TOMORROW: MIKE GILBERT ON CINEMA

There may be a conservative strain of common sense and/or wisdom somewhere which states that it is not a good idea to unleash something sight unseen upon the world. But then, I’ve never been blessed with much common sense. It’s time to stir the pot once again, jump into the deep end and see what happens. And who better to help do the stirring than our old friend Andrew Blackwood? Blackwood, a student filmmaker and long-time reader of SLIFR, premiered his experimental student film Slap here some two months ago. You may remember the movie was received with equal measures of enthusiasm and indifference, and a healthy dollop of outrage. Well, he has a new one on tap, and Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule, eager to jump into the fray once again, will be premiering it tomorrow at 12:00 noon.

As of this writing I have not seen the new short. All I know is the title, Mike Gilbert on Cinema. That title in and of itself may mean nothing to you, but it does fire up some expectations on my part. Allow me to explain. Mike Gilbert is also known as “Bandit” in the comments column of this blog and surely others. (He led off the discussion here, for example.) He is also an ex-colleague of mine at my day job, where he recently left for presumably greener pastures. He is a keen human being, a genial spirit, and he is a inexhaustible film nut. Just knowing Mike as I do, any movie entitled Mike Gilbert on Cinema ought at least to be fun to watch, and perhaps deliberately provocative and lively and annoying as well. He is likely to have lots of thoughts which may make you nod in agreement, or just as likely make you laugh or talk back at the screen. I doubt you’ll find him boring, however. That said, I have no idea what side of Mike will be on display in Andrew’s film, or whether it will even be one familiar to me, or how Andrew has approached his subject. So as always, expect the unexpected.

As with Slap, your comments are welcome. But I will repeat my plea from last time (which was, I’d say, 66% effective) to keep the comments spirited and constructive and respectful, whether you like the movie or not. By the time it shows up here tomorrow I will have seen MGOC and be ready to throw in right at the beginning, an advantage over my position last time, when it took me a while to see the film and then even longer to break away from the everyday in order to comment on it myself.

So tune in tomorrow, 12:00 noon, and enjoy with me the latest effort from Andrew Blackwood, a movie I’d like to think was tailor-made for SLIFR (though I may live to regret that statement). It’s Mike Gilbert on Cinema, comin’ at ya in 2-D right here tomorrow.