Secret Cinema 21...

On Saturday night Stu, Darren, Tim and I went to the latest Secret Cinema in the old Town Hall in London's trendy Crouch End. We'd been told what to wear, where to go and who to meet - but were a bit surprised (and mildly disappointed) by the film. It was a 'classic' - just a not very good one!

The 'business' beforehand was excellent would with all the actors playing their part very well.

Still worth a punt on SC even if the film choices can be a bit variable.

The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable...

Last night Stu and I went to Punkdrunk's The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable in the imagined Temple Studios in London's not so glitzy Paddington.

Billed as a promenade experience we walked around a vast cavernous ex-Post Office sorting office dressed as a number of film sets. In the back lot were the dressing rooms, the props rooms the make-up, costumes and the wigs. On set were the desert, an ice lake, various interiors and the forest. No really.

We were silent and wearing masks as the actors danced around us playing out stories of love, betrayal and death.

It was a truly immersive experience with loud environmental noise, dimmed rooms and secret passageways. All great fun. It was at times exciting, at times boring. You needed to seek out where the action was taking place - which itself could be a bit of a challenge. You'd walk into a room just as some episode was finishing. Or the other masked patrons would be crowding around something so you, standing at the back, couldn't see.

Still, the attention to detail was sublime. Every shop, every hotel room, every scarecrow's funeral, every changing room was meticulously dressed.

It was a sort of Secret Cinema but without the film. It was our first Punchdrunk performance and I don't think it'll be our last.

Secret Cinema...

A few weeks ago Stu and I went to the latest Secret Cinema event.

There are mild spoilers below so if you are going - read no further!

It's hard not to give the game away with these films  - but to be honest everyone I spoke to knew what it was before they had arrived. Suffice to say it was good film.

This time the event was held down in West Croydon at the old thirteen-story BT offices. The place had been done out like a make-shift Ministry of Information which we could roam about in until the film started proper.

We had become employees of the newly formed G.O.O.D. organisation where we had been assigned to the Committee for Credit Creation (Keynes Department K-4.06/F). We started our 'work' at 6:30pm prompt in our trusty grey suits. About twenty of us sat around a large meeting room table trying to come up with ways to generate wealth and sell the idea to the general public. It was fun and funny.

After that we headed up a floor to the media area where we filmed an advert with a group of other people - something about a mother, a loud-haler and her lazy kids running down for breakfast. Don't ask.

Then we just wandered about - there were masks and a party and a typewriting class and an office with a table that moved and showroom dummies and a restaurant and rooms with paper flowing out of the walls and people, lots of people. It was great fun.

The film was projected in the central atrium with the sound coming out of speakers behind us. The footage was fairly dim and so hard to see but the environment more than made up for that.

Another triumph for SC. Now if only they had sorted out the licencing so we could have had a drink...