Welcome to Bicknell. Home of the Bicknell International Film Festival – Better Living Through Bad Cinema

By Bennett Owen

Credit: My-West.com ©

WHAM! BAM! POW! BIFF! Yes, BIFF as in Bicknell International Film Festival, a southern Utah tradition since 1995.

Credit: BIFF

This weekend, Bicknell is in a B-Hive state of mind, embracing bad movies with a capital B. Each year the committee selects three films that best reflect the worst of a genre.  Past themes include:

• UFOria (1996)
• Beach Blanket Bicknell (2002)
• Big Top Bicknell (2006)

And the 10^th anniversary edition, ‘The B-er, the Better.’

This year, the festival jury has chosen superheroes…and the merriment gets underway Friday evening with the 1966 Batman movie, starring Adam West … a movie so camp you could park an RV in it. (My mom ruined the TV series for me by pointing out that he had bony knees!) 

Credit: BIFF

On Saturday, festival-goers will get a matinee look at Captain America! No, not the big budget blockbuster making its nationwide bow this weekend … rather the 1990 version, described as a “ridiculous adaptation.” This screening also features ‘audience participation’…

Credit: BIFF

And Saturday evening the festival comes to a close with a gala performance of Flash Gordon, one of the cheesiest movies ever made, complete with soundtrack by Queen.  (Flash saves the world on a treadmill!)

Credit: Sci-fimovieposters.co

But BIFF is more than just movies. Friday afternoon features the world’s fastest parade, clocking in at 55 miles per hour –

Credit: BIFF

Credit: BIFF

There’s also a Saturday Swap Meet, where people get together to … swap stuff -

And after grand finale, the BIFF “It’s a Wrap Party,” featuring music this year by the Main Street Revelators. 

Credit: BIFF

The festival venue is the 64 year-old Wayne theater, recently restored to its original … hmmm, splendor doesn’t quite seem to fit here. 

The theater holds 306 people. The population of Bicknell is 325. Its owner, Terry Davis, is in charge of BIFF. “Everyone has a superhero in them one way or another,” he observes, and he’s right of course, especially after a trip to your local Italian Deli.

Credit: BIFF

Bicknell, by the way is also the gateway to the fabulous Capitol Reef and Canyonlands National Parks, along with some of the best hiking and biking country in the west. But the film festival is something you have to see to B-lieve.

Bicknell Film Festival, July 22-23 – For more information:  www.thebiff.org

Credit: BIFF

July Fourth – The Seeds of Greatness

By Bennett Owen

Credit: Tattered and Lost Photographs

"When one has tasted watermelon, he knows what the angels eat."

-    Mark Twain         

Credit: Avaxhome

It was a yearly ritual of my youth. When we arrived at the family picnic site, the watermelons were the first thing I looked for, lying side by side, cooling in the frigid, fast running water of Billings Creek.

Herman Bolman and others eating watermelon. Credit: Oregon State University Archives.  

Tahlequah, Oklahoma. Credit: Library of Congress. 

When I was a kid, July 4th served purposes beyond merely celebrating the birth of our great nation. It was also a family reunion...and the first day day of the year in which the angels allowed us mere mortals a taste of heaven...

Montana, 1940s. Credit: My-West.com Berry Collection ©  

Montana, 1960s. Credit: My-West.com Berry Collection ©  

Montana, 1960s. Credit: My-West.com Berry Collection ©   

"Their (Americans') manner of devouring watermelon is extremely unpleasant. The huge fruit is cut into half a dozen sections of about a foot long, and then, dripping as it is with water, applied to the mouth, from either side of which pour copious streams of the fluid, while...a mouthful of the hard black seeds are shot out in all directions."

-    Frances Trollope--  Domestic Manners of the Americans (1832)         

Texas. Credit: Library of Congress    

Credit: Library of Congress

There's not much room for etiquette at a picnic. One of my Uncles would grab a butcher knife and cut big slabs of watermelon, as thick as a cut of beef. The first bite...the texture...the flavor...the seeds!

Jasper County, Iowa. Credit: Library of Congress. 

Everyone had their own way of dealing with them. Mine was simply to ignore and swallow them. My Aunt Ruth told me I'd soon have watermelons growing out of my ears.  I countered that it would more likely be corn. It took her awhile to see the humor in that.

Dead Ox Flat, Malheur County, Oregon. Credit: Library of Congress

This is the same Aunt Ruth who, in search of dishwashers, tried to lure my young uncles out from their hiding place under a bridge with offers of ‘fresh watermelon’. The temptation was so great that spies were sent out to see whether the offer was truly good or not. Alas it wasn’t and Aunt Ruth did the dishes by herself.

And now they even say watermelon is good for you. Well, if it’s good enough for angels…

Sheridan County, Kansas. Credit: Library of Congress.

"Most of my memories of Texas are of mosquitoes, watermelons, crickets and my brother teasing me."

-    Robin Wright Penn

Credit: PANA

Jasper County, Iowa. Credit: Library of Congress.