Asphalt @ the Paramount: Silent Movie Monday

This week -- after literally years of telling ourselves we'd go -- we finally made it to one of the Paramount's silent movie showings. Now we're kinda kicking ourselves for the delay. Next Monday is the last in this January's series of German Expressionist films: Asphalt. It may not be long on plot. IMDB sums it up like so:

Asphalt is set in Berlin. A well-dressed woman (Betty Amann) steals a precious stone from a jewellery shop. She tries to seduce the policeman (Gustav Fröhlich) who catches her, and he gradually succumbs to her charms.

They give it 7.3 stars out of 10, which makes it .2 stars more interesting than this week's film, The White Hell of Piz Palu, which was downright exhilarating. The succinct IMDB summary doesn't quite do White Hell justice, either:

A man climbs a 12,000-foot mountain to search for his wife, who was lost on their honeymoon. Another couple makes the dangerous climb with him.

One of the great things about the German Expressionist era is that the films are so much fun to watch -- they're some of the hardest working visuals in show business. But at the Paramount, you also get Dennis James on the Mighty (Liberace-Lookin') Wurlitzer, and for the first time at the Paramount, we enjoyed the sound up in the balcony. Whoever placed the organ's pipes knew what they were doing -- we felt like we had our "stereophonic" headphones on. And who knew a pipe organ could create such a snappy snare drum roll?

As is usual for Seattle, you can't just go and watch a movie; you gotta be prepared. Edu-ma-cated. So there's a preview from Jennifer Bean, an Associate Professor of Cinema Studies and Comparative Literature at the University of Washington. We disagree vehemently with her pronunciation of "stylization," but you make your own call.

Asphalt
Paramount Theatre
7pm, Monday, January 29
Tickets $12