The Crow – Memphis Flyer

What’s up, Memphis? Here’s what’s on the big screen for your viewing pleasure this weekend.

Alien: Romulus

Cailee Spaeny (of Priscilla fame) stars as an astronaut who discovers a derelict space station. Then, she and her crewmates discover why it is derelict: It’s overrun by alien xenomorphs. Set in the time between Ridley Scott’s original Alien and James Cameron’s Aliens, director Fede Álvarez aims to bring the sci-fi horror franchise back to its roots, and give you a big hug right in the face.

Dìdi

It’s the summer of 2008, and Chris (Izaac Wang), the first-generation son of Chinese immigrants, is trying to make new friends before he starts high school. He starts hanging out with some skaters, but since he can’t skate, he films them in the hopes of making skate videos. But the awkward teen has a lot of learning to do about life and friendship. Director Sean Wang’s ode to growing up in the early internet age swept the Audience Award and Dramatic awards at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival.

The Phantom of the Opera

The 1925 silent film set the standard for horror films to come. Lon Chaney, in his signature role, stars as the Phantom, a hideously scarred man condemned to live beneath an opera house in Paris who falls in love with a singer (Mary Philbin). He uses his organ playing skills to bewitch her, but sets himself and the opera up for a painful reckoning. The Orpheum Theater presents Phantom on Friday, August 16th, with live score on the Mighty Wurlitzer by organist Tony Thomas.

Time Warp Drive-In

This month’s Time Warp Drive-In theme is Comic Book Sinister, taking you to the darker side of cinema based on comics and graphic novels. Naturally, the first film on Saturday night at the Malco Summer Drive-In is Sin City, Robert Rodriguez’s pitch-black adaptation of Frank Miller’s noir graphic novel, starring Mickey Rourke, Jessica Alba, Bruce Willis, and the late Brittany Murphy. To answer your question about this scene, no Rourke didn’t cut himself shaving.

I give Zack Snyder a lot of grief these days, but credit where credit is due, his 2009 adaptation of Alan Moore’s Watchmen is actually a great movie. That’s probably due to the lengths he goes to to make his film match Dave Gibbons’ artwork from the original comic. It’s definitely worth watching on the big screen. Notice the very effective use of Philip Glass’ Koyaanisqatsi score in this original trailer.

The third and final Time Warp film is The Crow. Directed by Alex Proyas, the 1994 film is from the first post-Batman wave of superhero films that included stuff like Darkman. The film is notorious for the death of star Brandon Lee, who was killed on set in circumstances similar to what recently happened on Alec Baldwin’s Western Rust. This year, it will get a reboot. Here’s the trailer for the spooky original. The Time Warp Drive-In starts at dusk on Saturday, August 17th, at the Malco Summer Drive-In.

This mild spring day is perfect weather for the drive-in. Fortunately, the Time Warp’s got you covered!

The theme is Comic Book Hardcore, but the first item on tonight’s program is the official premiere of episode 1 of Waif, the sci-fi serial directed by Time Warp Drive In co-host Mike McCarthy. Waif is the story of an alien stowaway, played by Meghan Prewitt, who finds herself stranded on future Earth. The sci fi serial form is perfectly suited to McCarthy’s pulpy sensibilities, and the the space-based special effects by Raffe Murray in the opening episode have a pleasing hint of the 70s BBC shops that produced classic Doctor Who and The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.

Waif

2005’s Sin City saw OG indie auteur Robert Rodriguez’s most significant contribution to the comic book movie genre. Rodriguez, in collaboration with famed Batman artist Frank Miller, abandoned photorealism entirely and created a dark, stylized world where Miller’s hardboiled characters and over-the-top femme fatales fit right in. It’s too bad the sequel, 2014’s A Dame To Kill For, was so godawful, because this is one of the greatest visual masterpieces of 21st century filmmaking, and a perfect drive-in feature.

Sin City

Next up is an early entry into the comic book movie sweepstakes, the 1994 adaptation of The Crow, based on the underground comic by James O’Barr. The film is infamous not so much for what happens onscreen as what happened offscreen: Its star, Brandon Lee, son of martial arts legend Bruce Lee, was killed in a still-mysterious on-set accident eight days prior to filming wrap. Viewed from a distance of 22 years, Lee’s performance has a brooding charisma that inspires all sorts of might-have-beens, and the film looks like the blueprint for the DC grimdark philosophy of superhero films.

The Crow

1995’s Tank Girl is an infamous flop that destroyed careers and poisoned the reputation one of the few girl power comics on the scene in the 1990s. Lori Petty stars as the titular Tank Girl, who roams the post-apocalyptic world not so much like Furiosa as like Mad Max if he were played by Gewn Stephanie. It’s also notable for being one of the stranger roles rapper turned TV cop drama regular Ice-T has had, as he appears as a sentient marsupial mutant named T-Saint. The years have been kind to this film, imbuing it with a sense of trashy fun. Like Repo Man, it finds its salvation in a good soundtrack and some now-classic fashion.

Tank Girl

The final film on the docket is Blade, another 1990s comic book film that looks better in retrospect than it did a the time. It stars Wesley Snipes in a career-making turn as a sword-slinging vampire hunter. In this origin story, Blade, a half-human whose mother was bitten by a vampire while he was in the womb, faces off against the great character actor Stephen Dorff as a vamp set on world domination. It’s got enough stylish vampire decapitations to keep you awake into the wee hours of the drive-in.

Blade