The film series on the cover of OC Weekly (2014), just above the giant pink bunny head while a dance party goes on next door and Bax Baxter rides his Vespa through the gallery. Steve Elkins on the film series: Mysteriously, very few people seem to notice an absolutely massive "Hobby Shop" prominently located on a busy street in downtown Fullerton. It is nearly a city-block long and only open one hour per month. The hour is never announced. But inside this curiosity cabinet of build-your-own-rockets and model cars half-buried under decades worth of dust, two elderly men arrive at the crack of dawn every morning to take calls from the Pentagon while they devise detailed plans to colonize the moon, use asteroids as space taxis, and build a 12-mile elevator from the moon's surface to the exterior of the lunar atmosphere. While this may sound like the premise for a Philip K. Dick novel (who once lived and wrote in Fullerton), these men are actually well qualified for these projects, since they were two of the chief engineers behind the Apollo program that brought mankind to the moon. Through this work, one of them, Pete Magoski, was able to buy a building across the back alley from the Hobby Shop which he has allowed to grow into the Magoski Arts Colony. When Jesse Latour asked me in 2013 to project films at the Colony for the monthly Fullerton Artwalk he founded, I enthusiastically agreed. But knowing the Artwalk tended to have a frenetic atmosphere, I asked if we could expand it to a more intimate weekly event in which cinema could become an excuse to bring the Colony and the outside community together to talk to each other, to slow down and discuss our personal labyrinths of associations branching out from the images and sounds we share. What interests me most about cinema is that it seems to serve as the modern substitute for the nomadic campfires of our ancestors: it is the flickering light which gathers us together in the dark to cultivate (or shatter) our collective mythologies, and our inner picture of what the world might actually be like. When I met Japanese director Nobuhiko Obayashi (whose film "Hausu" I presented in October 2013), he illustrated this beautifully by asking if I knew sign language for the word "movie." He waved his hands horizontally in front of his eyes, then slowed them down until the gesture revealed a flicker pattern as his fingers crossed each other. "The magic of cinema," he said, "is that we come together to share a flickering light. At a two hour movie, you spend one hour seeing what everyone else sees, and the other hour in darkness. Cinema, like poetry, is about what you bring to the nocturnal spaces between our shared images, which is your own. This is what you take with you out of the theater, and why you should ask for half your money back on the way out." The film series has exceeded all my expectations. I have watched people from all sectors of the Fullerton community (lawyers, punks, city planners, students, linguists, pastors, artists, cryptologists) come together each week for deep and engaging discussions that often last for hours after each film. Potentially lifelong friendships have emerged from this. It has shown me that people are willing to forego the comforts of home, video-on-demand, and commercial theaters even if it means sweating through the oven-like temperatures of the Colony in summer, or shivering in a cocoon of blankets during the winter, on whatever pilfered improvised furniture we could gather (torn-out car seats, forklifts, and even a vintage dentist's chair), covered in residue from the week's activities (sawdust, paint, unidentified substances), because there is something you can experience here that your couch, computer, or commercial movie theater cannot provide. It shows more than ever that people don’t actually want the latest vomit from the film industry, that factory designed to ensure you do not think, but become a product of their own thought. Jesse and the Magoskis have my deepest gratitude for making such an event possible.

Hibbleton Gallery

Steve Elkins Presenting Stan Brakhage At The Fullerton Art Walk

Jesse Latour (Hibbleton Gallery)

A great article on film series co-host Jesse La Tour in the "People of OC 2013" issue of OC Weekly (photo by Christie Yuri Noh): "In 2010, Jesse La Tour ran for Fullerton City Council. He didn't have a prayer. He refused donations. The photo he initially submitted to a local newspaper featured him in a ratty, one-size-too-small T-shirt that looked as though it came from babyGap. The image of him, shot at night, on his campaign sign was almost sinister-looking... As downtown Fullerton has grown and mutated during the past 10 years, 33-year-old La Tour has been one of its most influential residents. Through working with others artistically and politically, he has helped give this small sliver of Orange County something that shockingly resembles an identity. He started the Downtown Fullerton Art Walk, held on the first Friday of every month which celebrated its third anniversary March 1. He co-founded Hibbleton Gallery in 2008; he helped to organize the first Saturday-morning protests outside the Fullerton Police Department in response to the death of Kelly Thomas. He's organized or inspired benefits, concerts and events of all stripes. Basically, if there's a proactive, creative endeavor going on in downtown Fullerton, La Tour is involved somehow... A Fullerton resident since age 7, La Tour is many things: writer, artist, musician, college English professor, videographer, art-gallery owner, local historian, activist. But his real talent may lie in the quiet, unassuming way that, through collaborating with others, he gets shit done. His central role in helping foster, in Steven Baxter's words, an 'asshole-free downtown Fullerton of artists, musicians, activists and educators' would have shocked those who knew La Tour a decade ago. At the time, he was a 'painfully shy' dude taking classes at Fullerton College and just 'Trying to figure himself out,' he says. 'I was the kind of person who would just be quiet, listen and observe and chime in from time to time.' In 2004, he moved downtown and into an apartment atop Mulberry Street Restaurant. Members of the Cold War Kids would hang out there, and coupled with 'all these creative, artistic types I kept meeting,' he turned the apartment into a hub for a small but real arts scene...Working with fellow artists, as well as gaining a deep interest in local issues, helped draw La Tour from his insularity and into his role as downtown's unofficial mayor of the arts. And unlike so many creative types who can't wait to split somewhere else, La Tour's quite comfortable in Fullerton. Shortly after opening Hibbleton, he bought an Amtrak pass and rode the rails across America for a month. It was an eye-opening experience, showing him 'America's beauty and its problems,' he says. When he returned to Fullerton's station, he hopped off the train and started walking to his apartment. 'Then one of those existential moments came, an epiphany,' he says. 'I think for the first time, I really realized this is where my roots are. This was my home.'"

Steve Elkins And Friends At The Film Series

Friends At The Film Series

Friends At The Film Series

Another late night gathered around Bax's scotch bar / desk atop a vintage television

Steve Elkins And Former Brown Beret Ricardo Gonsalves At The Film Series

Exhibition On The Cinema Of Iran (Hibbleton Gallery)

Exhibition Of Art Inspired By The Film Series

Jean Luc Godard's "Vivre Sa Vie" (1962)

Nobuhiko Obayashi (Director Of "House")

Nobuhiko Obayashi asked us (through a translator) if we knew sign language for the word "movie." He showed us by waving his hands horizontally in front of his face, then slowed them down until we could see that the gesture represented a flicker pattern as his fingers crossed each other. "The magic of cinema," he said, "is that we come together to share a flickering light. At a two hour movie, you spend one hour seeing what everyone else sees, and the other hour in darkness. Cinema, like poetry, is about what you bring to the spaces between our shared images, which is your own. This is what you take with you out of the theater, and why you should ask for half your money back on the way out. "It is amazing to have been flown here from Japan to experience my films through your eyes. If you will allow your eyelids to flicker for a moment, you will see a 75 year old man before you when they are open. But when they're closed, you'll see that you have made me a young boy again." Trailer for Nobuhiko Obayashi's "House (1977): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQ_Yo06kIIA

Friends At The Film Series

Friends At The Film Series

Friends At The Film Series

Photo from an Orange Coast Magazine shoot for an article on the film series by Natalie James: ORANGE COAST MAGAZINE: How’d you get this job? ELKINS: The gallery owner asked me if I would run the projection room during the monthly Fullerton Art Walk, but I realized I’d prefer to create a sit-down event. I wanted to show stuff that was as thought-provoking as possible. OCM: What kind of films do you screen? ELKINS: We pick a theme. For example, documentaries on radical women in the arts. We’ve also started to focus on regions. We wanted to find countries we don’t hear about cinema coming from. Mongolia, Kazakhstan, the Czech Republic, Nigeria. OCM: How does film encourage conversation? ELKINS: It seems like film is a language that everyone speaks. Everyone watches movies routinely. You don’t see that as much with literature or painting. OCM: Describe the discussions. ELKINS: Sometimes they’re really vigorous debates. I think it’s interesting; there’s the movie itself, then there’s our own internal version of that movie. That’s what comes out in the conversation.

Steve Elkins Presenting Ritwik Ghatak's "A River Called Titas" (Bangladesh, 1973)

Friends At The Film Series

Friends (Hibbleton Gallery)

Discussions On The Rooftop

Discussions on the rooftop

Discussions On The Rooftop