Summer Cinema Series Opens with It, starring Clara Bow
Mondays in July feature silent films
Minnesota State University Moorhead’s Summer Cinema Series enters its 38th season with two adventure films, one romantic comedy and an evening of silent comedy short films.
The Series opens Monday, July 7, with a classic from 1920, titled It. Clara Bow plays Betty Lou, a shopgirl who has designs on Cyrus Waltham, the handsome owner of the department store where she works. She gets his attention, but the romance cools when a newspaper reporter mistakenly writes a story depicting Betty Lou as an unwed mother.
Second in the line-up on Monday, July 14, is The Three Musketeers, starring Douglas Fairbanks. This 1921 film tells the story of the young Gascon D’Artagnan, who arrives in Paris with plans to join the king’s Musketeers. Three of the most respected and feared Musketeers take young Gascon under their wings, and together they fight to save France, and a lady’s honor, from the powerful Cardinal Richelieu.
The Lost World, a 1925 fantasy-adventure film featuring Wallace Beery, bears some similarity to the 1993 blockbuster hit Jurassic Park. In this classic film, Explorer Professor Challenger is ridiculed by the London press, thanks to his claim that living dinosaurs exist in the far reaches of the Amazon. Newspaper reporter Edward Malone funds an expedition to rescue another explorer, Maple White, who has been marooned at the top of a high plateau. Joined by a renowned hunter, the group goes to South America, where they do indeed find a plateau inhabited by prehistoric creatures. The film screens on July 21.
Closing the series on Monday, July 28, is a selection of silent comedy short films by Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Laurel & Hardy. After this showing, treats will be served in the hallway.
All shows are in Weld Hall on the MSUM campus and start at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $4 per movie, and are available at the door. Pre-show organ music performed by Red River Chapter members of the American Theatre Organ Society begins at 7:15 p.m.