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Zipper Doc at Film Fest in Wichita, Home of the Zipper

Posted in film, tagged Amy Nicholson, documentary, film festival, Nighthawk Cinema, Tallgrass Film Festival, Wichita, Zipper on October 18, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Cinematographer Mark Schwartzbard filming at Chance Factory in Wichita, Kansas in 2011. Photo via Zipper Facebbok

It’s beyond cool that Amy Nicholson’s documentary “Zipper: Coney Island’s Last Wild Ride” is traveling this weekend to a film festival in Wichita, Kansas, the home of the Zipper. Part of the film was shot at Chance Rides factory in Wichita, where the classic ride was invented in 1968 and the company’s elderly founder Harold Chance and his son Dick Chance were interviewed. Coney Island’s Zipper was number 34 of the 224 that were built.

The film will be screened at the Tallgrass Film Festival at 1:30pm on Friday, October 18, and at 2:30 pm on Saturday, October 19.

From ATZ’s review of the film when it premiered last year: “A small-time ride operator and his beloved carnival contraption become casualties in the battle over the future of Coney Island” is the film’s capsule description. Eddie Miranda, who worked on Coney Island’s rides since he was a boy, owned and operated the Zipper and Spider for a decade. In the doc, Eddie’s Zipper represents all of the mom-and-pops who were displaced by the real estate speculation that was set off by the Bloomberg administration’s plan to rezone Coney Island.”

Zipper has an upcoming screening at Nitehawk Cinema in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on Wednesday, October 30th, 9:30pm and is also available on itunes.

Video of the Day: The Down Home Daredevils

Posted in film, sideshow, video, tagged family, Jill Fleet, Lucky Daredevil Thrillshow, sideshow, Thrill Kill Jill, Tyler Fleet, Tyler Fyre on October 6, 2013| Leave a Comment »

“You want to go to the circus? Good news, you live in the circus!” says Tyler Fleet aka Tyler Fyre at the beginning of this sweet documentary short “The Down Home Daredevils.” Tyler and his wife Jill, whose stage name is Thrill Kill Jill, are the doting parents of two adorable little boys–Hank Lightning and Duke Dynamite. They’re also sword swallowers and fire eaters, and in Jill’s case a snake charmer, with the Lucky Daredevil Thrill Show.

The film by Corcoran College of Art new media photojournalism students Ben Dorger, Jenny Harnish and Emma Scott follows the family from their home in West Virginia to the Hell City Tattoo Convention in Columbus, Ohio. Hank, who is a toddler, joins dad onstage to do a make-believe straitjacket escape and Duke gets his first taste of applause as a babe in mom’s arms. “What the kids do in the show is up to the kids,” says Jill. “We’ll nurture them right into the show. It’s the family business.”

The film premiered at this year’s Coney Island Film Festival and was among “ATZ’s Top 10 Coney Island Film Festival Picks.”

Video of the Day: Coney Island Carnival (1945)

Posted in Amusement ride, film, video, tagged 1940s, Coney Island, Games, newsreel, rides on September 22, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Before television, newsreels like this one filmed in Coney Island circa 1945 were shown in movie theaters. The film starts with the Wonder Wheel (described by the narrator as “a mass of iron lace”) and ends with the Parachute Jump (“the highest in the whole United States”) and the Cyclone (“mountain climbing on wheels”). Among the long-vanished rides that appear are the Virginia Reel, Looper, Whip, Octopus, Caterpillar, Rocket Ships, a carousel with a ring machine and the original Steeplechase horse race.