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Doc Films
Rating Details »
Neighborhood: Hyde Park
1212 E 59th St
Ida Noyes Hall
Chicago, IL 60637
(773) 702-8574
1212 E 59th St
Ida Noyes Hall
Chicago, IL 60637
(773) 702-8574
- Good for Kids:
- No
12 reviews for Doc Films
Correction: this is second best thing in Hyde Park (after the Seminary Co-op, natch.)
This year's calendar has really upped the ante: New Taiwanese Cinema? Check. Stan Brakhage Mondays? Check.
Best thing in Hyde Park. Cheap (for students), great movies, well thought out themes, special speakers, etc. I wish I'd spent more time here / involved with this operation as an undergrad. Now I cheer it from afar.
...have to dock a star for the remembrance of quite a few technical problems. But they're students, it's cheap, what can you really expect?
Doc is a great place to see movies. When I was in High School we would get passes and go to Doc every weekend, sometimes both Fri and Sat night.
However, they do have a lot of problems when showing the movies. I think there were small glitches about 50% of the time, once they switched to a different movie in the middle, and once there was a huge glitch that couldn't be fixed so I only got to see half of the movie.
There's something about watching a good film with a bunch of smarty pants U of C students that is kind of envigorating. Now I know why Ponce DeLeon was so darn persistent.
Unfortunately, this particular night....the entire building felt like a russian bath house mit towels and old naked fat guys. That aside, what I love best about Doc Films, is that they provide you with a venue to watch 35mm prints of films that you might have only seen in the privacy of your own living room.
This might not mean a lot to you, personallly....but part of the movie going experience for me is audience reaction. Eh, I guess I'm a people person.
Keep an eye out for their schedule, it's worth the drive for us northsiders...and parking has been cake everytime!
I have fond memories of attending Doc weekly for entire quarters for particularly spectacular themes (Hitchcock, zombies, Bollywood) and always hope the new quarter's calendar will be full of gems, but have disappointed for the past two years or so. With that being said, can't beat recently released movies for $5 on the weekends and the themed weeknights are sure to make many people happy.
Plenty of technical problems, late starts, and general annoyances, but again, $5 (or cheaper with a quarter pass!). I love to hate it.
Presenting one of the most diverse selections of film in the city, U of C Doc Films is sure to satisfy just about everyone with something on their calender. Presenting at least 1 different film every night of the week (they close up for spring and winter breaks) in different themed series, there's always going to be something interesting playing there. Doc is also the only large venue which regularly plays avant garde/experimental cinema.
Tickets are a bargain at $5 and projection is almost always perfect. Guest speakers and filmmakers are sometimes present to introduce movies and answer questions.
Although rather inconvenient to get to unless you live in or near Hyde Park, no matter where you are, Doc is worth the trip.
I had to do an assignment for a film class where we had to write about my experience going to see a film with other classmates, and it had to be foreign film. Not that I have anything against foreign films. I typically enjoy a good foreign film Anyway, Doc's was screening Ousmane Sembene's Guelwaar. Since I had seen another film of his (Mandabi) in another film class, I decided to go for it.
The theater is small and quaint. It's a movie theater pre- AMC colonialism, which I like. If you're up for catching a film that is not your typical HBO/Showtime re-run, it's a relatively good spot. A lot of old people were there. You'll just eat this place up if you're 65 and over. I would at least. However, if it weren't for that assignment, I wouldn't have gone out of my way to go there. I would rather just find the film on netflix. I was a little mad that they ripped my raffle ticket, because I needed it as proof that I actually did go see a movie at a movie thtr. Oh and no food or drink is allowed in the thtr. I'm sorry, but I'm just a popcorn and film kind of girl. I still ate skittles anyway. :P
Do the projectors occasionally break? yep but The Doc makes up for this with many other charms.
First off, movies are still only 5 dollars and if that's too expensive for you it's usually possible to sneak in for free five minutes after the show starts. Second, on weekend nights The Doc shows older movies. Yes sometimes they're too weird for words but I've seen some great classic movies here.
Third, The Doc is a great atmosphere to see movies in. This is because the crowd is made up of University of Chicago students whose sense of humor is often different and who have no problem laughing at bad dialogue and openly mocking bad movies.
Neat people who really enjoy watching movies. To celebrate Halloween 2006 they showed John Carpenter's classic "Halloween" at midnight and gave away free tickets to anyone who showed up in costume.
You can see photos and words from the event here:
http://www.methodsrepo...
Six-foot Lobsters, Rainbow Brite, Mulder and Scully, even Shaun of the Dead turned up...
-A screening calendar that's updated quarterly.
-Series cover the full spectrum of genres, directors, actors, eras, etc.
-Really, really cheap movie tickets.
OK, so sometimes the projectionists may mix up the reels. Or they'll load them in reverse so that the soundtrack is visible on the screen (when was the last time you SAW a soundtrack?). If you're lucky, the actor's feet might be on top of their heads, too.
Yeah, it sounds like a fly by night operation, but it's none of that. DOC Films has been around longer than my grandma. The students at the University run the whole show from ticketing to programming to projection ( Hey, I was an apprentice projectionist at Doc back in the day!). Give 'em a break if the focus is off, someone's probably catching up on their readings in the booth.
On top of that, you occasionally get to watch movies with directors and film critics in the audience who'll take questions after the show.
Doc Films is a student-run venture which screens movies at the Max Pavlevsky Cinema in Ida Noyes Hall on the U of Chicago campus. Their film program schedules coincide with the U of C academic quarters - on weekdays their programming tends toward art, obscure, foreign, and/or classic selections, while weekend shows are generally recent releases and/or mainstream crowd-pleasers. The Pavlevsky theater is surprisingly comfortable for an academic facility, though food & drink are prohibited & a trip to the bathroom will involve a long, daunting trek to another area of Noyes hall. At $5 admission per person, Doc is a great, inexpensive movie option in an area which is seriously underserved in terms of film screenings.
This is a little-known cinema in Hyde Park, part of the University of Chicago's Film Studies department -- and an excellent theater to see classic, artistic or independent films. They tend to have few screenings a week, so combined with the remote location, you really have to plan to catch a film here. Their weekly schedule is listed in the "Showtimes" section of the Chicago Reader's Movies page: http://onfilm.chicagor... . It's worth it to get down there at least once though -- I saw "The Saddest Music in the World" here a couple years ago, after which the film's director Guy Maddin (by invitation of the University) held a Q & A session. A very cool university-subsidized viewing experience overall.
