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Every year I get freaked out because I am afraid I won't get there in time to reserve the spot me and my friends have been sitting in for the last 10 B-Fests! But, of course, I get there and everything is fine. I don't know why I get so worried.

Click on photo if you want to see a larger version of it (this will spawn an new window and will take some time due to the high-quality of the photos.)
5:00 PM: First Photo, My girlfriend Susan. Right after we staked out our usual seat section; front right. Before we got here, Susan and I stopped off at El Famous Burrito and also loaded up on snacks at Jewel. 5:15 PM: These guys were getting into the swing of things by playing what appeared to be a Magic-type card game with superheroes.
5:15 PM: Believe it or not, Susan was as excited about B-Fest as I was. Why? I might never know. 5:35 PM: Dino Ross (pictured) arrived with his older brother Mike and claimed he was going to stay awake and not move from his seat for 24 straight hours. I'd like to see that.
5:35 PM Mike Powers chats on the phone, Mike Ross poses for the camera, Susan gets a healthy snack ready and Whitney is blinded by the flash. 5:40 PM: A few people behind us get comfy with their air mattress. That is a fine idea. Maybe next year...
Reform School Girl 6:00PM: The 1957 movie about a innocent girl who ends up in reform school and has to fend for herself amidst tough girls and strict authority figures. TAGLINES: Caged boy-hungry wildcats gone mad! A white hot story of a good girl in a bad world! The Honorable Brendan Gardiner makes his appearance. Like everyone else, he can't believe that Edward Bernds wrote and directed Reform School Girl--the same Edward Bernds who wrote and directed so many great Three Stooges shorts.
Susan is wrapped up in Reform School Girls-- just like her heroine (picured right.) Susan and Brendan did a fine job on stage acting out the touching scene between the girl (who has her head bandaged due to a baseball bat injury) and the compassionate doctor.
7:20 PM: Greaser's Palace
Greaser's Palace is, I guess, a parable based on the life of Christ. The guy who played Doctor Freeman on M.A.S.H. is Christ in a zoot suit and there's a visit from Herve Villinchaize who played Tattoo on Fantasy Island. It's also a western. The woman above is about to see her husband and son killed and recieve multiple arrows in her leg.
 Yeah, I didn't get it either...as it turns out it was directed by Robert Downey and his son Robert Downey Jr. played the little kid who gets killed. The woman also has to bury her husband and son for some reason. Pictured above is Jesus.
8:50 PM: Blood of Dracula
This one (which at times I got mixed up with Reform School Girls) features a girl hypnotised into being a vampire.		 9:30 PM: James Kriegsmann (who looks more like Christ than the guy from Greaser's Palace) wonders how the filmmakes could name a movie "Blood of Dracula" when there obviously was little of either. Or maybe he's been hypnotised.
10:00 PM: Change in plans, expecting Solarbabies...we got Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold. Wow, that was a winner! Ms. Jones kicked ass and had no less than 7 costume changes throughout the movie.Tagline: 6ft. 2in. of dynamite explodes into action. Lindsay Harrington (blinded from the flash) and Mike Powers soak in the amazing dirtbike/kung fu/gunfight-at-the-casino finale of Nu jin gang dou kuang long nu (Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold's Cantonese title.)
Double down, Cleopatra! Double down! 12:10 Mike Brumm, getting ready for the Wizard of Speed and Time.
Once again, a new B-Fest classic is What Is Communism? This propoganda film made during the height of the red scare of the '50s. This guy on stage perpared cards for each of the WORDS (in this case SHREWD) that descibe "commies." Some one in the audience passed out little American flags for this short film that teach us that communists are DIRTY, GODLESS, UNDERHANDED, and members of an INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL CONSPIRACY!
USA! USA! USA!
12:20 PM: Plan 9 From Outer Space
This is the Big One. A huge cheer erupts from the crowd when Ed Wood's fever dream specticle of a sci-fi movie first flashes on the screen. Many here JUST for this movie... in fact this year it seems like more people are here than ever! 		B-Fest tradition is that everyone tosses paper plates during the scenes in Plan 9 featuring flying saucers.
More plates. The place gets filled with them. People write messages on them and it seems to me like every year people bring 15% more plates. After Bela Lugosi died during the filming of Plan 9, Ed Wood replaced him with a chiropractor a foot taller than Lugosi who covered his face with a cape. Pictured above is my roomate Brendan and I doing our annual tradtion of portraying the tall guy with Brendan is sitting on my shoulders and was covering his with a comforter. Since Brendan is about 6'5," we appeared to be collectively about 9 feet tall.
And here is the tea station--designed to keep throats from getting too sore during all of the wise-crack shouting that goes on through out B-Fest. Yelling at the screen for 24 hours can take its toll on your vocal chords. But, keeping a kettle with hot water running will help soothe the throat. Use non-caffinated (Celestial Seasonings Lemon Zinger is my fave) tea so you don't get dehydrated and add honey (which coats nicely) and you'll be back hurling insults with verve. Here Susan an I reenact the classic scene where Tor Johnson (the 300-lb Swedish pro wrestler) carries the heroine to the aliens (while they look on from their space ship.)
Mike Brumm claims he gets 20 hours of sleep during B-Fest. Here he is backing that claim up.

 Jason Baird, Justin Sheehy, Mike Powers and Mike Ross discuss the the Wizard of Speed and Time during a break.
Shhhh! John Adair is trying to sleep and his buddy Peter is trying to put plates on his stomach. Shhh... 1:40PM: Falling dangerous behind in the Monster race, The British attempt to catch up with Gorgo, who looks strikingly like Godzilla. Shop and compare! Tagline: Like nothing you've ever seen before!
3:00 AM: This is when I started sleeping on and off: I have already seen Gavotte (strange short film about two midgets who fight over a book or something), Invasion of the Bee Girls. I, fortunately, missed most of the Dirty Shorts: "Sweet Smoke and Buried Treasure." Grrrughhhh!

 3:10 War of the Colossal Beast
A sequel to the fabulous Amazing Colossal Man, this time he's mutated and insane. A series of food truck robberies tips the government off to the idea that maybe the 60 foot tall Colossal Man is not dead after all. The Army finds him, drug him, and he escapes. Mayhem ensues. (Tagline: The towering terror from hell!)
6:00 AM Solarbabies. Hmm... well, I guess it's "Futuristic" eighties movie that has a group of kids who like to rollerskate trying to get free of their fortress-like prison with the help of "Bohdi'' (sort of a Diet "Force") I tried to sleep though it. (The IMDB has a entertaining trailer of Solarbabies on their site.)

 7:45 am: The cold opening features the dad yelling at a young Greg Brady in Wild in the Streets. Of course this will set the tone for the rest of the movie. Greg will grow up, get mad, and start a rock band that will, literally, take over the country.
A rock band takes over the United States in Wild in the Streets. This is a winner. The lead singer gets himself elected President (after lowering the voting age to 14) and sets up concentration camps for everyone over 30.

 Yes, Shelly Winters is in this movie. You should see it sometime. It really is a trip. Richard Pryor is in it too. And Hal Holbrook.
One real was in backwards and upside down so we saw maybe a quarter of the Streets that way. strange Very.

 This might be the Undertaker and His Pals but I don't know for sure. I was very tired.
My sister Jen decided to join us this year and she gave a thumbs up (not to any of the movies, of course, just to the fest in general.)

 Brumm awakening for some reason or another. Probably looking for more snacks.
1:15PM: In Mystery of the Leaping Fish, Mr. Coke Ennyday enjoys a toot of his favorite narcotic. This short film with Douglas Fairbanks Jr. started off great...hilarious, sharp, and broad. But then the film broke. Just like B-Fest...if any films starts to be entertaining or thoughtful; then it must be destroyed.

 1:40 PM: This years anti-Marijauana movie was The Assassin of Youth. With the usual refer parties and dealers ruining their lives and the usual skinny dipping scene. But this time, an investigative reporter poses as a soda jerk to get to the bottom of the story and and old woman rides a motor scooter. Fairly enjoyable...
I decided to watch some of Assassin of Youth with my MP3 player as soundtrack. The slide whistle produces it's own soundtrack as well. It was fun (Bjork's "It's So Quiet" goes well with old movies)

 3:30: This guy is enjoying Dracula Has Risen From The Grave...another Hammer film (which is turning into a B-Fest Tradition.
4:35 Here we are ready for Mothra. The last movie at B-Fest no point in leaving any gas in the tank now! LETS GO! Here are some reporters hot on the trail of Mothra.
Okay, the reason I took so many pictures of this scene was because I wanted to help simulate a press conference with my flash on my camera. Clever. Garbage.
Susan's teddy bear Robert is trying to get into the picture. More flash bulb gags. Very clever.
Brendan is playing one of those little whistle sound makers. Only 39 cents! Brendan also put a garbage lid on his head that looked suprisingly like the helmets picutured above. These guys are checking out the radioactive island where they find two women only a foot tall.
More helmets. Robert is providing scale for the tiny twin fairies who's singing contains a telepathic page for help to Mothra; the gigantic moth worshiped as a goddess by the island people.
Mike Ross was ready to go at a moments notice with any wig-related gags. Here he worships Mothra along with the other island people. That's me dragging the larval stage of Mothra (Brendan under a blanket and on top of a dolly.)
The film frame became out of whack so everyone got up on stage to help pull it back into place. Thank God it worked! The guy on the left is trying to stop Godzilla.
Here Mothra, weaves a web of silk in order to make her cocoon ready to enter the pupal stage. Here is a graphic demonstration of the scene where the Japanese army (Brendan) was shooting energy rays (Christmas lights) that the cocoon (pillow.) Please use your imagination.
Finally Mothra! Whose wings would destroy all of Tokyo. The End.
Here's the gang... a little blurry after the fest but no worse for wear. Too bad I didn't take this photo...it would've been a good one.
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