Archive for March 19, 2009

Friday Night In Mountainair

by John Weckerle

Checking in on our friends at Mountainair Announcements, we find that there are some interesting events in Mountainair tomorrow night.  Dr. Joseph Sanchez of UNM’s  Spanish Colonial Research Center and Superintendent of Petroglyph National Monument will give a lecture on “The Mystery of the Lady in Blue: Maria de Agreda and the Jumanos in 17th c. New Mexico” beginning at 7 p.m. at the Shaffer Hotel Conference Room.  Arts enthusiasts will enjoy an opening at Mountainar Clayworks  from 5-9 p.m., featuring “coiled pottery, architectural constructions, clay masks and other objects of art” created by the gallery’s students and studio artists.  For more information, see the full announcement at Mountainair Announcements.

An Idea Whose Time Has Come – Here

by John Weckerle

Back in the 1980s, during a 5-year soujourn in Tampa, Florida, I enjoyed a great way to do dinner and a movie – cinema pubs.  The idea was simple – the cinema pubs showed movies that had just completed their runs in the major theaters but were still showing in the discount theaters and at midnight shows, but they also offered dinner as well as beer and wine.  Patrons sat at tables, and were served throughout the movie by waitstaff who seemed incredibly adept at minimizing their time between the patron and the screen.  Both the movie and the food were reasonably priced, and well-suited to those of us who were students and/or in their first job out of school, and it was a nice experience.  Depending on the film, I sometimes waited for movies to hit the cinema pubs because it was simply a better place to see them.  And now, you can see them that way, too.

Following the recent success of movie showings at Mustang Mudd’s, in the former Le Barn building, entrepreneurs Maria Braendle of Le Barn and Miki Anaya of El Comedor Restaurant have teamed up to bring the experience to Moriarty.  This weekend’s feature, Twilight (your editor, who has read the books and seen the movie, recommends it to fans of the Stephanie Myers series of vampire novels)  will be the opening event (for details, see the flyer).  Next week’s offerings, with shows from Wednesday to Sunday (with weekend matinees!), include Gran Torino, starring Clint Eastwood; Taken, starring Clint Eastwood; Bolt (voice of John Travolta); The Wrestler, starring Mickey Rourke; and Defiance, starring Daniel Craig (see next week’s flyer for show times and other info). For more information, call LeBarn at 832-9481 or El Comedor at 832-4492.