Not only does The Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art offer exhibitions, workshops and lectures, they also play movies. Sure, their screenings tend towards the artsy but it’s an art museum. The museum’s current Berlin School Series (contemporary films from Germany) includes several Chicago premieres. But Block also plays plenty of oldies but goodies. During Reading Week they’re showing The Best Years of Our Lives and A Time to Love and a Time to Die.
The occasional early screenings of films also swings through their doors, most recently Gus Van Sant’s Milk starring Sean Penn, James Franco and Emile Hersh showed to a packed theater more than two weeks before its November 26, Chicago release.
Along with approximately 40 Northwestern student volunteers, film curator and director of Block Cinema Will Schmenner selects the films. We sat down Schmenner to pick his brain about objectifying Robert Redford, his killer chops and the pleasure of hating.
Go to their website for more information about Block Cinema.
What do you actually do at Block?
Mostly I talk on the phone and send emails. Last year, I curated a show for the Block Museum of drawings and things by Alfred Hitchcock and now it’s going to the Berlin Film Museum.
You’re not a Northwestern student, so what are you?
I’m very, very old. I’m 30 years old and I went to the University of Chicago.
Where are you from?
Indianapolis, Indiana
So you used to work part time as a mechanic, do you ever miss it?
Being a mechanic can be a fun job because you get to walk around and you’re mobile, and you get to get dirty.
What’s the biggest similarity between being a mechanic and a film curator?
What your customers think really matters. If you’re a bad mechanic, word gets around just like if you don’t program shows that attract people, they won’t come to the museum.
What makes a good show?
When you walk into a museum space and you see to objects of art next to each other and they help you see those objects from a new perspective. They mean more together than apart.
What have been some of your really successful screenings?
Every year we do something called Sonic Celluloid where we have silent experimental film and live musical accompaniment and that’s a really fun event to put on.
Who actually attends screenings at Block?
Mostly people though there are sometimes other forces at work. It’s probably 60 percent people from Northwestern and 40 percent people from Chicago. Depending on the film, we either get a lot of students or very few. I wish more students would come.
So how do you feel about A&O’s films?
I think A&O does a great job. They show a totally different kind of film. I saw Kung Fu Panda. I had fun.
What’s been the worst disaster on your call?
There are so many disasters it’s hard to choose. One summer we had an exhibition of hand crank projectors and we had a demonstration of one of those hand crank projects by the owner of the projector. He was using film from the Library of Congress and the projector ended up picking the film up and all the film ended up on the floor. I had to call up the Library of Congress and apologize.
Who’s the most famous person you’ve ever met?
I saw Robert Redford at the Art Institute of Chicago. I was walking with one of my friends, we were in the big gallery on the second floor with all the impressionist paintings and I look over and say, “Look who that is, it’s Robert Redford.” She says no way and so we retread our steps and not only does she see it’s Robert Redford, she squeals. So suddenly now, everybody realizes it’s Robert Redford.
As we’re leaving the gallery I see my other friend and say to him, “Albert, did you see that? It’s Robert Redford. Go over there and have a peek.”
And he says, “Will…” And then Robert Redford says, “I’m right behind you.”
Do you cook and what’s the best thing you make?
It’s fall so I’ll go with pork chops, candied apples on pork chops over a bed of greens.
Where do you get your news?
I’m addicted to magazines. I subscribe to The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, The Economist, Sports Illustrated, Esquire and I get outside magazines.
What’s the coolest place you’ve been?
One of my favorite places is the Wastach Mountains in Utah. I’ve also visited my brother in Senegal, that was a wonderful trip.
Would you say you’re outdoorsy?
Yeah. It’ll happen to you when you have a job where you talk on the phone a lot.
What do you hate about Northwestern?
The parking’s difficult. There are a lot of things that bother me but hatred, I can’t say. There’s this great book out called The Pleasure of Hating about there being a pleasure in hating but I like to hate on movies a lot more than I like to hate on Northwestern.
What do you hate about in movies then?
I love to hate on pretense. I hate on Jeff Koons a little bit.
What’s you favorite film?
My favorite movie changes all the time but if would you take the average over a long period of time, my favorite film would probably be The Searchers.
You screened Gus Van Sant’s Milk. What makes big films want to screen at Block?
It’s a small theater so it’s somewhere where a director, screenwriter or actor can really interact.
What’s the goal of Block Cinema?
To show films people didn’t know they were missing.