For Raleigh Film Fans, These Are Some Of The Saddest Sights In Town

Citing plumbing issues, Mission Valley Cinema closed last summer after more than 45 years in operation. I’ve seen many many movies there since the ‘80s (I’m pretty sure the first movie I ever saw there was the Eddie Murphy/Nick Nolte action comedy 48 HRS in 1982) so I hate seeing the empty marquee whenever I go that shopping center.

There has been talk about the possibility of new owners, so there is some flicker of hope that the five screen venue might re-open someday, but until then that image above will remain a very depressing sight indeed.

Here’s a picture of Mission Valley in happier times - the opening of RETURN OF THE JEDI on May 25, 1983: 

I wasn’t there as I was living in Chapel Hill at the time and saw the movie at the Carolina Theatre on Franklin Street there - sadly that’s another venue that’s no longer with us as it closed in 2005.

I never worked at Mission Valley, but I worked for the same company – Ambassador Entertainment - at the Colony Theater in North Raleigh from 2009 to when it closed in 2015. 

The two screen indie theater originally opened in 1969, and like MVC, I had attended films there since the ‘80s (I’m pretty sure the first film I ever saw there was the Billy Crystal/Danny Devito comedy THROW MOMMA FROM THE TRAIN).

I still work for Ambassador Entertainment at the Rialto Theatre (opened in 1942), and often moviegoers will ask about whether the Colony will re-open. These hopes were fueled by the Raleigh News & Observer in 2017 when they reported that a permit had been issued for renovations. But that was three years ago, and nothing has happened.

Since I live fairly close to the Colony (or the Colony’s old location I should say), I see that sad blank marquee often (the empty poster cases are pretty dismal looking too). Within the last week I stopped by to look through the windows, and it was obvious that no work had been done since the seats were ripped out of the floor five years ago.

On more of an up note, here’s the Colony in happier times with one of my favorite marquees.

Man, I miss those yearly showings of THE BIG LEBOWSKI. The N.C. Museum of Art does a good job with their LEBOWSKI events, but it’s just not the same as the Colony’s.

If these venues don’t re-open in some fashion, I wish they’d take down those marquees so film fans don’t have to see their blank faces for years and years. But maybe it’d be worse if they took them away. At least they are reminders of what was, and serve as some kind of marker. Maybe that’s why I made this post with pictures of them.

Since I’ve mentioned three theaters that have closed in this post, I guess the bottom line is: support indie theaters!

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Film Babble Blog's Top 10 Movies of 2019

Usually I post these picks before the Oscar nominations are announced - which happened earlier this week – but things have been nuts lately. 2019 hasn’t been the greatest year for film, but any year that boasts two stellar Martin Scorsese movies shouldn’t be dismissed. So here’s my top 10 films with what I think are some of their crucial lines.

10. AMAZING GRACE (Dirs. Alan Elliott, Sydney Pollack) 

Reverend James Cleveland: “Many of you who never had the opportunity to hear Aretha sing Gospel, you’re in tonight for a great thrill. She can sing anything!”

9. DOLEMITE IS MY NAME (Dir. Craig Brewer) 

Rudy Ray Moore (Eddie Murphy): “Dolemite is my name, and fuckin’ up motherfuckers is my game!”

8. MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN
(Dir. Edward Norton)

Lionel Essrog (Edward Norton): “Okay, listen. I got something wrong with me. That’s the first thing to know. I twitch and shout a lot. It makes me look like a damn freak show. But inside my head is an even bigger mess. I can’t stop twisting things around, words and sounds especially. I have to keep playing with them until they come out right.”

7. JOJO RABBIT

(Dir. Taika Waititi)

“Let everything happen to you. Beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.” - Rainer Maria Rilke

6. US (Dir. Jordan Peele)

Jason Wilson (Evan Alex): There’s a Family in our driveway!

5. MARRIAGE STORY (Dir. Noah Baumbach)

Charlie (Adam Driver): “You were happy, you just decided you weren’t now”

4. UNCUT GEMS (Dirs. Josh and Benny Safdie)

Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler): “That’s a million-dollar opal you’re holding. Straight from the Ethiopian Jewish tribe. I mean this is old-school, Middle-earth shit.”

3. PARASITE (Dir. Bong Joon-ho)

Kang Ho Song (Kim Ki-taek):“So, there’s no need for a plan. You can’t go wrong with no plans. We don’t need to make a plan for anything. It doesn't matter what will happen next. Even if the country gets destroyed or sold out, nobody cares. Got it?”
2. 1917 (Dir. Sam Mendes)

General Erinmore (Colin Firth): “They’re walking into a trap. Your orders are to deliver a message calling off tomorrow mornings attack, if you fail, it will be a massacre.”

1. THE IRISHMAN (Dir. Martin Scorsese)

Frank Sheeran (Robert De Niro): “Whenever anybody says they’re a little concerned, they’re very concerned.”

Spillover:

THE LIGHTHOUSE (Dir. Robert Eggers)

THE LAST BLACK MAN IN SAN FRANCISCO (Dir. Joe Talbot)

ROLLING THUNDER REVUE (Dir. Martin Scorsese)

LITTLE WOMEN (Dir. Greta Gerwig)

KNIVES OUT (Dir. Rian Johnson)

THE TWO POPES (Dir. Fernando Meirelles)

ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD (Dir. Quentin Tarantino)

FORD V FERRARI (Dir. James Mangold)

THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY (Dir. Petra Costa)

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The BAD BOYS Saga Concludes. Or Does It?

BAD BOYS FOR LIFE

(Dir. Adil El Arbi & Bilall Fallah, 2020)

The 17-year long wait is finally over as the third and final chapter in the mighty BAD BOYS saga opens tonight. This entry has all the things you’d expect from a BAD BOYS movie: it’s too long, it has many instances of crappy comedy, it’s decorated with tons of sweeping shots of Miami (mostly in time-lapse), and it contains gunfire and explosions galore.

Now, the BAD BOYS series has always been about dumb fun as it’s delivered glossy LETHAL WEAPON-style buddy cop action hijinks once a decade since 1995, so it’s silly to be too critical of such a wannabe crowd pleaser, especially one released in January, but I’m still gonna give it a go.

This time, our heroes, Miami narcotics cops Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) and Mike Lowrey (Will Smith), realize that it’s time to hang up their badges and guns and take it easy into old age. Well, not really. Only Lawrence’s neurotic character is leaning that way, now that he’s a grandfather, but Smith’s smooth Mike is in denial as jokes about his dying his goatee attest.

Shit gets real when Mike is gunned down by a mysterious motorcyclist, and he’s laid up for months in the hospital with Marcus waiting by his side (and helping to re-dye his goatee). When he comes to, just in time for Marcus’ daughter’s wedding, he is intent on revenge. With the help of AMMO (Advanced Miami Metro Operations), a group of heavily armed, high tech millennial cops (including Alexander Ludwig, Charles Melton, Kate del Castillo, and possible Smith love interest Paola Nuñez), he hunts down the shooter who turns out to be the leader of a Miami drug cartel, Armando Armas (Jacob Scipio), and turns out to be something else, but no Spoilers here.

Lawrence and Smith, both in their 50s, look pretty good in this last outing – well, Lawrence looks a little pudgy, but that’s no real issue here. They still have the argumentative chemistry they had at the beginning of the franchise, though the shtick of them bickering while dodging bullets got way old in the second one back in 2003. Luckily, there are a number of good lines and laughs to help us through the predictable formula.

Directors Adil & Bilall do a good job replicating Michael Bay’s overly slick and jump cut crazy aesthetics, but they don’t bring much of their own style to the production. As big and cinematic as they want to go, these movies are really overblown TV shows, and these Belgian filmmakers are not much more than directors-for-hire here.

I did enjoy seeing returning regular Joe Pantoliano as Captain Conrad Howard have a more significant part than before, and I accepted most of the contrivances with out much eye-rolling, but just about everything else went down exactly the way I thought it would.

Maybe I’m speaking too soon that this is the concluding chapter in the trilogy as there’s a during the end credits scene (see? Even BAD BOYS movies are adapting to Marvel methods) that indicates that the game may not be up. Okay, fine – go ahead and flog this franchise. If there’s as much as a gap between entries as there’s been in the past, our beloved duo will be nearing 70 next time. Maybe Lawrence’s Marcus will finally learn the correct lyrics to Inner Circle’s Cops theme song “Bad Boys” by then.

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