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Why yes. Yes, we would. It’s called “Luminence,” and to call it a “light show” is an understatement. Don’t think “blobs of colored light swirling around a big room, then fog pierced by lasers.” Think precision custom lights particularly calibrated to every architectural detail in the building, capable of high-def imagery whose only limitation is the Mind of Man.” I hate the overused word “stunning” but it’s apt. I also use the word because it was what I wanted to do to the lady in the row directly in front of us. Not stun her to the point of unconsciousness, but perhaps make her see stars that were not part of the show. But we’ll get to that. It actually had a plot. Narration revealed some characters - a little girl who saw the Basilica go up, the suave and sparkly-voiced sophisticated European who designed it, and the voice of the building herself. They were muffled and hard to hear, but I got the pith. At one point the Voice of the Building was talking a lot about community, how we were all part of it and the future would be glorious because of you, and I thought well that’s one way to put it, seems a bit . . . generous in its assumptions, but fine. And the Voice mentioned some ecumenical event it had hosted, when Christians and Jews and Muslims all met and found something in common and learned something about their own faiths from the experience, and I thought, well, that’s nice, but I don’t think anyone converted to Unitarianism at the end of the day. Oh don’t be like that. I know. Still, it was a bit odd that there were only a few references to the actual purpose of the structure, and the doctrine and ideas it represented. I think “heaven” and “God” were mentioned once. There was no voice of Mary. It was avoided not because it would’ve been alienating, but because it might have thought to be alienating. Okay, but if you’re going to see a light show in a Basilica, I think you leave your right to be offended by doctrinal messages at the door. Also, even if you’re not a believer, you should take off your baseball cap. That was the guy right in front of us. His wife, I presume, began the show by holding up her phone and filming it all (portrait mode, of course), and the light from her screen was distracting. After a minute I bent over and bade her to lower it. She did. But it came up again and again, perhaps a bit lower, but still distracting, and then of course I was distracted by the fact that I was noticing it. Someone a few rows up was shooting twice as much. Why? I’m a big fan of shooting everything, just to have a record I may consult to remember . I have unbroken monthly summations of life going back to 2000. I do not film to have something for the Facebook so everyone else can envy me and my LifeLaffLove live. WHY anyone would want to take themselves out of this glorious experience so they can get a shaky video at a bad angle? WHY When it was all over I leaned forward and told her, again, that her camera had been a constant distraction that detracted from the experience. She gave me a goggle-eyed look of confusion. Also, at one point in the show, her husband let go a particularly long-lasting fart. Even with all that: wonderful experience.
Nice date night, you might sayy.
We continue with a small amount of manufactured enthusiasm to explore the trademarks of 1925, because no one else is. NO ONE!
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Have I done this one? I'm too lazy at the moment to check. Doesn't seem as if I have. Yet it does.
The always want some sort of Laura theme, and they can’t ever quite match it.
It’s sold as a noir on YouTube, but people throw the term around at anything that’s B&W and has some angst. Could be a weeper. I don’t know anything about it. Well, here’s out bad girl:
She’s married to a good decent man, but it’s a sham, one upon which they both agreed. Now the Good Decent Man wants to marry for love, but she won’t give him a divorce because she likes the monthly stipend he pays her. So he’s got a motive for murder! The husband can’t divorce her because he has no grounds. His dad might liquidate his company to pay off the bad girl. Ten minutes in and we have motives for murder all over. She runs an art studio, which apparently looked like this in the 50s:
I swear I’ve seen that some place before, like a Perry Mason. She has a cute assistant who has a handsome fiancé, and of course our bad girl flirts with him, because she’s scheming and awful and we all want her comeuppance. She makes her assistant stay behind while she goes on the fiancé’s boat, and yeah, she’s an old salt, all right, right at home on the sea, always appropriately attired for the life of the brine:
She was also in cahoots with a newspaper columnist who gets fired because of her, and she lies to make her assistant break up with the fiancee, and so on, and so on. It actually takes 39 minutes before someone decides to give her the ballistic perforation:
YAY says everyone in the audience. But whodunnit? I say right now - I’m watching this as I go - it’s the little guy with the high voice. Why? Because whoever shot her busted out the glass by the door handle. We had a close-up of the action. So that meant they were trying to throw suspicion on someone who didn’t have the key. Well, the next scene has the little caretaker drop by:
Yeah, it’s him. Percy Helton. Well, that’s my theory. Rest assured that the movie absolutely sprints to its conclusion and wastes not a moment, and does nothing more than occupy some time. It is not noir, and it is not a lost classic.
Still wandering from place to place, looking for a new home:
That'll do! Another week begins. Who knows what surprises will pop up?
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Saturday night ETBF (M) and I went downtown to see a light show in a Basilica. I’d been invited by an old site patron who worked in promotions, and had, many years ago, put Daughter in a chair attached to a thousand balloons and floated her up in the Metrodome, because they were working on UP. One of the assistants on that event was now managing the Basilica event; would we like VIP tickets? 
