Back in its heyday, the Silver Theater was host to many special roadshow movie presentations. Audiences came to the art deco movie palace, which opened in Silver Spring in 1938, for the special screenings, which presented the most famous movies of the day in a glorious wide-screen format and included extra footage, musical overtures, intermission and souvenir programs.
Starting Christmas Eve, the historic theater will once again host a roadshow presentation when Quentin Tarantino's new film, The Hateful Eight, opens for a special early release. One of only 100 theaters across the country to show the roadshow version, the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center, as it's now known, was already equipped for the 70mm Ultra Panavision format, which offers a wide picture with a high resolution.
"It's the best theater to see the film," Josh Gardner, associate film programmer at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center, said. "This is a 1938 art deco movie palace and hosted many roadshow presentations back in the day."
The Hateful Eight is only the 11th movie ever shot in Ultra Panavision and it's the first since 1966's Khartoum, starring Laurence Olivier. Other famous films shot using the process include Ben-Hur and Mutiny on the Bounty.
The Hateful Eight, starring Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell and Jennifer Jason Leigh, is set in post-Civil War Wyoming. A Western that also mixes in elements of a whodunit mystery, it throws together a group of bounty hunters seeking shelter in a blizzard. They all have secrets and reasons to seek revenge. Tarantino fans can expect his signature curse-filled dialogue and stylized bloody violence along with sophisticated filmmaking that uses the throwback 70mm technology to its best effects.
For audiences accustomed to seeing standard 35mm film or digital cinema, that means improved picture sharpness and resolution.
"It's closer to the way your eye works than digital," AFI Silver Director of Programming Todd Hitchcock said. "How things come into sharper or softer focus is more like how you actually see so it's a truer-to-reality look. It's sharper and more intense than what you're used to seeing."
Just like the roadshows from years ago, this version of The Hateful Eight includes six extra minutes of footage, a musical overture and entr’acte, and a souvenir program. It also includes an intermission, which may be appreciated by audiences sitting through the three-hour film.
"There's going to be something unique and special about seeing this presentation," Hitchcock said. "You're going to interact with it differently than you typically would with a film."
The Hateful Eight in 70mm opens at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center Dec. 24 and runs through Jan. 7, http://silver.afi.com/Browsing/Movies/Details/m-0100000409
The White Panda, Roots set to play Fillmore
Two shows at The Fillmore in Silver Spring next week promise to keep moods festive between Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
Dance music duo The White Panda is known for clever mashups and remixes of classic and new pop songs. Hailing from Chicago, Tom Evans and Dan Griffith recently released their sixth album, available as a free download on Soundcloud. Overlapping, mixing and adding to tracks, the pair combine songs by artists and groups including Pharrell Williams, Earth Wind & Fire, Carly Rae Jepson, The Weeknd, Chic, T-Pain, Kanye West, Backstreet Boys and Will Smith. The results are surprising and delightful new creations that turn familiar pop hits into epic party anthems.
9 p.m., Dec. 28, The Fillmore, $26.50, www.fillmoresilverspring.com
While the Roots have gotten more exposure than ever from their current gig as Jimmy Fallon's house band on The Tonight Show, the hip hop veterans have been around for nearly 30 years. Formed in 1987 as the Square Roots by vocalist Black Thought (Tariq Trotter) and drummer Questlove (Ahmir Khalib Thompson), the group is known for a jazzy, intellectual brand of hip hop incorporating a full live band. Audiences who come out to The Fillmore to see them in action can expect an energetic and eclectic set mixing elements of funk, soul, jazz, blues and rock, all driven by impeccable musicianship.
8 p.m., Dec. 29, The Fillmore, $76, www.fillmoresilverspring.com
