THE MT VOID
05/26/23 -- Vol. 41, No. 48, Whole Number 2277

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Co-Editor: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
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Topics:
Science Fiction (and Other) Discussion Groups, Films,
Lectures, etc. (NJ)
Mark's Picks for Turner Classic Movies in June
(comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Z CHANNEL: A MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION (film review reprint
by Mark R. Leeper)
Five Ways SF Writers Sidestep the Problem of Relativity
(pointer to column by James Davis Nicoll)
This Week's Reading (DANGEROUS VISIONS AND NEW WORLDS)
(book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)

===================================================================

TOPIC: Science Fiction (and Other) Discussion Groups, Films,
Lectures, etc. (NJ)

Meetings in Middletown are in-person; meetings in Old Bridge are
Zoomed, at least through the winter season. The best way to get
the latest information is to be on the mailing lists for them.

June 1, 2023 (MTPL), 5:30PM ALTERED STATES (1980) & novel
by Paddy Chayefsky
<https://archive.org/details/alteredstates0000unse/mode/2up>
July 6, 2023 (MTPL) FERMAT'S LAST TANGO (2001) & novel
THE LAST THEOREM (2008) by Arthur C. Clarke & Frederik Pohl
<https://tinyurl.com/LastTheorem-Clarke-Pohl>

===================================================================

TOPIC: Mark's Picks for Turner Classic Movies in June (comments
by Mark R. Leeper)

I have to admit I am a sucker for documentaries about the history
of film and of filmmakers. If Turner airs one of their
documentaries you will find me somewhere in the virtual audience
soaking it all in. Well, now the audience is not really there and
it is all digital but the motivation is the same. And Turner has
decided that the focus for June is going to be documentaries about
film. My picks for June are:

THURSDAY, June 8
12:45 AM Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the Movie
Palace (2019)
2:30 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 01
(2019)
3:45 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 02
(2019)
5:00 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 03
(2019)
6:15 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 04
(2019)
7:30 AM Image Makers: The Adventures of America's Pioneer
Cinematographers (2019)
9:30 AM This is Francis X. Bushman (2021)

WEDNESDAY, June 14
8:00 PM Carl Laemmle
(2019)
9:45 PM Oscar Micheaux: The Superhero of Black Filmmaking
(2021)
11:15 PM Burden of Dreams (1982)

THURSDAY, June 15
1:00 AM A Fuller Life (2013)
2:30 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 05
(2019)
3:45 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 06
(2019)
5:00 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 07
(2019)
6:15 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 08
(2019)
7:30 AM The True Adventures of Raoul Walsh
(2019)

MONDAY, June 19
6:15 PM Tab Hunter Confidential (2015)

WEDNESDAY, June 21
8:00 PM Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession (2004)
10:15 PM What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael (2018)

THURSDAY, June 22
12:00 AM The Celluloid Closet (1995)
2:00 AM Paul Robeson: Tribute to an Artist (1979)
2:30 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 09
(2019)
3:45 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 10
(2019)
5:00 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 11
(2019)
6:15 AM Yellowface: Asian Whitewashing and Racism in
Hollywood (2019)
7:15 AM Soundies: A Musical History (2007)

WEDNESDAY, June 28
9:45 PM By Design: The Joe Caroff Story (2022)
10:45 PM Floyd Norman: An Animated Life (2016)
2:00 AM High Noon on the Waterfront (2022)
2:30 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 12
(2019)
3:45 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 13
(2019)
5:00 AM Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema 14
(2019)

FRIDAY, June 30
6:15 AM Max Steiner: Maestro of Movie Music (2021)
8:30 AM Dean Martin: King of Cool (2020)

Other films of interest in June:
06/03 4:00 PM Angels in the Outfield (1951)
06/04 8:00 PM Blazing Saddles (1974)
06/06 2:00 PM Coma (1978)
06/07 6:00 PM Around the World Under the Sea (1965)
06/08 4:30 PM The Horn Blows at Midnight (1945)
06/08 10:30 PM Suddenly, Last Summer (1960)
06/09 7:00 AM Enchanted Island (1958)
06/09 2:15 PM Lord of the Flies (1963)
06/10 3:45 AM The Bad Seed (1956)
06/10 10:00 PM One Million Years B. C. (1966)
06/17 2:45 AM Queen of Outer Space (1958)
06/17 4:15 AM Hercules, Samson & Ulysses (1963)
06/17 5:45 AM Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959)
06/17 8:00 PM Time After Time (1979)
06/19 3:45 AM Donkey Skin (1970)
06/21 8:45 AM The Time Machine (1960)
06/23 4:15 PM Soylent Green (1973)
06/23 9:45 PM What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)
06/29 10:30 AM Tarzan, the Ape Man (1932)
06/29 12:15 PM Tarzan the Fearless (1933)
07/01 12:15 AM Eating Raoul (1982)
07/01 1:45 AM Lisztomania (1976)
07/01 3:45 AM Pink Flamingos (1974)

===================================================================

TOPIC: Z CHANNEL: A MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION (film review reprint by
Mark R. Leeper)

[Z CHANNEL, running on Turner Classic Movies in June, was on
"Mark's Top Ten" list for 2004. here are his comments.]

One of the earliest pay cable stations was also one of the best.
This is story of that station and of Jerry Harvey who made the
station a film fan's dream while running his own life into the
ground. Harvey would get films from all over the world, films that
most ardent cinema fans had been dying to see. This
documentary shows a rich selection of the films that played on Z
Channel in Los Angeles in the late-1970s. It all came to an end
very suddenly and very tragically. This is a documentary that does
a lot in a lot of different areas. It is well worth looking for.
Rating: low +3 (-4 to +4) or 8/10 [-mrl]

===================================================================

TOPIC: Five Ways SF Writers Sidestep the Problem of Relativity
(pointer to column by James Davis Nicoll)

<https://www.tor.com/2023/05/22/
five-ways-sf-writers-sidestep-the-problem-of-relativity/>

Introductory paragraph:

"Relativity! Extremely well supported by the evidence, and
extremely inconvenient for SF authors who want jaunts to the
galactic core to be as easy as popping down the road. Given a
universe so large that light takes as long as anatomically modern
humans have existed to meander across a single galaxy, combined
with a very strict speed limit of C, and you face a cosmic reality
that makes many stories authors might want to write quite simply
physically impossible. So ... what are hardworking science fiction
authors to do?" [-jdn]

===================================================================

TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)

DANGEROUS VISIONS AND NEW WORLDS: RADICAL SCIENCE FICTION, 1950 TO
1985 edited by Andrew Nette and Iain McIntyre (PM Press, ISBN
978-1-629-63883-6) is a collection of essays by divers hands (as
they say) which was a Hugo Award finalist in 2022. I found some of
the essays fascinating, and skipped some others (particularly
detailed looks at works with which I was totally unfamiliar), but
overall I found the book well worth the reading, and highly
recommend it.

Note: I did not buy this in hardcover for $59.95, or in paperback
for $29.95. I didn't even pay $9.99 for a Kindle edition, but read
it for free through my library's HOOPLA subscription. There was a
time when accessing the "Best Related Book" finalists was out of
the financial reach of many, but this is no longer as true.

Note 2: In the essay on R. A. Lafferty, an interview from LAN'S
LANTERN gets quoted. Since we introduced Lan to fandom, and LAN'S
LANTERN was where we were first widely published, this warms the
cockles of my heart.