Can we bitch for a minute? Seeing movies at multiplexes like Aventura and Lincoln Road is about as enjoyable as air travel. They move us like cattle through roped lines and mega escalators. We half expect them to make us take off our shoes at some point and start touching us inappropriately.
About six months ago, Miamians erupted with joy over new local art house cinemas. So why are we still forced to see flicks at Sunrise Intracoastal, which frankly smells like soiled Depends diapers?
Wynwood's O Cinema is not quite open yet (although they teased us during Art Basel) and Miami Beach Cinemateque has been moving to their new theater
for what seems like years (but is really just long months). Coral Gables
Art Cinema is the one success story so far, bringing premiers and
directors to South Miami. Kudos.
But there's another theater that predates the Miami art cinema boom,
which has been showing some freaking great films lately. Tucked away on
the University of Miami campus is the Bill Cosford Cinema.
For instance, tonight at 7:30 p.m, they're screening a 1926 film classic
The Flying Ace with live accompaniment by Frost School of Music
students. Where else can you see an archival film for free with live
musicians in Miami? Not unless you make it out to Cinema Sounds or one of the Super 8 film nights of Barron Sherer and Kevin Arrow.
Cosford also recently hosted the traveling viral video collective,
Everything Is Terrible, and screen wonderful camp classics at their
midnight screenings like Attack of the Screaming Forehead. Earlier this month,
they screened the South Florida premier of an epic Bollywood robot
musical Enthiran.
And not all of their programming is so off the grid from the
mainstream. They regularly screen Academy Award contenders such as this
year's Oscar Short nominees as well as blockbusters like the Harry
Potter series. Basically, whatever they put in their projector is
worth two hours of your time. Do you trust your local multiplex that
much?
But every time we visit Cosford, we're surprised at the sparse audience.
Perhaps it's because no marquee is visible from U.S. 1 and parking for
the theater feels a lot like parking for class. Whatever the case, Cosford hosts great film events faster than we can write about them so keep tabs on their programming over on Facebook. As for the promised new art cinemas, we hear the rest will open in the coming weeks. We'll believe it when our asses are actually in their seats.
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