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When is a themed Marathon that doesn't stick much to theme still feature one of the best lineups in Marathon history? 1999 has come calling and has its answer for you with the 17th Annual Ohio 24-Hour Science Fiction Marathon!
"17th?" you say? "Wasn't the 1998 version the 12th annual?" Well yeah! You see, once the Marathon was banished from the halls of the Riffe Center, Bruce sought to construct a time machine that would take us back to the Drexel North days for redemption. At one point, we even had a quarter of a million dollars to buy the place with, but somehow it ended up in the Thornton Waxman Institute for Gravitational Reserach's Swiss bank account (one of the great unsolved mysteries of the modern age.) But as we all know, time travel can be a tricky matter. And time itself often doesn't want to have its fabric punctured. And so, years 13-16 took place while we at Marathon Central worked on that time machine. And they were GREAT years, especially the 15th, when Boston's Martian Liberation Organization held the event hostage and played Mars propaganda (er..I mean film classics FREE MARS) for most of the night. At the end of the 16th Marathon, the machine was finally perfected and we all traveled back to 1991! But alas, this shattering of the space-time continuum subsequently thrust us back into early 1999 shortly thereafter, no memories remaining of years 13-16.
So yeah, it's pretty simple, actually. And, of course, has NEVER caused any head-scratching amongst the uninitiated. NEVER.
In a perverse way, it makes sense that one of the most solid Science Fiction Marathons took place during a vagabond year, in a theater whose glory days had long since faded. In its heyday, The Continent was a cutting edge shopping center/night club scene/luxury apartment complex. Trust me, it was one of the cooler parts of town for much of the 70s and 80s. But like many things in Columbus, suburban sprawl conspired to thwart the ambitions of the complex, and by the time 1999 rolled around the once thriving community was a shell of its former self. The Funny Bone remained, but would be gone to Easton a few years later. But smack dab in the middle of the complex was the Sony Continent eight screen theater. Since it was no longer a hot movie spot (Columbus's late 90s multiplex over-expansion having diluted its audience), renting its main screen for 24 hours wasn't too daunting of a proposition.
And lemme tell ya, for as much as I loved the grandeur of the Riffe Center (as Aaron so accurately points out), walking into a 400 seat theater that had a large middle section with a smaller one on each side....with a slightly funky 70s decor.....well, it was almost as if the Drexel North had just shrunk a little bit. Made me a bit misty in my time. And the theater itself was a pretty good spot for the event! Concessions were naturally more expensive, but being able to eat again in the theater after a three year respite more than made up for that. Plus, the staff pretty much left us alone. While there was only a slight uptick in attendance, the important part was that for at least one year, we weren't bleeding any more Marathoids.
For the record, the final film lineup was:
THE TERMINATOR
KRONOS
The OHIO PREMIERE of FREE ENTERPRISE
CAT WOMEN OF THE MOON in 3-D
The MIDWEST PREMIERE of EXISTENZ
MYSTERIOUS ISLAND
The OHIO REVIVAL PREMIERE of MIGHTY PEKING MAN
INVASION OF THE BEE GIRLS
DARK CITY
TIME BANDITS
TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY
So how, exactly, did this prominently advertised Time Travel theme end up only featuring three time travel films? From the flier's standpoint, TIME AFTER TIME ended up having no prints available (rest assured, screenable materials have FINALLY become available, and when we do this whole Time Travel theme right, it'll be in the lineup.) But in general, it all came down to diverging booking philosophies. Bruce pushed for THE TIME MACHINE, SLEEPER, and BILL AND TED'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE, but Jeff had his reasons for not going with any of them. Now, I could sit here and argue those reasons up and down for hours, but it'll be much more productive to wait for the Time Travel Marathon we'll organize soon, when we'll try to have at least the first and third of those titles (and maybe the Woody Allen film as well.) But I hand it to my partner in crime: when he has a concept, he goes with a concept no matter what. And so, the Time Travel Marathon that wasn't really a Time Travel Marathon.
But what a lineup it still was! You can't go wrong with the TERMINATOR bookend (more on that in a minute.) This was the first appearance of Terry Gilliam's TIME BANDITS (a personal favorite since childhood.) KRONOS made its first appearance in ten years in a sparkling new print. INVASION OF THE BEE GIRLS is quite the fun softcore 70s throwback. FREE ENTERPRISE remains one of the most popular Premieres in the event's storied history, an expertly calibrated satire of/tribute to geek culture. And the last minute addition of Cronenberg's EXISTENZ was a genuinely exciting happening; I still think it's one of his most underrated films, a worthy modern-day follow up to VIDEODROME (appropriate, as it replaced that film in the lineup.) Plus, there was the wonderful DARK CITY on the big screen (with a trailer tribute to the recently deceased Stanley Kubrick right beforehand.)
Of course, there were some oddities as well. The print of CAT WOMEN OF THE MOON could charitably be described as incomplete; it was missing a good chunk of one reel and quite a bit of the actual 3D content. (It would reappear in the 2009 lineup as the amazing Ultimate CAT WOMEN Experience......more about that another time.)
And then there was the infamous TERMINATOR 2 flipped reel, a flaw that would birth a new tradition. Several reels into T2, the reel change occurred and everyone realized that the film was now playing upside down and backwards. On the old Drexel North/Riffe Center reel to reel/dual projector setup, this would've been readily fixed. But the Continent's platter system meant that the film was strung together as one giant reel. Which meant a good half hour wait (at best) to fix the problem. And so, game as ever, the audience elected to watch this one reel upside down and backwards. Which was great fun. And spawned the now annual tradition (at both Marathons) of playing some type of film upside down and backwards.
As we walked into the bright sun that Sunday afternoon, it seemed as if the Marathon had found a new home, and the future looked just as bright. That didn't turn out to be the case, but the fond memories of this 1999 version of the event still remain.