Secrets of the City

#%^&*@!!!!!!!!!!!

First Evah MNspeak chain-ourselves-to-the-building Get together?

I propose a Wake for the Oak Street at Stub & Herb’s.

I’ll bring the C4.

I’ll bring my copy of CB4.

I’ll have to watch “The Sword Stained with Royal Blood” in honor of the closing. It was the first movie I saw there.

With so many false cries in the past, it’s hard to believe it’s really happening. I think it’ll hit hard once it sets in.

This is indeed a sad moment. Even if the Oak Street’s doom has been foretold for the past two years, its demise is painful. And let us not forget too that, because of the MFA’s ineptitude these past two years, the Bell Auditorium is no more. Apparently the UM would not renew the lease agreement with MFA, because there have been so many staff changes they couldn’t keep an active insurance policy.
Man, I’ve seen some great films there through the years. To lose such memories is the hardest blow.

I guess I shouldn’t be so judgmental and charge MFA with “ineptitude.”
I guess I should be more charitable and say it’s had “problems.”

The comments from the founders are not lost on me. Last year I received an e-mail from Film Forum New York. I’m including the body of that e-mail below.

Granted New York City is not Minneapolis, but still, the efforts of Cowgil and co. were thwarted when the people of Minneapolis offered to open up their pocketbooks in good faith, to save something so vital to them. Nor should we forget the fateful days when the now departed staff brought the city to the theatre on what was reported to be its last days, asking them to put the question with the staff to the board at that time, what was the fate of the Oak Street? What were their plans for the future? And I do remember them offering, on record mind you, to hold a follow up meeting with the community, informing stake holders of their process, and how things would progress. Did such a meeting ever produce itself? Not at all.

I asked the following question of the Minnesota Council of Non Profits a year ago

“There is a possibility they (MFA board) might sell a building (the Oak Street) that the organization owns. If this happened, and the organization folded, what are the legal implications for the money from that sale? Would the board be able to keep it, or does it somehow have to be dispensed to the community?”

I got the following response:

“The easy answer to your question is that by law the funds and other assets left after paying all obligations, including employees, must go to similar organizations for similar purposes. One exception might be for anything that has restrictions on it, then those assets must be used according to the restrictions.”

I no longer live in Minneapolis, but I still expect the board to answer such questions as those posed by Cowgil. If you want answers like I do I suggest contacting the Board’s clear leader, (not in name he’s not the president, but trust me, he’s the one pulling all the strings) Tim Grady. He owns World Cycling over in St. Paul. I believe the phone number can be found in any phone book.

In the meantime, here’s a copy of the letter sent by Film Forum New York last year. Mind you, this pleas came the same year MFA began having its “financial problems”. You the public have recourse. Just start asking the right people the right questions. Be that state, city, or regional governments. Write to the council on non profits to see if there’s anything you can do. Take a moment out of your day, and do something responsible, because its clear that the current stewards of MFA have no interest in doing so on your behalf.

Here’s that letter:
Spring 2007

Dear Friend:

2006 was a paradox.
More films that played exclusively at Film Forum
landed on 10 best- lists nationwide than ever before.
Yet our box office income decreased by $278,811 over the previous year.
Why?

Joe Morgenstern in a Wall Street Journal article (The Best Films You Havent Seen) writes: To find the gems, look somewhere between the mainstream and the completely obscure and cites ARMY OF SHADOWS, THE DEATH OF MR. LAZARESCU, and IRAQ IN FRAGMENTS as among the great unseen films of the year (all FF premieres). A.O. Scott in a New York Times article (The World is Watching. Not Americans) also cites MR. LAZARESCU as a case in point: an internationally acclaimed feature that received scant audience response in the U.S. In the same issue, Times critic Manohla Dargis bemoaned the relatively meager response to OLD JOY, another film that was a critics favorite and FF premiere.

Not since the advent of television in the early 1950s has theatrical
exhibition faced so radical a challenge.

Film critics, Hollywood studio executives, cultural pundits, and independent filmmakers all agree that the cultural zeitgeist is changing dramatically. Many Americans have invested in expensive new flat-screen TVs. They often rent DVDs by mail and spend more time online, on cell phones, watching video-on-demand, using TiVo, or playing video games.

Will movie-going cease to exist? No. But a drop in attendance means that Film Forum must find strong financial support from people with a passion for seeing movies theatrically, the kind of movies that challenge the intellect and arouse emotions.

To survive we must raise $1.4 million annually.
Individual contributions comprise a large portion of that figure.
Your contribution counts. And today it counts more than ever.
Please make your tax-deductible donation now or send your check to:
Film Forum, Attn: Annual Appeal, 209 West Houston Street, New York, NY 10014

If you give $250 you may select a DVD from among some of our most popular titles; with a $500 gift or more, please select two. (Just promise not to stay home and watch them at the expense of coming here to see something new!) DVD titles for you to choose from are: OUR BRAND IS CRISIS, THE DEATH OF MR. LAZARESCU, BABY FACE and THE CONFORMIST.

Thank you. We look forward to seeing you at the movies.

I loved Oak Street and will mourn its loss. Here are some of my personal highlights from over the years:

10) Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean. When Karen Black appeared onscreen, some crazy guy in the audience yelled, “Yeah, Karen Black”.

9) Rich Dworsky’s accompaniment of Harold Lloyd.

Watching The French Connection on a Sunday afternoon with four people in the theatre.

7) Electra Glide in Blue.

6) The Kurosawa retrospective.

5) The Magnificent Ambersons.

4) The Last Waltz. I’m not a huge fan of the Band, but what a beautiful, beautiful print.

3) Chinatown, Barfly, Rope, Cabaret, Last Tango in Paris, The Lady from Shanghai, …..

2) Elliot Gould’s question and answer session following the screening of The Long Goodbye.

1) Once Upon a Time in the West.

Man, the Long Goodbye is my favorite movie. How long ago was that Q & A session…?

Electra Glide in Blue? All I remember about that movie is the ending.

I guess I shouldn’t be so judgmental and charge MFA with “ineptitude.”
I guess I should be more charitable and say it’s had “problems.”

People I know who have to work with them would pretty firmly say “ineptitude.”

Take-Up Productions has rented the Parkway Theater on Monday nights since last fall. We’ve shown films like The Lady From Shanghai, Pickup on South Street and You Can’t Take it With You.

Our average audience is 120.

We haven’t lost money, and half of our overhead is theater rental, so when the MFA board says it’s impossible to break even in a theater they OWN (and Tim Grady talks like he owns it personally) and with all the financial benefits of nonprofit status and community support, it’s clearly time they stepped aside.

“Even when we don’t ‘win,’ there is fun and fulfillment in the fact that we have been involved, with other good people, in something worthwhile… To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.” –Howard Zinn

where the hell does the money go. As a distributor of the film Occupation Dreamland- I have been trying to get paid the meager sum of 900 that we are owed for the last two years. If there is no one paid to answer the phone or return calls it’s hard to figure out how all the money gets spent- because they certainly aren’t paying the filmmakers.

Long live the Parkway, one hopes. Barry, will Take Up be moving into take over programming some current stuff Lagoon/Uptown pass on in favor of a 13th week of “In Bruges”?

Once again, Homogenization adds another notch in its belt. I, too, was lucky enough to be at Gould’s Q&Q&Q&A and it truly was the Long Goodbye. Awesome. Sure, the Walker will continue to have its much higher brow versions of that, but for my money there is/was nothing better than cramming into the old musty Oakstreet surrounded by other movie misfits. Felt legit. Oh well, time marches on. Just ask Jedediah Leland.

This isn’t the first time that we’ve been told that the theater has been ’sold.’ The Minnpost piece refers to “recent news that the board of Minnesota Film Arts has finalized a deal to sell the Oak Street Cinema.” Can someone point to an article or other confirmation of this? Don’t get me wrong, I certainly won’t support a decision to close, demolish, or repurpose the Oak Street; but I’d rather see evidence that this will actually happen before jumping into the fray for the third (at least by my count) time.

This is devastating. Seeing every one of Rob Nelson’s “Get Real” documentary series at the Oak have been among my favorite cinematic experiences ever.

Rather than dwelling on the many mistakes and outrages, I like the idea of fronting an Oak St./Bell top 10 (no order):

– the entire Altman retrospective, but especially the moment a cell phone ring at a screening of (the then super-rare) Images (from Altman’s own print!) nearly resulted in a lynching

– attending a screening/discussion with a-g filmmaker Peter Kubelka that so heavily emphasized the babbling latter that well over half the completely packed theater (mostly film students required to be there) had slowly filed out before I threw in the towel too

– crouching next to a woman who was endlessly crinkling something cellophane at Godard’s Notre Musique and breaking the concentration required (by me, at least) to actually watch the movie and telling her “you’re ruining the movie for everyone here” before she meekly revealed she was icing a sprained ankle and I booked, embarrassed, to the back row

– taking a friend to Decasia (the art house equivalent of a GG Allin concert) and facing her wrath not over the headache-inducing audio/video but, rather, the smugness of the post-screening Q&A moderator who kept asking 10-minute questions with interjections of “I was struck by …”

– going to a midnight showing of The Thing while not sober in multiple ways

– an MF-ing Chris Marker retrospective (!)

– and, to round it out to 10 (well, 11), the three (well, four) longest movies I’ve seen there: A Grin without a Cat and Inland Empire (tied at 180m), La Commune (220m) and Satantango (450m … at a January showing for which I actually packed a blanket as though I were three times my age)

I will add as an honorable mention the initial feeling that the Jaime Hook era was going to be something special when I saw, for instance, The Little Theater of Jean Renoir there.

Dear Al Milgrom –

Thank you very much for all the hard work over the years – through all the cold days as well as the few sunny ones.

People talk a lot about your crankiness.

But Al, your tenacity, and your commitment, have served as an example much further. Thanks.

God bless you and all the other hard-working curmudgeons out there.

Ray Privett

In the spirit of full disclosure, I was the former program director at the Bell Auditorium. I saw the organization through both of its halves. Having been a volunteer for Oak Street Cinema during my college days at the U of MN and having worked at U-Film society. I saw it through its merger of the two organizations, a departure of its Executive Director (ED) who engineered said merger, a failed search for a new ED, a hiring of a Jamie Hook as the new ED, who although had his drawbacks, brought quite a bit of energy to the organization. I saw the board fail to ratify any budget Jamie proposed. I lived through Jamie’s failure to submit a grant to the State Arts Board in one of the earliest months of his brief tenure with the organization. I survived his plea to the board to help him make up that money through fund raisers, witnessed their refusal to do anything to help him. I saw Jamie’s frustration with the board grow with time. I survived him gradually dropping out of the day to operations, a result I can only a assume of his frustrations with the board. I saw the board refuse to back Jamie when one of the Oak Street founders tried to remove equipment from the Oak Street during MSPIFF 05. I saw former friends at the Oak Street bicker over said equipment forcing them to write a $3000 check to pay the founder to keep the equipment there. I somehow managed to make it through the summer continuing to program films, arrive at September, watch as the board fired Jamie from his post. I continued working at MFA. Waited, with growing frustration as the board insisted they would have a plan for recovery. Listened as the board requested the staff to come up with a budget for the festival. Argued as that budget and any other one proposed was refused. Was asked to let real estate developers into the Oak Street Cinema to have a look, but was never told why I was doing that. Watched as my colleagues one by one quit their posts. Asked myself, when my colleague was asked to stop programming the Oak Street what in god’s name was going on? Questioned the board of directors about this request, the arrival of the developers, and what the future of the organization had in store. Decided to take action by calling the community in to join the staff in asking what was going to happen to the Oak Street and MFA. Continued to work at the MFA offices, hoping that some resolution would arrive, hoping that bringing these issues to the publics eye would inspire others to insist upon action. Pleaded with the press, the public, and the community that the board of directors should be held responsible for all of the problems with the organization. Applied for a job programming in another city, where it appeared that support for film going and filmmakers was stronger although not nearly as well supported with funding as it is in the Twin Cities. Landed a job, quite the organization, participated in a round table discussion on the future of film exhibition in the Twin Cities, got in my car, drove half way around the country, arrived in Seattle Washington and started programming for another non-profit theatre, who like MFA goes through its troubles, but somehow, manages to continue to do its job, a job I consider a community service. Waited as my last pay check was withheld by the board of directors. waited some more. Watched as the Board managed to get the festival off the ground. Pleaded for my check, kept berating the board for it, until it finally arrived one day in the mail.

Two years later I realize a lot about that time. I realize that the board of directors made mistakes beginning at the moment the organizations merged. Why was their a failure to hire a new ED? Ask anyone around during those days, and I assure they’ll suggest the board was responsible.
There was malfeasance afoot at MFA and it was at board level. For instance, why did the board insist that the equipment (it was the speakers in the auditorium) be let go during MSPIFF05? Why didn’t they back the ED who had insisted that the equipment should remain with the organization? But maybe you’re to blame as well because, why don’t you ask them?

I also witnessed something miraculous. I watched a city insist for a moment, but just a moment, that they be held accountable for their actions. I learned that numbers could speak, and they did. I believe if it hadn’t been for the meeting at the earliest fated collapse of the Oak Street Cinema, a meeting where 300+ community members showed their support for what that theatre and that organization stood for, then the Oak Street would have died that year. Minneapolis you did this once before and you can do it again. What is required is action. I know your tired, but ask yourselves, how tired are those poor people who continued to try to make a go of it. I speak of the hundreds of volunteers, who continued to push MFA to operate under its mission of bringing the finest quality cinema to you its citizens. I speak of Al Milgrom, who we all know can be a total pain in the ass, but has continued to be, as he suggests in his opening letter to MSPIFF year after year, “your dutiful servant”. Ask yourselves, does cinema matter to you. Do you want to live in a city, that clearly has the funding to support a building like the Oak Street, clearly has the man power, but is willing to let a few rotten eggs at an incredibly ineffective board bully you around? Ask yourselves that as you watch the wrecking balls arrive at the corner of Oak and Washington. Ask yourselves that as you watch another unnecessary condo or apartment building erect itself in what used to be the heart of the cities cinematic nerve system. Ask yourselves that as you watch the ground floor go months without a retail occupant. Or just ask the board why this has happened. Hold them to the fire. If I was there I would, and when I was there I did. To me cinema is as important in life as breathing. It is one of the few places in our culture where you sit calmly next to a stranger. It is one of the few places you find yourselves having a conversation with a complete stranger about ideas, about art. The cinema is vital, or at least that’s what I believe and that’s why I’m in Seattle, a town that surprising doesn’t support its arts as well as the funders in Minneapolis do, going through a new executive director search mind you, entrusting my current board of directors to uphold the task the city has entrusted them with, to keep cinema alive.

I’m proud to find myself fondly thinking of Al as I say, cinema’s dutiful servant,
Adam

It is an embarrassment for our film community to be represented by Minnesota Film Arts, when cities such as Portland and Seattle have such great and vibrant film societies.

Barry is right and he should be an inspiration to us all. Hence my argument is as follows: Minnesota Film Arts should no longer be fought with, they are finished. They have repeatedly proven that they will never listen or change their course, and any further struggle with them is a waste of all our productivity. If they so shamelessly turn their backs on the community that supported them, then we should turn our backs on them for good. So I say we should stop looking backward at their litany of mistakes and start looking forward to what we can do to change things. Thus, I want to say what seemingly few have been able to say out loud in the past 5 years: Let’s band together and create a new Film Society for the Twin Cities, one that is communally organized and democratically run, not serving the needs of one individual or one small group of individuals. It is time to dispense with the cynicism and make this happen, and I want to help bring everyone together who has the energy to make it happen. Anyone who is with me on this can email me at john(at)cinemarevolution.com. Let’s make this film community a real live community and something of which we can be proud.

I, too, will miss the Oak Street and will mourn the loss.

It is a sad day, indeed.

I struggle with the idea of a Minneapolis without Oak Street Cinema despite the accumulating evidence of the inevitability that this day would arrive.

It is sad that the Oak Street will be missed by those who appreciate and enjoy an informed and erudite film program that always remained broadly appealing and accessible to all.

It is even sadder that the Oak Street has failed to thrive of late not for a lack of community support but, instead, due to a series of administrative missteps bordering on negligence.

To me cinema is as important in life as breathing. It is one of the few places in our culture where you sit calmly next to a stranger. It is one of the few places you find yourselves having a conversation with a complete stranger about ideas, about art.

Adam, brother — you moved me right there.

So aside from finger-pointing, what are the possible solutions? And, what is the financial reality of MFA and Oak Street?

And where in public records might one find the list of the MFA Board of Directors?

Oh wait, duh. Page 74.

Chuck, wish I could tell you the financial reality of MFA,, but I don’t know it.

I suggest contacting their previous funders. McKnight, State Arts board (that’s real public money!) also talk to someone at the state and city level who might be able to offer you some legal guidance. I do believe you’re entitled to some legal recourse.

I was there when they opened, living just off campus and watching giddily as the big day approached, then getting to see CITIZEN KANE for the first time on the big screen.

I saw Terry Gilliam, sick as a dog but flying in anyway, present a gorgeous print of BRAZIL. I saw Bruce Campbell present EVIL DEAD and Michael Moore present ROGER AND ME (but then not actually show it) and, yes, the bizarre Elliott Gould LONG GOODBYE screening (he sat behind me during the film, eating a huge bucket of popcorn and giggling at himself on the screen).

DAYS OF HEAVEN, PSYCHO, CITY LIGHTS (w/ live accompaniment), BARRY LYNDON, THE SEARCHERS, LATE SPRING, CONTEMPT, WILD STRAWBERRIES, ANDREI RUBLEV, WINGS OF DESIRE, von Trier’s THE KINGDOM (1 and 2!), the CITY PAGES GET REAL festivals, MSPIFF screenings, TWIN PEAKS episodes, locally-made independent features… Oak Street is where I saw the films that are now part of who I am. And for every film I saw, there were three that I kicked myself for not being able to get out to.

Oak Street was a second home for me till I moved to L.A. a few years ago. There’s an embarrassment of screening riches out here, but Oak Street (in its prime) was programmed as well as any of these venues and one of the toughest things about being so far from the Cities has been watching it fall apart. If, at any point, a call had gone out — I’m still on the freakin’ email list! — asking for donations to keep the place from being torn down, I’d have happily given beyond my means. I still would.

It’s absurd to think of an area as artistically vital as the Twin Cities lacking a rep cinema. I continue to hope that rallying around Oak Street might be able to produce some tangible result — if there’s anything to be done to save the physical space, let’s do it. But if the wrecking ball swings, I’ll happily support any effort to continue the spirit of the Oak Street in some new venue with the leadership of custodians who have learned from the seemingly tremendous mistakes of the Oak Street board.

It’s hard not to see this as being analogous to another landmark of Twin Cities culture that met a far-too-early end: REV105. The spirit of that station managed to persevere in the community long after the signal left the airwaves… and now we’ve got The Current. If the Oak Street itself can’t be saved, perhaps we can work to make a better Oak Street somewhere not too far down the road.

page 74 (plus contact info):

President:
Stephen L. Zuckerman, MD
612-728-1800 (phone); 612-721-1621 (fax)

Vice President:
Susan Smoluchowski
smoluchowskis@crimeandjustice.org

Treasurer:
Tim Grady
tgrady@worldcycling.com

Member:
Senator Richard J. Cohen
sen.richard.cohen@senate.leg.state.mn.us

Member:
Professor Robert B. Silberman
silbe001@umn.edu

The horror!! Just the latest, and perhaps most frightening example of the McSuburbanization of Minneapolis. Pity the U of M; Half a 100,000 students, no campus, and now that staple of every campus from Bangor to Bangladesh bites the dust–the art house movie theater. I have been going to the theater for 30 years (with a 15 year out of town break), as well as Gopher football and basketball games–and the loss of this venue is worse news than another generation of crappy teams and a commuter campus with the feel of a never-ending bus line. Say it ain’t so, Joe!

I’m proud to find myself fondly thinking of Al as I say, cinema’s dutiful servant,
Adam

Adam, that was a remarkably and helpfully detailed post on MFA. You are very brave to offer it to this community.

So aside from finger-pointing, what are the possible solutions? And, what is the financial reality of MFA and Oak Street?

Chuck, one story I read on the impending demolition of Oak Street said that last year’s tax form for MFA showed a $140.000 yearly deficit. If you wish to be enterprising and find out for yourselves the financial history of MFA, you can likely find their tax returns on Guidestar.org.

Personally, I think we need to move on. No one is denying that the Oak has seen some great programming and MFA has done some great work, but when the public did offer it’s support and there was a rally cry to come together to fix what had broke, the board simply turned its back. So be it.

But perhaps we can learn from our mistakes. If so, it is time to start supporting the programs that are working and are providing films and experiences that we will reminisce about with the same passion with which we reminisce about the Oak Street. My examples are endless: Barry’s great programing at the Parkway; “Home Grown Cinema” at the Parkway May 12 – June 2, not to mention their run of Chop Shop; Carlos Reygadas recently at the Walker with his amazing Silent Light; the equally amazing trio of films by Naomi Kawase at the Walker; new prints of Planet of the Apes and 2001 coming up at the Heights; this Thursday screening of The Harvey Girls at the Heights; I could go on forever. This isn’t an advertisement; I’m just trying to point out that there are really awesome screenings in town without the Oak.

Of course, there is some sort of irony that this is coming up right in the middle of a very strong Minneapolis St Paul International Film Festival (not at the Oak Street) put on by MFA. My last two days of screening (which included Catherine Breillat’s The Last Mistress, Tom Kalin’s Savage Grace, the amazing documentary Up the Yangtze, and Icelandic crime/thriller Jar City) have been nothing short of amazing. I was convinced that 2007 was the last year we would see MFA doing a film fest. But here we are in 2008 where the biggest problem with the Film Fest, from an observers point of view, is that there are just too many damn people.

It’s sad to say, but the energy is not in the Oak. There’s energy is at MSPIFF…there’s energy is at The Parkway’s Monday night series..there was some energy at the Standard Operating Procedure screening with Errol Morris at the Walker a couple weeks ago…I’m done being sad about the Oak. I’ve got a 7:15 movie to go to.

I agree completely with Kathie. Sometimes the finger pointing makes me feel better (I sure know where to point) but nothing is going to change the fate of the Oak Street Cinema at this stage.

I’ll show up if someone organizes a wake, to drink and tell stories about that one night in 1996 when Cowgill walked into the theater and asked, “Can you smell it? Can you smell the death?”. But it’s time to move forward.

And I sure wish I’d been able to get tickets to see Errol Morris.

To address the question from ephender, Take-Up is mostly interested in repertory film programming, but Rick Hansen and new owner Joe Minjares (who you remember from such films as Untamed Heart and The Truman Show) program the other six nights a week at the Parkway. They deserve your support. For one thing, they work about six times harder than I do.

I love what’s happening at the Parkway (and the Walker), but the fact remains that the Twin Cities is big enough and arts-oriented enough to deserve/support a full-fledged nonprofit cinema (2-3 screens) with year-round, nightly programming. New nonprofit cinemas/film centers have been popping up recently, including Film Streams in Omaha, and the soon to be opened Robinson Film Center in Shreveport, La.

Ideally, the Mpls-St Paul would have a place like this (how about in the Riverfront area?) with high-quality programming and a respectful but fun atmosphere like that offered by the Alamo Drafthouse in Austin, Texas — with a strong food/drink component.

I’d be willing to support such an effort and would love to have a place like this to go to regularly. I think many others would too. These days, atmosphere goes a long way in getting people to come out to the movies.

Additionally, such a venue could partner with organizations like IFP Minnesota to offer production workshops and educational programs for youth to help promote film/media literacy and build a future generation of film lovers and makers.

Let’s appreciate the past but look to make the future even better!

Bob Cowgill’s points are well taken. Those of us who have spent time at the Oak are very fond of the venerable old barn that brought us the Altman retrospective, the “Get Reel” documentary festival, and the premieres of many notable local films – from Emily Goldberg’s “Venus of Mars” to Chuck Olsen’s “Blogumentary.”

If this is to be the Oak’s end, it will be a pointless and avoidable end. The financial mismanagement of recent years certainly posed a problem, but not an insurmountable problem. There was plenty of willingness by the greater film community to help shore up the Oak. Cowgill and others did much to demonstrate the breadth of support in the Twin Cities – even to the point of seeking pledges of financial support, which many of us gladly offered up.

In the end, these efforts were for naught. Instead of harnessing the outpouring of community support for the Oak, the board seems to have joined in what has become our national pastime – taking once vibrant institutions, and running them into the ground.

Is it too late to save the Oak? Hard to tell without looking at the books. But the questions that Bob poses need to be asked – and the filmgoing public deserves some clear answers (and, as Adam suggests, legal accountability) before the walls come down.

I won’t be happy until Al Milgrom, Jamie Hook, Tim Grady, and the rest of the board at MFA are hauled away in cuffs. The sale of Oak Street is criminal and I’d kind of like those responsible to suffer a bit. Can’t someone make some wanted posters or something? Just to cheer me up. Please.

I invited Tim Grady and Al Milgrom to chime in on this thread.
(verybitter, is that you Al? Kidding!)

Anybody have a hookup for a premium Guidestar.org account? I think that’s the only way to see MFA’s books. Or, you know, they could simply participate in this discussion.

Forget it, Matt…it’s Dinkytown.

(OK, Stadium Village…but what the fuck?)

I have to add that to blame Al for this mess is an absolute outrage. He has done more for film culture in this town than anyone. He financed UFilm office expenses for years by using his own Social Security checks for chrissakes!
Please leave Al alone.

Tim Grady on the other hand? He reminds me of Adolphe Menjou’s General Broulard in “Paths of Glory.”

General Broulard: There are few things more fundamentally encouraging and stimulating than seeing someone else die.

Well, I got an email from Al saying all kinds of things I won’t repost here. The entire MFA saga is complicated and full of drama, and backstabbing, and not nearly enough sex – which is why I’m reluctant to wade in too deeply.

Here’s part of his email I’ll share:

…The Oak will be open until the last
millisecond of the wrecking ball (probably all
summer). Then there is the good old Bell Aud. still
for us , whence we started, not to mention other
locales that will carry on the tradition. Got $150,000
to pay the bill inherited from the previous Oak
regime? We at the old U Film Society thought a merger
with the Oak could have been a good thing. Look what
happened. Yet we carried on, and who’s now left? Tie
a yellow ribbon!. Al Milgrom

Sad times. Remember the 30’s musical extravaganza? I think I saw 2 movies a night for a week. And I had never seen An American in Paris on the big screen until the Oak Street. Tres magnifique. The Last Waltz was fun too.

The attorney general’s office should have all the financials on MFA – they are, er, were a non profit. You might have to pay a fee (I think it’s small) but would be worthwhile to check out. And they are always super friendly when you show up in person! If I were there instead of Berlin (with a butt load of repertory cinema alive and well) I would go check it out myself. And where the hell is Peter Wagenius? I thought he was going to throw around some city weight when the big meeting happened in ‘06.

I’m a little surprised there aren’t more words of praise for Bob Cowgill. Bob’s heart was in the right place and I’m sorry to see his dream and best efforts to keep repertory cinema alive all for nought. You had a good run, Bob! And you touched people’s lives with your little picture house!

Peter Wagenius:
peter.wagenius@ci.minneapolis. mn.us

I know I said I’d quit with the blaming, but Al’s statement leaves me a bit outraged myself. Al talks about how he inherited the current MFA debt, when the truth is entirely the opposite.

When Al says “previous Oak St regime” he isn’t referring to Bob Cowgill and the other Oak Street founders. After bailing out the bankrupt U-Film Society (as T. J. Larson said, running on Al’s social security and credit card debt) Cowgill left MN Film Arts in excellent financial condition. This is shown in the MFA tax returns, anyone interested in a copy should email me, barry (at) take-up.org.

Al must be talking about Jamie Hook’s run as executive director. But Jamie’s desk at the time was only a few steps from Al’s, and it’s hardly accurate for him to refer to the “bill inherited from the previous regime” as if he wasn’t there at the time.

where is “Al’s statement”? could someone post it here? thank you.

About 5 comments up, but I’m not repeating it.

I don’t want to take anything away from the rich history of Minnesota Film Arts (and the incredible time and effort folks like Al Milgrom and Bob Cowgill put into it), but Tim Grady and the current board have clearly not managed things properly, and it’s hard to have any faith/trust in MFA under their leadership.

MSPIFF is a great festival, and I hope it continues for years and years to come.

Other such festivals around the country have worked hard to create “home” cinemas in their communities to offer year-around programming. MFA already had that, and it’s being thrown away. How very sad.

I reiterate my call (see above) for a new effort to establish the kind of nonprofit cinema that the Twin Cities deserves. It can be done.

Abuse of power comes as no surprise. Nevertheless, I am saddened by the extent to which the venom of frustration is poisoning a long series of daily successes, the small kind that are born of the efforts of enthusiastic presenters operating on shoestrings and nerve.

We’re lucky that these venues existed at all but they, along with many others, seem to have disppeared.

In this specific case, I’d like to offer a reading of the situation that might be of use to the community as we move forward.

I wasn’t ever directly involved in either organization, or even in town at that time, but it seems to me that the University Film Society and the Oak Street Cinema, after years of forging ahead as fundamentally charismatic organizations tried to do something quite complex – merge and find a new figurehead. That operation was a longshot from the beginning- individuals as talented and dedicated to their concepts of the cinema as Al and Bob do not come along everyday. Unfortunately, because of the very personal nature of their passions they also have a very hard time giving up the reins. Good intentions together with bad breaks and misunderstandings along the way coincided with the pressures of a changing marketplace for projected media. Though I might not always understand the decisions that have been made I find it hard to believe that anyone involved has been acting in bad faith or with malicious intent. Carelessness was the biggest villain in this trajectory – on most of our parts.

But what now? MFA appears to have made the decision to become a festival organization, which while being less ambitious is at least likely to be a feasible longterm way to serve what they understand as their mission. Ufilm and Oak Street are over, Al doesn’t know how to be. The Parkway certainly carries the spiritual torch of the Oak. There has always been the Walker. Better yet, as far as I can tell, any time you have a projected film its a cinema, no matter what the scale of the set up, as long as the experience is shared. Ask Pitman and Jeans.

Anybody have a hookup for a premium Guidestar.org account? I think that’s the only way to see MFA’s books. Or, you know, they could simply participate in this discussion.

No one knows how to use Guidestar? What are they teaching young arts folk these days?!
Chuck, I just emailed you copies of MFA’s public tax returns for the past three years. Watch for them.

Boooooooo.

This is not OK.

Again, I love the Parkway and the Walker screenings, but they have some limitations in that they’re often one-off screenings. Some of us work nights or have other obligations. A single showing excludes a lot of people.

Hence my desire to see a full-fledged nonprofit cinema with programming seven days a week. Landmark is fine, but their programming at the Uptown/Lagoon/Edina isn’t as diverse as it could be since they’re operating under a for-profit model.

Speaking of Landmark, it’s just been announced that they’re abandoning their operation of the single-screen Hi-Pointe cinema in St Louis because it’s not profitable. I wonder if that’ll one day happen with the Uptown… if so, could be an opportunity for a new, lively nonprofit art cinema in Mpls.

But I’m guessing the Uptown is doing better for them than the Hi-Pointe did… don’t know. At any rate, I’d like to see another full-time, art cinema here. I can’t be the only one…

In the meantime I’ll continue to get to the Parkway and Walker whenever possible. And kudos to the Parkway for bookings like the upcoming run of Chop Shop!

Andy, the biggest obstacle to a full time nonprofit film venue is Minneapolis property values. In the 90s, places like the Heights and the Oak Street were sold for a couple hundred thousand. Now, a 350 seat theater sells for $500k and up. Making payments on a mortgage that size is extremely difficult to do on the sort of money a successful film program pulls in.

The Oak Street had a big headstart, which makes this all the more tragic. From the 2004 tax returns at guidestar.org, MFA had $125k in cash on hand, and owed only $85k on the Oak Street’s mortgage.

I’m not saying that it’s impossible to get back to that state with a new venture. It’s my long term goal as well, but I think it will take time. Anyone who’d like to help should drop me an email. Or introduce themselves when the Widmark series comes around in a couple of months.

Two years ago when people tried getting together to save oak street cinema, Al Milgrim fought against it and sided with Tim Grady and the rest of the MFA board. He was up to no good.

I would like to add a few comments on the Oak Street. As one of the original founders of the Oak Street Cinema I was witness to many of the goings on. When Bob, Barry and I began the adventure, the then Campus Theater was only an empty box. No projection, no sound, some seating, and antiquated boiler and numerous violations of the fire code. We worked many weeks to get the place open and continued to work though out our tenure. Barry Hans worked miracles in the place and made the Oak Street one of the best sounding and best looking screens in the Twin Cities. Bob Cowgill ran the place with some of the best programming in the country. As a businessman Bob was outstanding. He kept the place solvent and there was always money in the bank. He did this all out in the open and above board.

In reading these comments I feel I must respond in particular to Adam Sekular. I would like to address his comments about equipment being taken from the Oak Street. I can state as fact that the equipment did not belong to Minnesota Film Arts. Minnesota Film Arts knew that the equipment did not belong to them. I was there when the equipment was brought into the Oak Street by the person who owned it. I was there to help him take the equipment that he owned out of the Oak Street. There were a few pieces Minnesota Film Arts felt they could not do without and they purchased them from him. Minnesota Film Arts could have continued showing films without this equipment, but they made the decision to buy the pieces. This was a purchase, nothing more, nothing less. I highly resent any implication that Minnesota Film Arts was extorted. The owner of the equipment is one of the most honorable men I know. He is in all things honest.

My fellow co-founders are some the finest people I know. While they were Oak Street Cinema the theater was a vibrant success. They did it by investing themselves into the operation. If something needed to be done, they did it themselves. At a certain point we knew it was time to let the Oak Street grow. We all had outside family obligations. We had to trust others to carry on the work we started. What I want now is accountability and justice. A great many people made investments of time and money into the Oak Street. The board members are stewards, not owners. If they now decide to turn their backs on the mission, they need to answer questions honestly and openly.

When I was a younger, perhaps naïve, young man, I mentioned the word justice to a group friends. One of the people there sniffed and informed me that justice was an antiquated notion, having no place in this new world.

Randy Carpenter

yes, there are things to lament, but i agree with those who are ready to look upwards and onwards. i would love to join up with anyone else in this city to form a new center for cinema. maybe it could be membership based – a collaboration with various groups each programming a night of the week or something and everyone helping to promote the project. what we need is a new, sustainable venue. the point would be to work together rather than compete and whine. i think getting together to talk and brainstorm would be the best way to tap into the apparent desire to keep film alive here.

barry is doing a fine job with take-up, rick with the parkway, kathie is tapping away with sweat on her brow on a daily basis keeping us updated on the latest film/dvd news on her blog, john, victoria and crew at cinema revolution are providing a library of film that allows us to cultivate ourselves in lieu of or in addition to any actual screenings in town, a new collaborative at the u has started off with a bang (the baldwin screening); al and bob helped build a beautiful foundation for this art despite whatever drama that ensued and all the others who are out there doing something to keep things going – i am grateful for you all – nice hear from you adam – perhaps you could share what works out in seattle with us. let’s squeeze a few more good years out of this era before everything is devoured by youtube. a good example of a thriving film community is madison, wi where there is a cinematheque, several independent cinemas, the first sundance cinema in the nation, lots of funding from the state to draw in filmmakers, a great festival, a national film archive, many small university film programs and on and on. there is innovation there that is saving the day for them.

put me on the list john.

where’s the goddamn splenda?

Gosh, I saw the initial release of the movie Pi at the Bell.

What is important to fight for in this OAK STREET matter is to maintain a repertory theater in MPLS. Before home video in the early 80s, all cities had a rep theater which showed classic films and art films. Now you can go rent CASABLANCA, CITIZEN KANE, M, or 400 BLOWS. But an experience I had at the OAK STREET a few years ago reminded my why such rep houses are crucial for Cinema–both for filmmakers who learn by watching and audiences who enjoy watching films in public.

I saw Fellini’s 8 1/2 when it was re-released. I had seen it many times on a bad video copy of a 16mm print. I thought it was a wonderful film, but didn’t know what it was REALLY like until I saw it at the OAK STREET. Little did I know, it was Cinemascope (widescreen picture)! And seeing it 30 feet across instead of 10 inches is a whole different ballgame. We may, indeed, lose the big screen experience of movies altogether as the 9-year-olds grow up who are now perfectly happy to watch a feature film on their iPods.

As a matter of art history, film education, and the sheer pleasure of the public big-screen experience, it is crucial that we maintain these rep theaters–WHEREVER THE MONEY COMES FROM. It’s also important NOT TO EXPECT these theaters to be profitable ventures. Yes, they ARE a charity–but so are almost ALL ART MUSEUMS! Art does not always pay, and the films that DO pay are not always art. In fact, some art is priceless. That is, it is BEYOND discussion of money–a touch of the infinite in our very finite and limiting world.

And it is exactly those films–viewed LARGE ON THE SCREEN–which rep houses like the OAK STREET and FILM FORUM in NYC screen. Like Godard’s MASCULINE FEMININE which closed in NY in 1965 after 2 unprofitable weeks (see: Pauline Kael’s rueful contemporary review!), films which not only awe us with their scale and visuals but also challenge our beliefs, assumptions and politics–these are the films which need special places to screen. These are the films which make Cinema matter–whether they’re “art films” or the occasional blockbuster which achieves both commerical AND artistic greatness.

SCALE is a significant, I would argue CRUCIAL element of Cinema. Most people will only ever “see” Picasso’s “GUERNICA” painting on a postcard. But Picasso didn’t paint that on a 5″x7″ piece of paper. It’s many meters across and many high–about the size of a Cinemascope moviescreen image.

Because many movies DO make so much money, we in the US frequently dismiss the need to pay any special attention to the fostering and maintenance of this art form whose artistry is frequently drowned out by its occasional (and statistically RARE!) windfall profits. But like any large industry which gets much cultural and government support (the auto industry, the mining industry, the high-tech industry–do THEY really need tax-dollar assistance?:), we need to foster both the present and the past of Cinema in order to strengthen our most significant art form.

Sadly, the OAK STREET will probably pass into history. I join T.J. Larsen in commending Al Milgrom–both The Man and The Legend–who I once saw silence a misguided film student at the OAK STREET who “didn’t really see why it mattered if we watched movies big or small…” Al stood up like the ghost of Sam Fuller/King Lear and delivered an impassioned speech on Cinema, the likes of which SHOULD be the battle cries of filmmakers 1/4 his age. Al Milgrom out-did and out-does the most idealist punk rocker in his quest for Cinema, his love of the art, the people, the culture. Who would drive his own beat-up Volvo to Toronto and enter on dubious press passes year after year in the name of Cinema? Did YOU? Did I? Al Milgrom did–always.

The who, the why, the how of the OAK STREET is now largely irrelevant (save the producer looking for his check!). But fortunately, we have Joe Minjares picking up the torch with the PARKWAY. I had the great pleasure of working with Joe a couple years ago (in his actor capacity), and we are lucky that he has both the ability and artistic judgement to turn the PARKWAY into another MPLS theater which, like THE HEIGHTS, will allow us to watch our dreams in public–LARGE! So get out there, film fans, and watch those movies. And remember, Cinema never disappears–it only changes form. Or forum.

To Randy,
I prefer not to get into a swpat sir, but I must once again suggest that the equipment that the former founder wanted to remove from the theatre was inherited by MN Film Arts. Had the merger of the organizations not gone sour, that equipment would have stayed with the organization. your implication that his one time donated equipment could be removed because it wasn’t originally owned by the theatre, adn again only because he disagreed with how the organization was going is ludicrous. It is one piece in a long story, a story I feel I could weigh in on, I felt I should freely and openly discuss the history. At the time of the merger I know that U-Film had to disclose all property, and I would only assume Oak Street did as well. There is surly enough paperwork about this should anyone wish to research it.

The history though is so twisted. If you look at the three personalities remaining in this madness, you have Tim Grady, who at one time worked for the Tedd Mann and his theatre chain. You have Bob Cowgil, who at one time co-ran the Cedar when it was a movie theatre, and co-founded the Oak Street, And you have Al Milgrom, who co-founded the U-Film Society and MSPIFF. As the history was recounted to me by these gentlemen, Mr. Grady, when working for Mr. Mann, suggested he would put Mr. Cowgil’s Cedar theatre. You have Cowgil, who was concerned that U-Film, in its heyday a student organization receiving funding directly from the university, was competing too much with the film exhibition business in the Twin Cities. Again you have Mr. Grady who worked for a period with the Star Tribune, who apparently helped launch MSPIFF in its naisance. These gentlemen have a fair amount of history behind and between them. A history i’m sure plays into the emotions they are feeling and the actions they are making. It is again one piece of this history.

I agree with everyone on here who suggests that rep cinema can continue elsewhere in MPLS, and it has. But I do want to suggest that what you should be fighting for in MN Film Arts is actually justice. It is a non-profit organization after all and should have the interests of you its citizens in mind. I detail the history I know because it can help you do that job.

I remember watching “Oklahoma” at the Oak Street — even though I’d seen the dance sequences many times on video on the small screen nothing compared to seeing the performances sweep across the screen on a clear print. The colors were beautiful. Arguably this experience could have happened in any theater but there was something about the old, musty, creaky environment that made me feel transported back in time.
The demise of Oak Street is incredibly sad, not only because it’s yet another example of how so many in the Twin Cities fail to value landmarks but also because it signals yet again how cinema is becoming less and less of a communal experience. I certainly value the small theaters that are struggling to keep going and the film series out there that continue to draw audiences and I hope they can keep up the good fight. But it will still be a sad reminder to see yet another meaningless condo or chain restaurant or whatever else the developer plans to put up on the Oak Street spot. Seems like an avoidable loss . . .
Caroline Palmer

Adam

You can suggest all you want. But it is obvious you only have information second hand. I was there on day one of the organization and I know first hand that the equipment in question did not belong to Oak Street Cinema or to MFA. I helped the man bring it in and I helped him take it out. You weren’t there. The MFA board checked off on the equipment that was removed. The speakers that were purchased were not required for the film festival. They were a $3000 investment by MFA. So if you have evidence of theft or extortion please present it. Otherwise please do not slander my friends. I’ll have no more to say on this and I suggest you do likewise.

The merger in fact did not go sour. It occurred. What went sour was MFA.

FLICKERING OUT: Ode to OAK ST Cinema

FLICKERING OUT: Ode to OAK ST Cinema (d’oh–link at http://www.minnpost.com/community_voices/2008/04/30/1677/flickering_out_an_ode_to_the_oak_street_cinema)