"THE MOVIE THEATER"
In 1936, Michael Schlimazl and Jacob Schlemihl were commissioned by the mayor of New York City to solve the mystery of the Loew’s 175th Street Theatre, a movie palace where, seemingly, strange things happened. Sometimes the projector was blocked suddenly, other times the lights of the room were lit in the middle of the movie, and sometimes the spectators were catapulted by their seats and ended up floating around the room like restless spirits. Michael and Jacob took the opportunity to go to the screening of a brand new film: “Dracula's Daughter”. That day nothing unusual happened except for some isolated incidents, such as the fact that a man lost his toupee during the screening and the next day appeared at the Bronx Zoo crowning the head of a chimpanzee. Or the fact that another spectator spent all his time gargling so loudly that he prevented the correct listening of the dialogues. So much so that when Michael and Jacob left the theater and commented the movie, they found that each one had a different version of the plot: Michael thought it was a western and Jacob was convinced that it was a musical comedy, even though it was completely lacking in horses and cowboys as well as musical performances of any kind.
The next day, Michael and Jacob returned to the cinema to watch the same movie. But although this time there was no disparity of criteria regarding the type of film in question (all seemed to indicate that it was a horror movie), the main characters had disappeared. Except at a certain moment when Count Dracula poked his head through a slit in a barrel of beer and went back to hiding immediately, only the secondary characters appeared, and these were muttering "What the fuck is going on? What the fuck is gong on?”. It was as if everybody in the screen was afraid of something or someone. In the main scene, which lasted about three minutes, no one appeared, hence the camera was three minutes focusing on an empty stage. Actually something very strange was happening in this movie palace. Michael and Jacob went to see Mr. Loew, the venue’s owner, who had no idea what was going on. Apparently, the strange phenomena were repeated regardless of the movie being shown, which indicated that the problem resided in the theater and not in the movie about Dracula's daughter. Michael and Jacob searched every corner of the theater thoroughly and found nothing out of the ordinary. However, when they were about to give up, they discovered a trap door that gave access to a large attic filled with junks and outdated cinema machinery. And among all those useless objects, they found a lectern on which there was a worn notebook full of hand-drawn graphics and annotations and whose title was "How to gross film viewers out”.
At the precise moment in which they made this surprising discovery, something even more surprising happened. The only clarity that penetrated this attic was the light that went through a round window. In order to read the annotations of the notebook, Michael asked Jacob to take a cloth and get the dirt off the window. Well, while Michael leafed through the mysterious notebook, Jacob exclaimed “A witch!”. Michael jumped and rushed to the window and, through the dirty glass, he saw that, indeed, a woman dressed in black and mounted on a flying broom was approaching them at full speed. And at full speed too, they escaped running from the attic and the theater and did not stop until they reached their appartment and locked the door with a bolt.
The next day, Michael and Jacob returned to the cinema to watch the same movie. But although this time there was no disparity of criteria regarding the type of film in question (all seemed to indicate that it was a horror movie), the main characters had disappeared. Except at a certain moment when Count Dracula poked his head through a slit in a barrel of beer and went back to hiding immediately, only the secondary characters appeared, and these were muttering "What the fuck is going on? What the fuck is gong on?”. It was as if everybody in the screen was afraid of something or someone. In the main scene, which lasted about three minutes, no one appeared, hence the camera was three minutes focusing on an empty stage. Actually something very strange was happening in this movie palace. Michael and Jacob went to see Mr. Loew, the venue’s owner, who had no idea what was going on. Apparently, the strange phenomena were repeated regardless of the movie being shown, which indicated that the problem resided in the theater and not in the movie about Dracula's daughter. Michael and Jacob searched every corner of the theater thoroughly and found nothing out of the ordinary. However, when they were about to give up, they discovered a trap door that gave access to a large attic filled with junks and outdated cinema machinery. And among all those useless objects, they found a lectern on which there was a worn notebook full of hand-drawn graphics and annotations and whose title was "How to gross film viewers out”.
At the precise moment in which they made this surprising discovery, something even more surprising happened. The only clarity that penetrated this attic was the light that went through a round window. In order to read the annotations of the notebook, Michael asked Jacob to take a cloth and get the dirt off the window. Well, while Michael leafed through the mysterious notebook, Jacob exclaimed “A witch!”. Michael jumped and rushed to the window and, through the dirty glass, he saw that, indeed, a woman dressed in black and mounted on a flying broom was approaching them at full speed. And at full speed too, they escaped running from the attic and the theater and did not stop until they reached their appartment and locked the door with a bolt.
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