shelter, Merry Clayton and her story.
• Rediscovering Lisa Fisher, former solo artist who was a backup to Luther Vandross (himself a backup artist to David Bowie on his Young Americans track).

On a side note (and a nice treat to boot) – although I did not attend the live Q&A screening at the film center, on my way into my screening, I saw Ms. Love leaving the theater.

 

How was your weekend at the movies? If you did not see Man of Steel, what did you see?