SECRET MOVIE CLUB presents

Part of our JOHN FORD FUNDAMENTALS series! Wednesday, March 2, 2022

LOCATION: The Secret Movie Club Theater, 1917 Bay Street, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, CA 90021

*Please note entrance/parking is actually in the back of the building. Make a right on Wilson Street, then a right behind the building. We’re the first set of black steps after the big gate. We’ll have staff to help guide/park you.

730pm THE LOST PATROL (1934, dir by John Ford, RKO, 73mns)

9pm MARY QUEEN OF SCOTLAND (1936, dir by John Ford, RKO, 123mns)

IMPORTANT NOTES:

***ALL AUDIENCE will be required to show proof of vaccination at the door. PLEASE HAVE YOUR VIRTUAL OR PHYSICAL VACCINATION CARD READY BEFORE ENTERING THE THEATER. If you have an exemption, please have proof of a negative PCR level COVID test within 3 days of the screening.

***ALL GUESTS WILL BE TAKEN THROUGH PROTOCOLS PRIOR TO ENTERING THEATER SO EVERYONE CAN HAVE A FUN AND SAFE TIME.

***EVERYONE WILL STILL BE REQUIRED TO WEAR MASKS INDOORS WHEN NOT EATING/DRINKING CONCESSIONS IN THEIR ASSIGNED SEATS.

HOW TO:

1)PLEASE BRING AND WEAR A PROPER MASK AT ALL TIMES WHEN NOT EATING/DRINKING INSIDE THE THEATER AS A SAFETY PRECAUTION.

2)PRE-ORDER ANY CONCESSIONS OR MOVIE MERCHANDISE you would like from the additional Add-Ons. You can pick up all concessions & merchandise at our tables in our lobby prior to the screening.

We will be able to sell concessions & merchandise at the theater. But it will make everything much quicker and easier if you pre-order!

3)PLEASE BE AWARE THAT ANYONE EXHIBITING COVID OR FLU LIKE SYMPTOMS AT THE DOOR, WILL BE OFFERED COMPLIMENTARY TICKETS TO A FUTURE SHOW AND ASKED TO RETURN WHEN HEALTHY. So please, if you’re feeling sick, just write us at community@secretmovieclub.com and we’ll offer your complimentary tickets to a future screening when you’re healthy. Let’s all do our part to beat this thing so we can go back to the complete movie going experience!

Ford made several movies that act like prologues and are key to his untouchable 1939-1941 run (from Young Mr Lincoln through How Green Was My Valley). Tonight, we show two of them.

First up is his incredibly taut, wildly entertaining adventure yarn The Lost Patrol starring Ford Stock company regular Victor McLaglen and includes the incredible Boris Karloff.

In many ways we see the best and most clever of the Ford formula here. Filmed on location (the deserts of California and Arizona) in pretty brutal conditions, The Lost Patrol's production guaranteed that Ford wouldn't be bothered too much by Hollywood or irksome producers (though one almost died of heat stroke).

Ford turns in one of his most electrifying and taut movies about a group of British soldiers in the Iraqi desert who come under attack from an unseen assailant. As they are picked off one by one, they struggle to find a way out of the murderous trap.

Along with movies like Gunga Din, one can see some of the DNA of the later Indiana Jones series in this movie, although it also plays a bit like an Agatha Christie horror movie in the baking sun of the desert. It also shows just how tight Ford's craft and understanding of the needs of the material are. The action and ensemble approach here feel like prologue to Stagecoach and his 40's Westerns.

After a brief intermission, we return with one of Ford's lesser known though possibly critically important pictures: Mary Queen of Scotland starring Katherine Hepburn in her only role she ever performed for Ford.

The movie, though occasionally stuffy and awkward by Ford's standards (one can see as an Irish-American he's not entirely comfortable making a picture about royalty and European pomp) is still hugely entertaining as an example of Ford doing historical costume romance better than most of his contemporaries.

It tells the ill-fated story of 16th century Catholic Mary Queen of Scotland destined for execution at the command of her tactically brilliant Protestant sister Elizabeth, the "Virgin Queen" of England.

Mostly the movie follows court intrigues and the romance between Hepburn and her co-star Frederic March before a moving scene of martyrdom for faith (you can feel Ford really click in here).

But what you're really watching is Ford falling in love with Katherine Hepburn. Poor Frederick March almost seems sidelined here as the real romance is between Hepburn and the camera.

Katherine Hepburn would become (by most reporting) the biggest love of Ford's life outside his wife, Mary Ford. Their affair was almost ruinous for Ford's family and marriage and they decided ultimately to part ways.

But it's often theorized that this sacrifice (romantic love for the good of the family/community) crystallized in Ford an understanding of the sacrifices necessary for the greater good that would haunt almost all his movies afterwards.

And of course when it came time to make The Quiet Man, it's no mistake that the Maureen O Hara character is named Mary Kate after the two women who had the most affect on Ford.

So come see two pictures that act as little Rosetta stones to possibly the greatest run of any director ever.

Best always,

Craig Hammill

35mm Secret Movie Club Founder.Programmer

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS FOR OUR IN-DOOR THEATER SCREENINGS

REFUNDS:

We can offer refunds up to 24 hours before showtime. Please request a refund through Eventbrite and we will process ASAP. After that, no refunds. Sorry.

However if something last minute comes up and you can’t make the screening, for whatever reason, just write us at: community@secretmovieclub.com and we’ll offer you complimentary tickets to a future screening.

HELPFUL SECRET MOVIE CLUB (1917 Bay Street, 2nd Floor, LA, CA 90021) THEATER PARKING TIPS:

We recommend that you park just outside our theater. Remember our theater is actually in a beautiful street art alleyway in the back of the 1917 Bay Street building. You get to our entrance by taking a right on Wilson, then a right behind the building. We are the first set of black steps on the right after the big gate.

We will have a staff member on duty to monitor all cars parked in the street-art alleyway at our entrance.

There is also a parking lot at the corner of Mateo and Violet Street, just 2 blocks from our theater, which costs $7 per car.

HOW CAN WE STAY ON TOP OF NEWLY ANNOUNCED 35MM SCREENINGS, EVENTS, ETC?

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HOW CAN I CONTACT YOU IF I HAVE OTHER QUESTIONS/RECOMMENDATIONS:

You can always email us at community@secretmovieclub.com with any other questions, concerns, thoughts, recommendations.