Downtown Los Angeles Then & Now - Part 2 (2013) Dir: nicolewonders
YouTube user nicolewonder found the 1946 night time footage of Downtown Los Angeles and matched the route with new footage. It makes an interesting look at two eras. The mash-up is in three parts, and the original source is below.
Part 1 [view]
Part 3 [view]
Original 35mm via Internet Archive [view]
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Fatburger in the 80s
Andrew Park poked around and found this video VFaL posted in 2007 and it's close to his heart. If you recall "Broadway in the 80’s," YouTube user Meadowlawn stuck his Zenith camcorder out the window andshot the street on VHS-C tape while being driven northbound. It's now an archive of what shops and stores were around. One place was Fatburger. "It's back in historic downtown!" says Park, who had a sincere excitement about finding this clip. It gives me the chance to trot out this favorite and make it an official Downtown Vid Pic.
As for Fatburger, the Grand Opening Celebration is Wed, May 15, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at 888 S. Figueroa Street. The first 100 visitors get a Fatburger T-shirt and a medium drink with any purchase.
Downtown Los Angeles at Night (1988) Dir: Meadowlawn
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Life Stinks (1991) Directed by Mel Brooks
The late Mark D. Schumaker and I shared notes on obscure downtown film locations. I recalled this scene and brought it up to him. It was no surprise he already knew about it. More so because the doorway is known by anyone who has entered Old Bank DVD.This Downtown Vid Pic is for Mark. His memorial is Saturday.
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Duquesne Whistle (2012) Bob Dylan. Directed by Nash Edgerton.
Downtown's constant revival is a miracle that has been a surprise discovery by someone each month during the last decade. In this video for "Duquesne Whistle," the late Charles Bukowski would almost crack a smile if he saw Bob Dylan make downtown street's mean and filled with ordinary madness again. Is there some kind of wicked subtext to see a potential hipster romance turn out bad? The black skinny jeaned male is harrassed by cops, then kidnapped. It gets darker. But the visual treat is seeing Dylan walking up Broadway like a rolling stone with his posse.
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"One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer."
John Lee Hooker revisited his 1966 cover of the Rudy Toombs penned song "One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer" in this video film at 544 Mateo, near Palmetto. The Downtown Vid Pick was spotted by Arts District local Tim Quinn, who suggests the filming took place around 1999. No matter. The song is a triple shot Arts District anthem to dance away 2012.
The blues master passed away in 2001.
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Saw it at LA Observed. Had to nab it. In Little Tokyo, Brittni Paiva plays "Take Five" on four-string ukulele. Dave Brubeck passed away Wednesday. He would have been 92 today. Previous Brubeck Downtown Vid Pic saw the quartet float over Los Angeles freeways. "Blue Rondo A La Turk"
Website for Brittni Paiva [view]
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I
can’t pass up October 31st without this clip of City Hall getting whacked
by out of town guests from "War Of The Worlds" (1953), the first in a long
line of regional alien invasions. With the film shifting to Los
Angeles in the early 1950s, George Pal had the Orson Welles tale work on
nerves frayed by the Cold War. Looking back, the scenes of streets
emptied of civilization, switching back and forth from a studio to on
location near 8th and Hill, the sci-fi classic is an accidential commentary on downtown being
abandoned in the mid-20th Century, an evacuation during a crisis.
Next year will mark the 60th year since the release of this gem. Grand Park would be a great place for a screening next Halloween.
"War of the Worlds" (1953) trailer
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Chalk art near The Pie Hole in the Arts District is part of a viral campaign.
It's a street art campaign that Jordy Altman, the digital media coordinator for the Weingart Center, hopes will go viral and bring attention to homelessness in Los Angeles, reports the LA Times. "In the arts district, as volunteers curled up on the sidewalk or leaned their backs against brick walls, a young artist drew around them in chalk. He drew a bed around a woman lying on the pavement, and drew a cozily curtained window above the bed." The chalk artist is John Stevens.
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I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me) / Camera Adam Cude
Random human connection is seen in this clip of Count vocalist Gabbi McPhee singing a soft acoustic arrangement of “I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)" to an older man who was watching the shoot.
Gabbi and her band mates were filming a simple video for "Dancing in the Dark" on Spring Street, between 6th and 7th. In the middle of a take she “received a marriage proposal from this gentleman Daryl. So I decided to sing him a song.”
As he sits on a Historic Core bench, Daryl quietly listens.
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