The Projectionist

Odd little movie about a dumpy projectionist who wanders around not doing much but fantasizing about movies, imagining himself as a superhero and making up stories for friends about his love life. The film is predominately film clips strung together as rather uninteresting collages.

I've seen this movie described as one you have to love if you're a film buff. Well, I'm a film buff, and I recognized tons of the clips, and I found the movie quite tedious. The film collages seemed pointless and rather pretentious (especially when you start getting a lot of Hitler footage). The superhero section aims to be a comedic silent take of old movie serials, but the physical humor invariably falls flat.

I don't see this movie as something for film buffs. I see it as something for people who like somewhat arty films that reference movies, which is something else altogether.

The film, the Projectionist, is geared towards those who like weird, cult-type films. I watched this because I usually like to see Rodney Dangerfield. This is Rodney's film debut. This film only gives a glimpse of Rodney Dangerfield's acting/comedic ability. He is not starring as a typical Rodney Dangerfield character. This is a strange film and was difficult to follow. With the exception of seeing Rodney's first flick, watching this film was a total waste of time for me. However, others might like this type of flick to watch. This is not a prime time film. I could see a young college type crowd watching this movie while partying. Definitely, not my cup of tea.

There have been movies before and after The Projectionist that tear down film's equivalent of Theatre's fourth wall by lifting the barrier between the movie and the real world. Buster Keaton did it most brilliantly in Sherlock Jr. (1924, 44 mins., also featuring a projectionist), and Woody Allen pulled off a reversal (character steps out of the screen) in The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985). Steve Martin duked it out with Cagney and others in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982). The Projectionist is an amusing and annoying combination of a sweet schlub played by Chuck McCann, very reminiscent of John Candy, Rodney Dangerfield's film debut as a dictatorial movie theatre manager given to delivering incredible dressing-down speeches at his hapless ushers (shades of Full Metal Jacket), a nostalgic look at Times Square before it became "Times Square", and a melding of our hero with his screen idols, including his eye-popping drop-in at Rick's Cafe Americain. So what's to be annoyed at? A running super-hero theme is weak, and once you realize it will return again and again it's stomach tightening time while you anticipate the enjoyable sequences being interrupted by this underwritten motif. But without question The Projectionist is not to be missed in a time when imagination has been sucked out of Hollywood. And so I appreciated this film last night even more than when I saw it in a theatre 31 years ago, not excluding a hilarious trailer for a faux end-of-the-world flick that's a little too predictive of 9/11 for comfort.

A projectionist (Chuck McCann) fantasizes that he is a superhero named Captain Flash and his jerk of a boss (Rodney Dangerfield) is a villain named The Bat. This seemed like it would be a fun movie but it just didn't work for me. I'm not saying it isn't interesting but it's just not that entertaining. The Captain Flash segments are especially tedious. The film would have been better served focusing less on that and the tiresome clips and more on the somewhat interesting goings-on at the theater. Speaking of clips, I have no idea how the producers and distributors of this film were able to get away with using the wide variety of classic film clips they used. I'm going to assume they didn't pay for them as this was a very low budget movie. Even more puzzling than how they got away with it in 1971 is how they managed to get it on DVD in this sue-happy day and age.

When not goofing off, the titular yutz daydreams of being a silent film superhero. Parts of the score are cribbed from old serials, and scenes are lifted from features of the 20's thru 50's. One wonders how John Wayne and Humphrey Bogart would react to seeing their work intermingled with clips of war atrocities and grindhouse dancers. Chuck McCann's character is immensely likeable when he dwells in the present, but his superhero mugs like the class clown you always despised. Released on VHS in 1986 to capitalize on Rodney Dangerfield's (straight) supporting role.