Free films shown Fridays

When most buildings are empty on a Friday night, Ballantine Hall is the host of classic world cinema, shown in 16mm format for a price every student loves: free. City Lights, a program funded by the Department of Communication and Culture, does not utilize the latest in sound and image technology. Instead the Hollywood, foreign and independent films are shown in their original format, which is the main attraction for many audience members.\n"You get both the experience of seeing a film as close to the original format as you're ever going to see it, in terms of the film structure itself, and you also get the chance to see it as it was intended to be seen, in a theater," graduate student Pete Rowley said.\nThe City Lights board consists of ten graduate students in the department. They volunteer their time to provide the free service to students and residents of Bloomington. Every semester they show one film each week at 7 p.m. on Friday, including a surprise short, except for three Fridays when there is a double-feature.\nThe audience includes students and community members, and in recent years community members have become loyal fans, board member and graduate student Sherra Schick said. The hope is that a loyal student fan-base will also develop, she said.\nA variety of films are being shown throughout the semester, from Humphrey Bogart classics like "To Have and Have Not" to lesser known foreign films such as "Cleo From 5 to 7." There are not many places in town where it is possible to see such films in their original form, board member and graduate student Mary O'Shea said.\n"It's a great way to take advantage of being able to see these films you can't see anywhere else," O'Shea said. "You don't have to pay anything, and it's a wonderful way to spend a Friday evening and get some good entertainment and look into some film history."\nCity Lights is showing "The Battle of Algiers" Oct. 18. The film follows members of the Front de Libération Nationale in their struggle for Algerian independence from France. Shot like a documentary, "The Battle of Algiers" captures the hardships of the native Arab Algerians as they are segregated from the European section of Algiers, Algeria's capital city. The FLN employs techniques such as bombings of cafés and dance clubs, making the film "very pertinent to what's happening in our world today," Schick said.\nSchick also recommended "Duel," Steven Spielberg's directorial debut, scheduled for Nov. 1. The film chases a salesman, played by Dennis Weaver, through California as a big-rig truck tries to kill him. "'Duel' was a harbinger of the sophisticated white-knuckle tension on which Spielberg would found his career," the write-up in City Light's Movie Schedule said.\nThe program was founded five years ago by two graduate students as a way to bring rare films in a rare format to the Bloomington campus and give graduate students studying media a chance to give back to the community. Board members run each showing, including the projector, volunteering their time. Their reward is the chance to view and study movie history.\nEach show starts with an announcement by a board member on duty and can include conversations between crowd and staff about favorite and upcoming films. Then the surprise short starts with the familiar clicking sound of the movie projector and the image that Schick said she loves. \n"There's something so sensual about that liquid quality of film," she said.\nThe features are audience oriented. O'Shea said there have been times audience members have requested certain movies, and the City Lights board has looked up those films, reviewed them and on occasion included them in the next season's schedule. She encourages anyone to come check out a film sometime during the year and those that already have to keep coming back.\n"The people who come are generally really happy," O'Shea said. "We wish always that more people would come and take advantage of what we're doing here because the people that do come ultimately seem to get something out of it."\nFor more information, visit the City Lights Web site at www.indiana.edu/~clights or call 856-3549. The Fall Movie Schedule is available on the City Lights Web site. For other questions e-mail clights@indiana.edu. Parking is free at Ballantine Hall with a City Lights brochure displayed on the dashboard.