Oriental Theatre 90th Birthday Celebration
On a warm summer evening in 1927, Milwaukee’s grandest movie palace, the Oriental, opened for the first time. Advertising at the time boasted of its size (2,500 seats), its cost (a staggering $1,500,000) and—vital in the sweltering hot months before the advent of air conditioning—a $175,000 ventilating system. To mark the anniversary, the Oriental is throwing a birthday party with cake (courtesy of Eat Cake!) and magic (courtesy of Dead Man’s Carnival’s Glen Gerard). There will be a raffle and a screening of the most beloved film from Hollywood’s golden years, Casablanca.
The party takes place on Sunday, June 25 beginning at 6 p.m. Casablanca screens at 7:15 p.m.
Transformers: The Last Knight PG-13
The fifth Transformers film came in at $280 million. Outrageous? Yes...or perhaps not, since each film generates $900 million globally (China’s tickets sales alone are forecast at $400 million). A legion of writers pitched ideas to Michael Bay for the final chapter he plans to direct. He considered both King Arthur’s Camelot and Word War II, deciding to shoehorn both ideas into one picture. If the combination sounds jumbled, perhaps you aren’t its intended audience. Besides, there’s always next year’s spin-off about young Autobot scout Bumblebee—a yellow-and-black 2016 Chevrolet Camaro. Entertaining Transformer fans until the next proper Transformer movie—it’s one way to get more honey for the money.
