In just a few days, the 2024 TCM Classic Film Festival will be getting underway. Which means I’ve spent the past couple of weeks obsessing over the schedule, trying to figure out my plans. As always, there are lots of scheduling conflicts to work out, and even though I mostly have my plans figured out, there are a few blocks where my plans will all come down to how I’m feeling when the time comes. As it stands now, here’s what I plan to see during the festival.
Opening Night
For opening night, my tradition is to sit in the bleachers to watch the guests arrive on the red carpet, then skip the first block of movies to get dinner and get my first movie in later that night. This year, I’ll be breaking that tradition by actually going to the big opening night movie: a 30th anniversary screening of Pulp Fiction with a conversation between John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, and Uma Thurman. In all the years I’ve been going to TCMFF, this will be the first time I go to the opening night red carpet movie, so I’m definitely excited for this.
Friday, April 19
For the first full day of the festival, I’ll start things off with the That’s Vitaphone! presentation with Bruce Goldstein, Shane Fleming, Steve Levy, and Bob Weitz. This event will feature six classic Vitaphone shorts complete with sound played on the original discs. I went to another Vitaphone presentation at the festival a few years back and it was an absolute delight. And any festival events with Bruce Goldstein are always a treat, so this event was immediately one of my big essentials for this year’s festival.
After Vitaphone, I’ll head over to the Egyptian for a screening of The Little Foxes. It’s always hard for me to pass up a Bette Davis movie and I haven’t seen The Little Foxes in a long time so it’ll be great to revisit that one. This screening will be introduced by Mario Cantone, whose introductions are so much fun — especially when his Bette Davis impressions are involved.
The following block is a little bit up in the air for me. Over in Club TCM is a conversation with Billy Dee Williams, but that’s up against The Silence of the Lambs, introduced by Jodie Foster, in the Chinese Theater. On one hand, it’s hard for me to pass up the chance to see one of the stars of my favorite Star Wars movie. But I haven’t seen Silence of the Lambs in a very long time and it’d be amazing to see it in the Chinese theater, especially with Jodie Foster there. We’ll see which way I’m leaning when the day comes.
Next up is one of the hardest conflicts of the festival for me: Close Encounters of the Third Kind introduced by Steven Spielberg against Lady Sings the Blues introduced by Billy Dee Williams. Close Encounters is my second favorite Spielberg movie, but I’m also a Diana Ross fan. These two start at the exact same time and end at the exact same time, so there’s no way for me to do anything like stay for the intro for one movie and leave early to get in line for another. It was a hard call, but I think Close Encounters wins this one for me. It’s playing in the Chinese theater, which has an amazing sound system, so it’s hard for me to imagine a better theater to see it in.
After Close Encounters, I’ll be sticking around the Chinese theater for a screening of Se7en, introduced by David Fincher. I haven’t seen Se7en, but I’ve always wanted to so I was glad to see it in the schedule this year. As much as I’d like to head over to the midnight screening of Road to Ruin, I realistically know it’ll be hard for me to do both midnight movies so I’ll probably be calling it a night after Se7en.
Saturday, April 20
For Saturday, I’ll be starting the day off at the Egyptian for Night Has a Thousand Eyes on nitrate. That’s another one I’ll be seeing for the first time at the festival. From there, I’ll head over to the multiplex for either She Done Him Wrong or A Little Romance. She Done Him Wrong is another one being introduced by Mario Cantone, but A Little Romance will have Diane Lane as a guest. I’ll have to see which way I’m leaning when the day comes for that one.
Everything in the next block of the day is a good call, but the clear winner for me is the Melies 3D Discoveries event in the multiplex. I simply cannot resist the chance to see a 3D presentation of some Georges Melies films. After that, I’ll stick around for the Back from the Ink: Restored Animation Shorts event. It occurred to me that I’ve never done an animation-related event at the festival before and I’ve been digging Fleischer animation lately, and this event will include several Fleischer cartoons.
After the animated shorts, I’m hoping to head over to the Roosevelt for a poolside screening of Footloose. I’m sure that’s going to be an absolute blast, but I’m also a little concerned that I might be doing a little too much, so I might end up doing a dinner break instead before the midnight screening of Heavenly Bodies.
Sunday, April 21
I always try to keep my Sunday plans pretty flexible since there are always a lot of TBA blocks in the schedule where movies that played well earlier in the festival get a second screening. The only things I know for sure that I want to do are The Sin of Nora Moran, with Cora Sue Collins as a guest, and hopefully the book signing with Billy Dee Williams in the morning. Sherlock, Jr. will probably end up being my last movie of the festival, but I could potentially be swayed by something in the last TBA slot of the festival.
