B-Fest 2003:


   Planning is good. Planning is very very good. Learning from last year's
late departure and a rather far away Slayer concert this summer, we decided
early on that sleeping all in one place the night before the `Fest was a good
plan. Brother Fistula and Fedeler, Friend to the Brotherhood, arrived at my
dorm around 12:30 Friday morning. The cast had changed a little bit, however.
Joining the (B) festivities this year along with Fedeler was my roommate Andy.
Ferox, being more broke than my will after seeing the name "Ross Hagen" on
a movie I'm about to watch, opted not to come. Unfortunately, the main
problem with sleeping in the same room with four other people you haven't
seen in weeks is that it's not terribly conducive to sleeping. 


   After a shockingly inadequate 3 ½ hours of sleep and armed to
the teeth with music ranging from the Beatles and Guitar Wolf to
Dillinger Escape Plan and Agoraphobic Nosebleed, we arose at 5:30
Friday morning and hit the road by 6:00a.m. The plan was to have some
time to shop and explore before getting to the theater, and shop we did.
I left with $265.00 in cash in my wallet. I came back with $35.00 and about
$6 in change. Not all of it went to stuff, of course; some went to the hotel
(hooray for not pulling an eight hour drive in the dark on no sleep!), food, 
gas, and a one-legged Swiss hooker with an eye patch and a tattoo of a heart
around the name "Salty Ron." 


   Speaking of gas, I have never understood the Indian gas station attendant
stereotype until now. Every one we went to was run by someone hailing
from the vicinity of central Asia, and one in particular I swear was run by
Mujibur and Sarijul from the Late Show with David Letterman. Also
somewhere in here we got to talking about what a moose sounds like
for whatever reason. I do a pretty passable impression of a moose, so
making moose calls became the "let's see if we can get each other to blow
various liquids out of our noses" joke of the trip.

    I must say, 70 bucks for four people is not too shabby. We reserved a
room for Saturday night and were on our way.


   At this point, it was about time to find some food for our cooler (it was
cumbersome, but well worth not having to live off bite-sized Snickers for
a day and a half) and get to the theater. We were, however, sidetracked
for close to an hour by a store I glimpsed out of the corner of my eye
called Phoenix Comics. It was a warehouse worth of stuff packed into
a broom closet, and it was absolutely incredible. They had stacks of
Doctor Who New and Missing Adventures books, and I damned myself
for not bringing my list of all the ones I have (once the count pushes past
fifty it's hard to recognize simply by cover art). Knowing I also needed to
conserve cash for post-'Fest shopping, I managed to tear myself away only
40 dollars lighter, carrying two Doctor Who episode novelizations (Doctor
Who and the Zarbi, and the Green Death for curious fans) and the
McFarlane Toys box set of Alien and Predator.


   Moving on into Evanston, we stopped at 2nd Hand Tunes, a record store
I spied on the way out of town last year but we were too tired to stop at.
While it wasn't as mind-blowing as I had expected it to be (when you
work at one of the biggest record stores in the country, it grows harder
and harder to be impressed), I did find another obscure White Zombie
single for my collection and scored a cheap copy of Hercules Against the
Moon Men. They had a huge selection of kung-fu movies, and a tape in
a blank white case with only a running time and a title like "a woman calls
a plumber" or something to that effect. When I asked the guy behind the
counter if it was a snuff film, his only reply was "It's pretty interesting,
you should watch it." I was too afraid to buy it, but if it's there the next
time we stop by, I think I'll be compelled by the part of me that hates
myself to buy it.


   Still lacking food and approaching 4:30, we stopped at two gas stations,
both of which had the word "Mart" in the title but didn't carry bread, and
finally ended up at Walgreen's before we found a place with satisfactory
amounts of food. Call me crazy, but if you're going to call your store a
"Mart" of any kind, you should carry bread, considered by many to be the
most important of all staples. After filling the cooler, we tooled around
until we found the free on-campus parking lot.

     4. Wizard of Speed and Time: As I promised myself last year, I did
indeed join in the Wizard Stomp. It took a little while to get the reels
changed for the upside down and backwards bit, so we all sang 99 Bottles
of Beer. That stomping is harder than it looks. I do, however, feel like a
puss for my legs being tired from that. Not a week after B-Fest I attended
a concert with Malorie, as well as the rest of the Brotherhood and a few
others to boot. The bands playing were Nile, Napalm Death, and Strapping
Young Lad. After hearing that much double-kick drumming in one night,
two minutes of stomping doesn't seem so hard.

     6. The Happy Hooker: One of the `Fest's best this year. I can't say
I know for sure what the allure of films like this is, but I love them.
If it's grainy and crispy and from the 70's, it's okay in my book. Oddly
enough, the second of the three reels broke and we missed the middle
half hour of the film, but whatever happens in that part of the movie is
totally unnecessary. We jumped into the third reel without skipping a
beat. The whole thing made perfect sense. Must try to track this one
down.


     7. Betty Boop - A Language All My Own: A mildly entertaining
blast from the past, but I've never been particularly enamored with
the animated antics of Ms. Boop. Biggest selling point of old cartoons:
their shocking disregard for physics.


     8. Wizard Redux: I can only imagine this was put on while they were
trying to thread the next movie. I'm damned if I can understand 10% of
that song.


     9. Flesh Gordon: I've seen it before, and I knew it was coming, and I
couldn't wait to see it again. I was surprised at the number of people who
hadn't seen it. While perhaps too crude for some, I find this big budget
(for a pseudo-porn, I'm guessing) soft core spoof of Flash Gordon to be a
brilliant send up and I love every minute of it. Strangely enough, we were
attacked by a penisaurus on the way home.


     10. Betty Boop Redux: This, upside down and backwards, is almost
scarier than the Wizard of Speed and Time.


     11. Warlords of Atlantis: The most fun movie of the night, in my
opinion. Not the best, but the most fun. At this point about 70% of
the people in the theater were asleep, and those of us who were awake
were all on the same page. With that many voices removed, you can
actually hear what the people around you are saying. My dubbing of
the Atlantean prince as Feminor early on caught and stuck for the duration
of the film, and the jokes were coming fast and furious throughout.


     12. Dementia 13: I saw this many years ago and remembered liking
it. What I didn't remember was the worst boom mic shot in the history
of film. Mother. Mother. While I still like the movie, it's a bit slow and
hard to handle when you haven't slept in twenty-four hours. Dozed
through the second half and awoke to see…



   The lights coming on. For some reason I neglected to write in my
notebook when the breaks were, so I'm just going to moosh some of
them together here. One of the funniest non movie-related incidents
was in the bathroom (where else?). I was taking a leak and a dude in
the stall, who was obviously taking a rather large crap, started farting
and didn't stop for close to a minute. By some miracle and a little grace
from Cthulhu, I managed to keep a straight face. This gave the
impression to the guy at the urinal next to me that I didn't find it funny,
and so he damn hear blew his head off trying not to laugh at the
increasingly wet sounds splorching forth from behind us.
The breaks were all a haze this year, so I can only assume some more
random picture taking and brief chatting ensued before I turned around
and saw Hulk Hogan on the screen.

     14. Mac & Me: This was something I remember forcing my parents
to watch quite a few times when I was a kid. As soon as the first few
seconds were on the screen, horrid flashbacks of the whole thing came
flooding back. No need to torture myself again. I did wake up just in
time for the chanting of "End end end!" though.


     15. The Last Dragon: I subject customers of Movies America to this
movie on a regular basis. Unfortunately, that also means I subject
myself to it on a regular basis. Zzzzzzzzz.


     16. It Came From Beneath the Sea: Harryhausen is God. Indeed. 
Even if the octopus only had six tentacles. I can't for the life of me
figure out why this odd departure from biological normalcy would be
caused by budget constraints. Is clay really that expensive? At any
rate, I own this movie and dig it thoroughly. Take the octopus bowling,
take him bowling.


     17. What is Communism?: The flags were much nicer this year.
And you're a dirty, shrewd, lying, godless, determined international
criminal conspirator. I know you are. If you say you aren't, then you're
lying, which is what commies like you do.


     18. Supergirl: Another blast from the past that I remember very little
about save the fly scene at the beginning. I kinda wish this would
have remained a memory. I get the feeling Fedeler and I were branded
as "those guys" when someone quipped "Black Sabbath rules" during
a close up of a gargoyle and we cheered loudly. The overly-loud
soundtrack made me wish I had brought my concert earplugs.


     19. Godzilla 1985: The first Godzilla movie I ever saw as a child, and
one of my favorites to this day. Chris Holland and I had a nice Godzilla
discussion while the other man animals poked fun. An absolutely
excellent cap to an enchanting twenty-four hours of b-movie madness. 



   Since we actually managed to find the on-campus parking this year,
we didn't have to bolt from the building at mach 1 for fear of being
towed. A pre-breakfast cleanup made the work post-'Fest that much
easier, so we were squeaky clean and free of plates and wrappers in
no time. We made the rounds of farewells, bidding adieu to Ken, Nathan,
Chris, Tim, Skip, and anyone I forgot to mention. We sadly missed
Chad and Freeman, but we'll see them next year.


   Overcoming our first-year awe and sitting with friendly faces made
all the difference. This year was more fun than any demi-god movie
reviewer could ask for, and I thank everyone who was there and
everyone who made it possible.


   Lugging our stuff back to the car, we went to get checked in to our
room, which turned out to be very nice. The TV didn't work too well,
but none of us were equipped to stay up much later anyway. First on
the agenda - a much needed shower. Nearly two days worth of unclean
leaves you icky and smelly, and I for one (not being French, of course)
am not a big fan of being icky and smelly. Once clean, the next order
of business - find some food that didn't involve peanut butter or grape
jelly. We all agreed that Chinese sounded good, and after some aggravated
attempts to eat at places that had already closed, we found an excellent
Chinese buffet. The sesame balls kicked my ass, and they had the best
egg rolls I've ever tasted. Stuffed full with the three plate minimum, it
was time to sleep. Checkout was at noon, and we wanted to get a jump
on some shopping before heading home.

   A quick stop at Sbarro topped off the slowly digesting Chinese, and
we headed over to the biggest damn Border's I've ever seen.


   It was here that we came to the conclusion that everything in Illinois
is better than everything in Iowa. At Border's, I spent the last of my
petty cash on Two Thousand Maniacs and Godmonster of Indian
Flats. Reviews pending. Final tally: eight movies, three books, two
CD's (one of which was free), two action figures, a cup, and a shirt.
The drive home was punctuated with moose calls and shouts of
AAAAARGH! Zeus impacted us all very deeply, it turns out. If you
look past his tough exterior, there's an intelligent philosophical being
in there just waiting to reach humanity.

   Our vow to take a picture next to Family Beer and Liquor just outside
of Galena was broken because none of us was really paying attention
to where we were until we crossed the Mississippi (ha!) again, but
we'll get there next year. For those of you who are wondering why
this is funny, just think about that name for a minute. Family. Beer
and Liquor. Yep, we're in Missouri, folks.


   We pulled back into the dorm parking lot around 7:30, unloaded our
stuff, and Fistula and Fedeler headed for home as Andy and I unpacked
and settled in. B-Fest 2003 was easily the least turbulent road trip
we've ever taken. No getting lost, no road work detours, no breakdowns,
and the most fun I remember having since that party at Caligula's place.
So, the majestic power that is B-Fest was taken on board a grave
robber saucer and carried back to the magic dimension of speed and time
where it dwells until the next year when the time comes to return to Earth
and encompass us with love and schlock once more. Oh yeah, and
RRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGH!
 



   As some supplementary material, here's an article about B-Fest I
published in my column for the Wartburg Trumpet.