Sixty years after its creation, Billy Wilder’s Hollywood noir remains as shocking as ever, casting a spell as thick and dark as the best David Lynch and featuring one of the most fearless performances in film history. As the desperately deluded has-been Norma Desmond, Gloria Swanson throws her ego onto the fire, and watching it burn is one of the great pleasures of American cinema. An opportunity to see Sunset Boulevard on the big screen cannot be ignored. (Metro Cinemas, 4500 Ninth Ave NE, 781-5755. 7 and 9:10 pm, $10.)
David Schmader—former weed columnist and Stranger associate editor—is the author of the solo plays Straight and Letter to Axl, which he’s performed in Seattle and across the US. His latest... More by David Schmader
There is a truly delicious controversy about the name of this film, in which one side maintains that the proper name of a film is how it is rendered in the titles, just as with a book it’s what it says on the title page, not the cover; and the only depiction of the name of this film in the opening titles is the street name painted on a curb, thus: “Sunset Blvd”. Which is thus the name of the film. No “Boulevard”. I’m on their side.
I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. Demille.
“I *AM* big!! It’s the PICTURES that got small!!”
Can’t wait. I’ll definitely be there for this.