Sunday, April 22, 2007

Where Would We Be Without the Cedar-Lee?

I saw two great movies recently at the Cedar-Lee, Cleveland's only true art house theatre. An Unreasonable Man, a warts-and-all documentary on the life of Ralph Nader, is quite good. And Flannel Pajamas, an inquiry into the emotional complexities of marriage, is one of the truest intellectual explorations of marriage I've ever seen. I'd recommend them both highly.

7 Comments:

At 3:05 AM, Blogger Susan said...

I miss the Cedar-Lee so much!!! Moved to Alabama from Cl. Hts. 5 years ago - our closest art house is in Montgomery and they only show half art stuff, mostly mainstream, and 50 minutes away anyway... alas. Thanks for the good memories!

 
At 11:57 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

i was in bed with my wife reading so i missed these cutting edge must see movies. These sound like some love you lots movies. I hope these movies make it the local Loews and may be i will catch a Saturday matinee and buy a big box of DOTS. mfh

 
At 12:58 PM, Blogger John Ettorre said...

Thanks for visiting all the way from Alabama, Susan. Always nice to hear from expat Clevelanders. Lord knows, there are so many of them.

 
At 2:52 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Great movies, awful theatres (result of chopping place into smaller rooms years back). i'll wait for the dvds...

(are there any decent theatres around anymore?)

 
At 3:24 PM, Blogger John Ettorre said...

I quite agree that it's depressing to have these wonderful old movie houses chopped into smaller units. Worst of all is what was done to the grandest of the local movie palaces, at Shaker Square (which is under the same ownership as the Cedar-Lee). But the reality is that the economics of movies have changed, and so to survive, they had to do it. I'd rather have them in their current altered state than not at all.

 
At 6:01 PM, Blogger Kristin Ohlson said...

I adore the Cedar Lee, even though I also hate those tiny rooms. But your post also reminded me of my often thought, "Where would we be without NPR?" I can remember when we didn't have it in Cleveland. How did I know ANYTHING?

 
At 9:43 AM, Blogger John Ettorre said...

Kris,
You're of course right about NPR. It's a natural intellectual bookend to the Cedar-Lee. Interestingly, Cleveland was probably the last major market to get an NPR affiliate. While WKSU is about a half-century old, WCPN began only in 1984, well past the time when most major markets had a station. The thing also could have been housed at John Carroll, if the university hadn't blown it with extreme short-sightedness, but that's a story for another day.

 

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