It came from beneath the Cinemat

It's three a.m. and a small, motley group is standing outside of the Cinemat on the corner of Walnut and 4th Street, practicing some fire-eating techniques. "It's a cold fire," explains a short, round-faced woman with spiky black hair as she lights another metal stick with what looks like Pennzoil. She is one of the fire-eaters who are trying to convince me to try to eat some flames myself, but I, never being one to stick strange objects in my mouth without at least learning their name first, am obviously hesitant. A medium-sized, tentacle-faced creature leans toward me; his cold, unblinking yellow eye staring into mine. "Come on, try it," he says, his broad, rolling accent sounding sinister. I laugh nervously, but I'm not going to eat fire anytime soon. Luckily, these aren't just any random strangers hanging out on street corners in an attempt to frighten people in the middle of the night. Instead, they are the members and fans of the well-loved weekly movie event called Atomic Age Cinema, a $3 midnight shock show designed to poke fun at really crappy sci-fi and horror movies. And the tentacle-faced creature isn't really … well, OK, so he is kind of sinister, but officially his name is Dr. Calamari and he's one of the two hosts of this darkly humorous commentary show that encourages audience participation. Atomic Age Cinema is held every weekend in donated Cinemat theater space at midnight, in the murky hours between Saturday night and Sunday morning. This September it celebrates its second birthday as one of the only live-hosted horror film shows in the nation. Often compared by its fans as a bizarre combination of "Rocky Horror Picture Show" and "Mystery Science Theater 3000," the program is gaining prominence as a great way to spice up the dull early morning hours of a weekend in Bloomington. "It's definitely an alternative to [the bar and band scene] because that stuff can get old," says Dave Pruett, the executive director of the Cinephile Film Arts Organization, which hosts the out-of-print and obscure movie screenings each week as a form of fundraising for its group. Not that the audience actually cares about all that. They are here for the beer and the laughs. "What's white, fluffy and goes sss-boom-bah?," asks Dr. Calamari, his flaccid mouth of dark-grey tentacles quivering slightly as his moves his ear-less head. "An exploding sheep," someone in the back of the room shouts, and the rest of the audience roars with laughter. It's the intermission during the utterly ridiculous movie "The Day the Earth Caught Fire," and I'm sitting back in my chair, popping Junior Mints and drinking my bottle of water. Tonight the strange trivia questions are pretty much unanswerable, but they are funny nonetheless, so the audience doesn't really care. Baron Mardi, a 6'6" tall voodoo priest from New Orleans, stands at the front of the room with his co-host Dr. Calamari. Both comedians never break character and avoid disclosing their alter egos to the audience. Mardi, beer in hand, tosses out a "prize" to the winner of the last trivia question. "The prizes are -- you never know what you are going to get," Pruett says, standing outside the concession stand he mans, which sells everything from popcorn and hot dogs to a wide selection of domestic and imported beers for those who are of-age. "Last week someone got a parking ticket." Stephen Jankovic, a part-time IU student, explains that, like everything else Atomic Age does, the prizes are just bad, and sometime really bad, jokes. "The worst prize we gave out was dryer lint," he says, naming the "Village of the Giants" movie where the "prize," surprisingly all pooled from one person's dryer, was given out. "We said it was giants' belly button lint." And dryer lint is what makes this irreverent, ribald show funny. Back in the darkened theater, the black-and-white film turns back to a sepia-tone meant to represent the "burning" Earth. The audience claps and cheers. "Mostly we like to show films that have no social relevance at all," Dr. Calamari yells above the noise. After all, this shock show is not just about making fun of bad movies. Atomic Age Cinema's rather twisted story began over two years ago, when Cinephile, which supports independent filmmakers in south-central Indiana through grants, internships and film festivals, needed a source of funding for their fledgling group. Before lighting on the idea of showing really horrid B-movies to a willing Bloomington audience, they concocted all sorts of crazy and expensive schemes, like a tabletop movie jukebox that would play independent filmmakers' movies when given change. "We came up with all kinds of really lame ideas for fundraising," Pruett says unabashedly. Finally someone in the group mentioned the horror hosts of yore, low-budget TV characters like '80s goth-princess Elvira who hosted weekly television horror movie specials, and the crazy-fun idea of creating a spoof was born. Throw in some cracked out B-movies from the '50s and '60s, a couple of outrageous comedians in costume, lots of beer, and stir until you can't see straight. Or, as Pruett puts it, "I've always been a fan of B-movies and we had access to the space." Whatever. Yes, whatever the real story is, the fact is that people love Atomic Age Cinema. Whether it's the thrill of yelling at a movie screen in a darkened room and having other people laugh at your comments or just the ability to actually drink beer and watch a movie on the big screen at the same time, people keep coming back week after week. Bloomington resident Mark Richardson, a long-time regular, said he knew immediately that this show was going to be fun. "I knew from the beginning," he says, twisting in his chair to speak to me. "It was this absurd thing. And it's just really fun." "I come here because I laugh as hard as I can," says senior Lindsey Charles, who drags her friends every week to the show. "It's a good break from the week. You don't get to see movies like this on a regular basis." For Claudia Kidd, the spiky-haired fire-eater, her reason for coming is a lot more concrete. "I'm screwing the Baron," she says, her face deadpan before cracking a smile. "And besides getting greasepaint all over my face every night, I'm a really big film buff." "It's something unique," adds senior James Stroman, who joined Cinephile after becoming a fan of the midnight show. "And it's kind of hip. It's geek-chic." Pruett agrees that this is one of the most well-attended events the Cinemat holds, even though he admits he is hard-pressed to understand exactly why. "I think it's because … there's not another show like this in the Midwest -- maybe not anywhere," he says. And maybe it's just because people have twisted minds. "(People come because of) the glory -- dissections, live human abortions and the Earth catching fire," Dr. Calamari says after the show, standing outside with his long-stemmed cigarette holder carefully propped between two heavily-gloved fingers. Unlike Holly Golightly, however, Dr. Calamari's wandering cigarette and gleaming eye make you wonder if he's really joking or not. "It's like your mom's mashed potatoes," Baron Mardi throws in, trying to shed some light to the unknown quality that is their core audience. "It's something that people know consistently … we're kind of self-deprecating and we play up the goofiness." "You can drink and watch a movie -- and there's a smoke break," said the Baron before lighting up a stick, throwing back his head and dipping the flame into his open mouth. "I don't know how people can sit through an entire movie without a smoke." Upcoming Events for Atomic Age Cinema Sept. 30: Movie -- "Xtro"
Oct. 7: Movie -- "Alice, Sweet Alice"
Oct. 14: Movie -- "Masque of the Red Death"
Oct. 21: Movie -- "Profundo Rosso"
Oct. 28: Hosting the Monster's Ball at Second Story