Brian Darr
@hellonfriscobay.bsky.social
Cinephile, music lover & library worker originally from San Francisco now living in Maine. These are personal opinions that may not reflect the views of my employer.
Pinned
It's ATAlive!
When Mumbai filmmaker Ashim Ahluwalia was invited to be artist-in-residence in 2013 by the San Francisco Film Society (now SFFILM) and screen Miss Lovely (2012), his Cannes-premiered period piece abou...
www.screenslate.com
Wrote about one of my favorite San Francisco screening spaces @ataconnect.bsky.social for @screenslatesf.bsky.social www.screenslate.com/articles/its...
Not pictured: the not-on-Letterboxd short BLOWING THINGS AWAY, which I saw at the Exploratorium Tuesday, or the as-yet-unlogged movies I watched yesterday
December 26, 2025 at 5:16 PM
Not pictured: the not-on-Letterboxd short BLOWING THINGS AWAY, which I saw at the Exploratorium Tuesday, or the as-yet-unlogged movies I watched yesterday
A second showing is happening at 9pm- still never gone to this annual 35mm event.
December 25, 2025 at 12:09 AM
A second showing is happening at 9pm- still never gone to this annual 35mm event.
He ain’t kidding! Check who’s at the two-minute mark…
this is cool. someone uploaded the first TCM Remembers, from 1995. lots of recognizable names, and a couple of cosmos-moving titans in the bargain.
The first TCM Remembers (1995)
YouTube video by Chuck Amuck
youtu.be
December 24, 2025 at 10:48 PM
He ain’t kidding! Check who’s at the two-minute mark…
And here she is in San Francisco six years later digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/m...
December 24, 2025 at 12:56 AM
And here she is in San Francisco six years later digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/m...
It was great to see Craig Baldwin’s early film/provocation in a cinema environment on Saturday- particularly at @ataconnect.bsky.social. Brought a lot of thoughts forward about cinema spaces in my hometown boxd.it/caGVcD
A review of Stolen Movie (1976)
In my recent Screen Slate article on Artists’ Television Access I described this as a “guerrilla documentation of grindhouse-era Market Street moviegoing” before quoting from Sam Green’s essay on the ...
boxd.it
December 22, 2025 at 6:19 PM
It was great to see Craig Baldwin’s early film/provocation in a cinema environment on Saturday- particularly at @ataconnect.bsky.social. Brought a lot of thoughts forward about cinema spaces in my hometown boxd.it/caGVcD
Stevens is the heart of this book- good stuff on Capra, Ford, Wyler & Huston too but Stevens is the one who I emerged with a totally refreshed understanding of.
Some of the best (I think) material in Five Came Back is there because a librarian saw what I was working on over 3 days and asked me if I'd like to take a look at a box of old George Stevens papers that had not been catalogued yet. So no, for a ton of reasons, AI cannot "do the research for you."
December 22, 2025 at 2:14 AM
Stevens is the heart of this book- good stuff on Capra, Ford, Wyler & Huston too but Stevens is the one who I emerged with a totally refreshed understanding of.
Started my SF visit with three Budd Boetticher Westerns, two at the Stanford Theatre and one on the plane out. My Letterboxd review of the appropriately-titled latter includes links to both of the former. boxd.it/c9EVUn
A review of Westbound (1959)
Knowing I’d be catching the very last double-bill of the all-35mm Stanford Theatre’s dreamy Classic Westerns series the next day, I figured the plane ride from Boston to San Francisco would be the ide...
boxd.it
December 22, 2025 at 12:49 AM
Started my SF visit with three Budd Boetticher Westerns, two at the Stanford Theatre and one on the plane out. My Letterboxd review of the appropriately-titled latter includes links to both of the former. boxd.it/c9EVUn
I would never have known what “unskinny” was without the guidance of C.C. DeVille.
Here's a question I've enjoyed asking on various social media platforms. What are vocabulary words you have learned from songs? For example, I learned the word "raze" from REM's World Leader Pretend.
December 21, 2025 at 10:04 PM
I would never have known what “unskinny” was without the guidance of C.C. DeVille.
Catching up with my Letterboxd backlog, starting with Monday’s @spacegallery.bsky.social showing of this puckish feature from the director of THE AFTERLIGHT and PAINT DRYING boxd.it/c8IFRh
A review of Zodiac Killer Project (2025)
You can’t spell “psychogeography” without the “psycho”. The most compelling thing about this is the impossibility of sussing out whether Charlie Shackleton really wanted to make a True Crime doc emplo...
boxd.it
December 20, 2025 at 9:19 PM
Catching up with my Letterboxd backlog, starting with Monday’s @spacegallery.bsky.social showing of this puckish feature from the director of THE AFTERLIGHT and PAINT DRYING boxd.it/c8IFRh
Finally a Cinematrix puzzle I can be proud of - my first 9/9 single-digit percentages in several weeks! (Including a 1-1-1 row)
December 20, 2025 at 8:21 PM
Finally a Cinematrix puzzle I can be proud of - my first 9/9 single-digit percentages in several weeks! (Including a 1-1-1 row)
The #1 movie when you were 10 years old is how your 2026 is going to go.
December 20, 2025 at 12:05 AM
The #1 movie when you were 10 years old is how your 2026 is going to go.
Whigs 2.0
The Democratic National Committee has completed its long-awaited analysis on what went wrong in the 2024 campaign. But in a move that will attract intense criticism, it’s keeping the findings secret. trib.al/PMlTxIm
Dem Leaders Decide to Bury Damning Report on Why Trump Won in 2024
The Democratic National Committee has completed its long-awaited analysis on what went wrong in the 2024 campaign. But in a move that will attract intense criticism, it’s keeping the findings secret.
trib.al
December 19, 2025 at 9:25 AM
Whigs 2.0
Relived that my top ten list shares no more than one title with Obama’s.
December 18, 2025 at 10:27 PM
Relived that my top ten list shares no more than one title with Obama’s.
Trump-Hoovervilles
What's next? The Trump-Washington Monument? The Trump-Lincoln Memorial?
How is there literally anyone left who supports this fucking asshole?
How is there literally anyone left who supports this fucking asshole?
December 18, 2025 at 6:39 PM
Trump-Hoovervilles
Heading back to San Francisco for a little bit; here’s a list of (pretty much) all the films I ever saw at @ataconnect.bsky.social to get me back in West Coast mode… boxd.it/Q9fzs
A.T.A. to Z
One of the more complicated of my “cinemas that count”-tagged lists, this is theoretically a collection of every film I ever saw (chronologically) at San Francisco’s venerable microcinema Artists’ Tel...
boxd.it
December 18, 2025 at 6:37 PM
Heading back to San Francisco for a little bit; here’s a list of (pretty much) all the films I ever saw at @ataconnect.bsky.social to get me back in West Coast mode… boxd.it/Q9fzs
Finally saw this flawed but fascinating San Francisco movie directed by John Carpenter boxd.it/c4R0vr
A review of Memoirs of an Invisible Man (1992)
I knew it was risky going into this but I also knew I inevitably would have to someday, as it was my penultimate unseen theatrical release directed by John Carpenter (leaving his Village of the Damned...
boxd.it
December 17, 2025 at 7:57 PM
Finally saw this flawed but fascinating San Francisco movie directed by John Carpenter boxd.it/c4R0vr
Can’t argue against the three of Odie’s selections here that I’ve seen for myself (though I might quibble with his rationales- for instance I like most Wes Anderson movies a lot more than I did The Phoenician Scheme)
December 17, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Can’t argue against the three of Odie’s selections here that I’ve seen for myself (though I might quibble with his rationales- for instance I like most Wes Anderson movies a lot more than I did The Phoenician Scheme)
Was wondering!
Just looked up the National Film Registry on Reddit for that community, and it's coming out in January.
December 17, 2025 at 1:33 AM
Was wondering!
Why I didn’t put any Netflix movies on my top ten list boxd.it/c4B8eh
A review of Nouvelle Vague (2025)
2025: the year Netflix became inescapable, even for me. Neither Kerry nor I had ever subscribed, preferring to experience queues at the movie theatre, and DVDs via neighborhood video stores, public li...
boxd.it
December 16, 2025 at 6:45 PM
Why I didn’t put any Netflix movies on my top ten list boxd.it/c4B8eh
Heading back to my hometown in a few days and this thread is getting me excited!
This week, @hellonfriscobay.bsky.social profiles @ataconnect.bsky.social, "one of the last bastions of underground weirdo culture in the city," which this week showcases CCSF student work and hosts the season finale of Other Cinema with a (de)tour of NorCal: www.screenslate.com/articles/its...
It's ATAlive!
When Mumbai filmmaker Ashim Ahluwalia was invited to be artist-in-residence in 2013 by the San Francisco Film Society (now SFFILM) and screen Miss Lovely (2012), his Cannes-premiered period piece abou...
www.screenslate.com
December 15, 2025 at 10:48 PM
Heading back to my hometown in a few days and this thread is getting me excited!
Wrote about one of my favorite San Francisco screening spaces @ataconnect.bsky.social for @screenslatesf.bsky.social www.screenslate.com/articles/its...
It's ATAlive!
When Mumbai filmmaker Ashim Ahluwalia was invited to be artist-in-residence in 2013 by the San Francisco Film Society (now SFFILM) and screen Miss Lovely (2012), his Cannes-premiered period piece abou...
www.screenslate.com
December 15, 2025 at 6:06 PM
Wrote about one of my favorite San Francisco screening spaces @ataconnect.bsky.social for @screenslatesf.bsky.social www.screenslate.com/articles/its...
First one of these mini-screenings happens in five minutes!
If you or anyone you know in striking distance of Midcoast Maine likes underground moving image art, expanded cinema, 16mm projection, etc. make sure you put my wife Kerry Laitala’s open studio event this coming Sunday on your calendar!
December 14, 2025 at 4:26 PM
First one of these mini-screenings happens in five minutes!
Lots of others I could pick on but the only one I’ve watched twice to make sure (and it made me even MORE sure) is YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU.
Late night question for the gang: what’s your LEAST favorite Best Picture winner that’s not Crash?
December 14, 2025 at 12:50 PM
Lots of others I could pick on but the only one I’ve watched twice to make sure (and it made me even MORE sure) is YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU.
This is tomorrow!
If you or anyone you know in striking distance of Midcoast Maine likes underground moving image art, expanded cinema, 16mm projection, etc. make sure you put my wife Kerry Laitala’s open studio event this coming Sunday on your calendar!
December 13, 2025 at 8:35 PM
This is tomorrow!