It's like having a live expert give you your own commentary track! Wednesday, Inspire kicks off seven weeks of Vegas-themed movies with local experts chiming in, with a showing of Casino featuring special guests Oscar Goodman...Hey, he's in it! As himself!...and author David Schwartz, director of UNLV's Center of Gaming Research. Admission is free with purchase of one $7 cocktail; the evening starts with cocktails and Q&A with Oscar at 7 p.m., followed by Film at 8. Future screenings include The Las Vegas Story and that ultimate Vegas classic, Showgirls.
The Westwind Drive-In wants to treat you to movie night tonight. The open-air multiplex at 4150 W. Carey is hosting free screenings of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Maleficent, How to Train Your Dragon 2 and Think Like A Man 2 with show starting at 8 p.m. For more event details, give them a call at (702) 646-3565 or check out their website.
Filmmakers are seeking a distributor for their thinly veiled fictionalized account of the Ted Binion story. They're hoping for a wide release. Their name draw is Michael Madsen. Good luck with that. Actually, they make Madsen sound like a great fit for the doomed, dissolute Ray Easler (their Binion counterpart). Avid Vegas film buffs like me probably already stopped at the T/A truck stop in Kingman to pick up a DVD of Sex and Lies in Sin City, which featured Matthew Modine as the undisguised Ted, although it's hard to beat the casting of Woody Harrelson in Zak Penn's improv comedy The Grand, as a loser so obviously modeled on poor Ted that it isn't funny; at one point he's confronted in a men's room by his dad's ghost, based on guess who.
There's actually a whole 'nother movie to be made about how the squabbles between the Binion kids caused them to lose control of their father's legacy, the tragic hero of the piece being the uncut sheet of $10,000 bills that used to hang on the wall at the place.
The Mob Museum will host an exclusive screening of Whitey, a documentary about the Boston mobster who inspired the Jack Nicholson character in The Departed, Tuesday and Wednesday, August 12 and 13. The $20 admission includes popcorn and a beverage (museum members get 10% off). After being an FBI informant, "Whitey" Bolger spent years on the run and became the number two man on the FBI's Most Wanted List...right behind Osama bin Laden.
Still time to check out Town Square's free summer "Movies in the Square" series, Thursday nights after sundown. Bring the family to check out Free Birds (appropriately enough) and other titles through August 21. Check out the schedule here.
"The drive-in will never die." Not in Las Vegas, anyway, where the West Wind All-Digital Drive-In keeps the carloads coming in the age of high definition. Showtimes on its five screens currently start at 8 p.m. Tuesday is Family Fun Night with admission of $5 per person (normally $7), although children ages 5-11 get in for a buck and younger kids get in free. At those prices, what better way to entertain that passel of young'uns? It's located at 4150 W. Carey Ave., just east of Rancho and behind the Fiesta. (Which reminds me of the Fiesta Drive-In back in El Paso, Texas. Although it ended its days screening X-rated movies. Which was rather awkward for anyone building subdivisions in the hills behind it. I once interviewed two city councilmen who dared each other to stand at the entrance polling customers on what they thought of a proposed zoning ordinance, an enterprise that was doomed to failure, as was, sadly, the Fiesta.)
Jerry Lewis is coming to South Point for three nights starting May 30, but if you can't wait that long to get your fill of the funnyman, an exhibition of his photographs is on display at UNLV's Marjorie Barrick Museum through August 16. The photographs ... impressionistic captures of lights at night ... are accompanied by classic Lewis film and theater posters, while two video monitors on opposite ends of the hall run documentaries on his life and career. To put the cherry on top, the museum is running a Jerry Lewis Film Festival with a new title each Thursday night at 6 p.m., starting with The Nutty Professor this Thursday (May 15) and wrapping up with Frank Tashlin's classic Martin & Lewis satire, Artists and Models, on September 11. Like all the best things in life, it's all free.
Movie ticket prices got you down? What the heck is your problem? If you have the patience to wait in line (I know, time is money), you can take advantage of free preview screenings that are being hosted at various theaters around town. You'll find pointers to free pass giveaways in the Las Vegas WEEKLY and the Las Vegas Review-Journal, and sometimes the studios or theater chains will host free screenings as well; get on their mailing lists if you can. You could catch two or more shows for free in one week! One recent week I watched Brick Mansions at the Palms and the very next night moseyed over to Towne Square to catchThe Other Woman. And no charge! What you spend on popcorn and Sno-Caps is your problem.
Heads up: at the Brenden (inside the Palms), I needed to go to the concession stand and trade in the passes I received via e-mail for tickets to get me in the right line. At the AMC Towne Square, you just waited in line outside the theater, and shortly before show time someone distributed tickets to everyone who'd waited. You want to get there early to be sure of a seat, because your pass alone does not guarantee you one. As Rip Torn so memorably put it in Songwriter: "Airlines do it all the time."
If you're familiar with a certain stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard between the Strip and Downtown, you'll have noticed a certain motel has painted over the word "Adult" that used to precede "Movies" on their marquee, but no such qualms at the Desert Moon Motel at 1701 E. Fremont Street, which advertises XXX movies on flat-screen TVs. According to Cheryl the manager, the building dates back to the 1940's and has even appeared in a few movies over the years. Long-time readers will be familiar with my twin passions for movies and Las Vegas history... Anyway. Rooms start at $44.80 (tax included and no deposit) on weekday nights, and Friday-Saturday range from $56 up to $95 plus tax for jacuzzi rooms with a 55-inch TV. Currently on special: jacuzzi rooms for $85.99 plus tax midweek.
I only stumbled upon the Sci-Fi Center because the Pep Boys were working on my car across the street, but I'm glad I did. In between selling comics, graphic novels, DVDs, and back issues of FANGORIA, these guys host screenings of classic science fiction and horror movies...for varying definitions of the word "classic," of course. Tonight they were running the Oscar-winning Disneyfied version of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea in glorious widescreen; upcoming screenings this week include Creature of the Black Lagoon (in 3-D!), Dawn of the Dead, and Pink Flamingos. Admission prices range from $5 to free, for the Cinemonday screenings and the family-friendly Saturday night drive-ins (Coming Soon: The Phantom Planet). A local troupe of players "shadows" some of the features, so a recent screening of Night of the Living Dead might be accompanied by the walking dead hovering over your shoulder, or Rocky Horror by enthusiastic re-enactors; future offerings will take on Ghostbusters and...the one I'm most anxious to check out....They Live. If that's not enough to entice you, I have just one word: Nerdlesque. (Sahara & 6th, www.thescificenter.com, (702) 792-GEEK)
