My favorite video featured a virtuosic, non-stop performance by local filmmaker/actor Rock Ross impersonating a politician or CEO delivering a speech stringing together absolutely empty catch phrases and promises; it was all rhetoric, completely devoid of content. Brilliant! It's another classic that will never be outdated. Transcendental pianist Jimi Ali (you guessed it; his stage name derives from Hendrix and Muhammad) closed the evening with a brief but deafening Fats Waller piano recital on the roof--which seemed strangely anarchic, given the loud volume and close proximity of neighbors!

The other films, too numerous to list, left us with memories of a prolonged car crash, slaughtered deer in the snow, a nude in a bathtub, aerial warfare, and the San Francisco Art Institute in the fifties as a Village of the Damned. There was also a showing of Marian Wallace's Sally Mann-invoking "Music To Strip By," featuring the music of Mal Sharpe's Big Money In Jazz Band. George Kuchar's homage to The Pioneers who won the West (officially titled "The Oneers") brought a masterfully satirical close to what felt like a very special evening. There's nothing quite like watching films outdoors, except making love outdoors, of course. With the big sky overhead and the fog wafting in, movies take on an especially magical dimension. Yes, we remain prisoners of the two eyes inside our skulls, restlessly endeavoring to take in everything that surrounds us, yet forever constrained to viewing just what is directly in front of us. Next time, however, we'll bring our warm fuzzy fake-fur coats . . .