Read the Book, See the Movie

A whole bunch of good movie stuff is going on at the Charleston County Public Library, part of its ongoing quest to draw in diverse members of the general public to come and poke fun at the bookworms.

The Women in Film series is running at various branches. It’s a collaboration with the Gibbes Museum of Art, which is showing work by the cinematically-minded African American artist Lorna Simpson. The next film will be Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust (Sept. 30 at the main branch). It tells the story of the Peazant family, descendants of slaves living on islands near South Carolina and Georgia. The Oprah-produced Their Eyes Were Watching God will be shown in October, as part of the NEA-funded Big Read initiative. Women in Film will continue through the fall.

We’re also pleased to see the return of the library’s excellent documentary-based lecture series. This week’s feature is The Great War, showing on Sept. 24 at 2:30 p.m. The film series runs every other week through Nov. 19, and Citadel scholars will be on hand to talk about the era and answer questions. Other documentaries scheduled include Men of Bronze and One Woman, One Vote. If, as in previous years, soda and cookies are provided along with the films, we’ll be very happy.

The library’s current experiment with opera video screenings has been a success. Apparently there are enough people in town to warrant showings of well-known operas every Thursday at 1:30 p.m. Some, like Sept. 20’s Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci, are recordings of live performances. Others, like Oct. 18’s Turandot, take a behind-the-scenes look at productions — in that instance, an incredible show in Beijing’s Forbidden City.

IMAx-ed Out

Last Friday I got an e-mail from the Charleston IMAX Theatre, telling me about all the cool stuff that would be showing at the theatre through October. Transformers at the IMAX? I’d go see that. Dinosaurs 3D coming soon. I was looking forward to catching these films and others at the Aquarium Wharf theatre. Three days after the e-mail, IMAX shut its doors, apparently for good. According to a press release announcing the closure, “the theatre was no longer financially viable.” The closing leaves a big, sad hole in the tourist area of Aquarium Wharf. —Nick Smith

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