The movie theater actually wasn’t what I expected.  I expected a place named Film Forums to be a theater with only one room, and approximately 15 seats.  Once I entered the theater, however, I already got the vibe of a regular movie theater, except with a more ‘home’ feeling.  The food served wasn’t the typical candy, but more of homemade snacks, and others.

The documentary Strange Powers was really one of the least enjoyable movies I have ever watched.  The most probably reason is because I had never heard of this band, and the documentary really didn’t have any drama and action, which is what I look for in movies.  Stephin Merritt did have a very odd sense of humor, but it was funny at many times, and thus made this movie somewhat copable.  I did learn about this band though, and the history, and how even though they aren’t that well known, there are some die hard fans out there.  I guess this is true for most bands; there will be one small group that loves their type of music.  How else would they be able to survive financially?

The music produced by Magnetic Fields can be described in one word: Different.  Contrary to other bands that play music with definition, I felt that the songs constructed by Magnetic Fields really was random. Though most bands have a particular theme, I just could not figure out Magnetic Fields’ theme.  In my opinion, they was no reasoning behind the songs they produce.

The best part of the day was visiting where the films were stored, and played.  Though the area was small, the design of the system was very intricate, and the explanation of each portion of the film was very interesting.  It took alot of machinery to operate one film, and I didn’t know it took that much so it opened my eyes and helped me appreciate films.  I was glad that I was able to see the inside, because it actually made the whole experience somewhat enjoyable.

When first passing by Laurie Andersons’ O Superman, I was initially attracted to it because it was the only video in the room. I thought that I was watching a music video at first, but after a few seconds I was not sure what I was seeing. I am still not so sure. The video is half sung and half spoken. Most of the video is simply the word “HA” repeated many times in order to create the background tune for just about the entire length of the video. The tone is very soothing and the vocals seem to have an electronic sound, created by some sort of machine. The visuals of the video, like the vocals are very simple, yet captivating. The first word that came to mind when viewing this video was “trippy.” I am not sure what message this video is trying to convey and to be honest; I am not totally convinced that Laurie Anderson knows what message she is trying to convey. It remains very open to interpretation.