| Lucille Hanson |
Tickets for The ’80s Action Extravaganza III are sold out, but you can still learn more about it and other exciting Trylon events by visiting trylon.org. This programming is made possible through partnership with the Cult Film Collective.
Around February or March 2019, I was at an interview for a local filming company and in their lobby, I spotted the Spring program for the Trylon. I flipped through it and was blown away. It was the first time I had ever seen a movie theater run nothing but older movies. Being born and raised in the Twin Cities, I had only been to theaters like the AMC in the Rosedale Mall, Mann Highland/Grandview and the Riverview, as well as now defunct theaters such as Hopkins Cinema 6, Vali-Hi and others. Anytime I went to those theaters, it was for new releases. Discovering that there were movie theaters that showed movies that I never got a chance to see in theaters was a dream come true. That April, my dad and I drove across Highway 94 to an area of Minneapolis I had rarely explored, parked alongside 33rd, and walked into our community’s beloved cinema for the very first time. After an exciting showing of Akira, a tub of popcorn, Dots and a 7UP, I left knowing I had found a place I needed to cherish with my entire life. I ended up going one other time in 2019, seeing Alien in August, but when we moved further away, it became a lot harder to make it across town. I don’t drive, so I would either have to take 2 hours of busses one way, or it would’ve had to be something that my dad wanted to see enough to justify the drive. I looked at the website constantly, trying to find something to go see with my family, but no luck.
November 2024. It’s Such a Beautiful Day. That was my first movie back at the Trylon. After spending a day figuring out my work commute and helping my dad paint and build new walls for our house, I took the bus over to the Trylon to watch one of my favorite movies on the big screen for the first time. The theater was like I had never left. It looked the exact same as I had been there the last time: the black chairs and red lights. The preshow bumpers. The crowd all primed and ready, chuckling to themselves at some of the early jokes in the movie, but then the theater grew dead silent. The movie ended, and no one left when the lights turned on. We all just sat there, ruminating on the film. Eventually someone stood up, and everyone else did as well. But for a brief moment, the entire audience was connected.
That moment of connection is something that I rarely feel with most movie audiences, and yet every time it happens it is always at the Trylon. Every time I sit down to watch a movie at the Trylon, it truly feels like every single person who is there is there for the same reason (you’d be surprised at the amount of times I’ve gone to movie theaters where people just don’t care. Looking at you Marcus Oakdale audience). Everyone buys in, is (usually) respectful of the crowd, and it suddenly just feels like a big communal cinematic bonding experience. Nowhere is that more exemplified for me than when I went to last year’s 80s Action Extravaganza.
The second Extravaganza the Trylon put on, subtitled The Quickening, was my first time ever attending a marathon screening like this. It was an absolute blast. There was something for everyone: if you liked sleazy/poorly aged trash, action horror, intense character dramas, Hong Kong Action, sci-fi dystopias, black comedy, you were bound to find something you would enjoy! And if you somehow didn’t like any of that, you had Parkway Pizza and the energy of the Trylon crowd. For eight hours, we were huddled together in the theater, hooting and hollering as synthesizers pulsed through the screening room. Cars exploded, limbs were severed and nazis were killed. And we couldn’t get enough of it. Even with the people next to me constantly dozing off and waking up during the next movie still made time for some “Hell Yeah”s. It was one of the most enjoyable experiences I’ve had in a theater.
What could even be shown this year? Letterboxd claims over 4000 movies were made in the 80s that fall under the action genre, but they’re even including things like Robert Altman’s Popeye and Ivan Reitman’s Stripes in that grouping. I remember ruminating numerous possibilities that could be shown, and I did not predict even slightly any of the subgenres shown. I doubt even with this, I’ll even predict anything, but a girl can dream and dream she shall.
After many hours of thinking, here’s how I personally would’ve planned this year’s Action Extravaganza, if I was given the chance to do some. I wanted to kick things off initially with one of my favorite action films, either Robocop or Road House, but as those were both part of standard Trylon programming recently, I shifted my thinking and decided that I’d kick things off with BLACK MAGIC M-66, an anime film from 1987. It’s a fast paced cyberpunk action flick where a journalist tries to save a child from a rogue military android. Despite feeling like a riff on both Terminator 1 & 2, the manga this is adapted from (written by Masamune Shirow, creator of Ghost in the Shell) came out over a year before James Cameron’s sci-fi classic, and this OVA predates T2 by four years. I haven’t seen it since high school, and outside of the opening scene where we are given a pretty damn cool setup/title card drop that is then immediately followed by an equally long stretch of full frontal nudity, I remember it having some really kick ass set pieces and a great sense of worldbuilding. At a brisk 47 Minute length, it makes for a great start to a marathon of a night.
Following that, I would throw in The Hidden, a sci-fi action horror flick starring Kyle MacLachlan that I’ve been wanting to watch ever since I first learned that it exists a few years ago. I know vague details about its plot, but I’ve been told it’s one that’s best watched blind. So I’ve been waiting for the right moment to watch it, and like how last year was my first experience with another film that I had wanting to see for years, I think a rowdy action extravaganza crowd would make a great first impression.
Now I would’ve put in a John Woo movie here, but talking to a fellow Perisphere contributor while waiting in line to buy tickets, the one I wanted to pick was shown at the first Action Extravaganza, so I’m scratching that off the list. In its place, I’m throwing in Jackie Chan’s Police Story. This is one I haven’t seen, but it’s been on my radar for years and I’d love to finally scratch it off. Admittedly, I’m not too familiar with Jackie Chan’s work outside of Rush Hour, Shanghai Noon and his family movies (anyone remember The Spy Next Door?), and every time I manage to catch a martial arts action film at the Trylon, whether it be Wuxia or something like Magic Crystal, has been a hell of a good time, so it’s a subgenre I would love to dive deeper into.
And finally, we ended it with a Carpenter film last year, so why not do it again? I flirted with the idea of Big Trouble in Little China, but I think I would end up picking Escape from New York instead. On many days my favorite Carpenter flick (swapping with Prince of Darkness), this ultra cool dystopian action flick is FILLED with things that I love: Snake Plissken, an over the top plot played ultra serious, incredible use of shadows, Snake Plissken, great character actors, a fun and moody synth score, Snake Plisken, and an atmosphere/narrative structure that lands like a mash of a 50s Western and a PS2 video game. Did I mention Snake Plissken? This just ran at this year’s Minneapolis Saint Paul International Film Festival with cinematographer Dean Cundey in attendance, and I’m kicking myself for missing it. So, if I were in charge of any programming this year, I would run it in a heartbeat.
As fun as it is to speculate the schedule and create your own, the true joy of The Extravaganza for me is the crowd. I’ll be attending this year with some friends of mine as a birthday celebration, which is already going to be a blast, but truly when the mood is right, there’s no greater feeling than celebrating an exciting movie with a sold out crowd. Everyone is on the same wavelength, and everyone is having a great time. Shuffling in and out of the theater in between movies to take a breather and chat, before going right back in with the same energy as before. It’s infectious really, and it’s not only why I’m excited to go again this year, but to return to the Trylon month after month, because there’s nothing like a communal theater experience, and you’ll always find that here.
Edited by Olga Tchepikova-Treon