The Revue Revisited

Contributed by Louis Papa

Back in early October, after going through what was surely one of the most pained of periods in its long ninety six year existence, the Revue theatre on Roncesvalles opened its doors again to the delight of everyone in the community. By now most of us here in Toronto have either heard of or were directly involved in the struggles the theatre went through last year, having been sold and closed down after nearly 100 years in business. Its very cool looking Marquee crashing down to the ground into a big heap of garbage shortly afterwards also kind of sucked.

But all the tears and joy and hard work that went into keeping the old lady that is The Revue alive is in the past now, right? I mean it reopened, there was an online vote, 'Some like it Hot' won and was screened and everybody is happy, right?

Not so much.

The doors closed a year ago because, simply, there were obviously too many empty seats and a general lack of support. (Not in a mean way, though, of course.) So it can happen again. Very easily. She's old, the Revue. She needs more attention and a whole bunch more support than her much younger, bigger, and flashier brothers and sisters. Lucky for us this week coming up, that shouldn't be too hard to do.

On Wednesday and Thursday two relatively old films are getting the big screen treatment and both will make you feel dirty and/or philosophical. The first is: Last Tango in Paris; which, along with its 'butter scene' and Marlon Brando saying stuff like 'I get to milk you twice a day,' made enough of a stir back in 1972 that it most likely single handedly choked off any remaining doubt that money spent on making art films was just plain stupid. (In America, any way.)

There are a bunch of classic lines in it, some really lovely cinematography, and a splash of sex here and there. In other words, it's great. The second film is the now cult classic Blue Velvet. If you've ever wondered what Dennis Hopper dry humping Isabella Rossellini would look like, which I'm sure we've all done at some point, this film is for you. Now we all know David Lynch has made some messed up and crazy films, but watching 'Al' from Quantum Leap doing some mighty fine Karaoke to Roy Orbison's 'In Dreams', is all sorts of crazy and brilliant smooshed together. I'm grabbing a ticket for that scene alone.

Photo by mikenfer on Flickr