No, it’s not the Village People camp classic, but rather a popular 1941 wartime farce starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello (pictured) in the team’s third film as nitwit swabbies on the loose. Comedy abounds, as well as punchy numbers from The Andrews Sisters, in the next screening from the Syracuse Cinephile Society, to be held Monday, Nov. 9, 7:30 p.m., at the Spaghetti Warehouse, 680 N. Clinton St. Food is available from the venue’s tasty menu. Admission is $3. For details, call 475-1807.

The inaugural International Film and Digital Equipment Expo sounds like an indigestible mouthful that might be met with shrugs by the locals when it occurs next week in Syracuse. Yet respected industry figures from around the globe will be winging their way to the Salt City to showcase their innovative wares, along with a host of vendors from, among others, Kodak, Nikon, Sony, Arri and Silicon Imaging. The expo, an offshoot of the Syracuse International Film Festival, is a big deal that’s happening in our own back yard. 

Film projectors light up the screens for several autumn slates

As daylight inevitably ebbs amid our autumnal evening skies, with fair-weather ducks bidding noisy farewells as they take it on the lam, the urge to hibernate within our cozy homes deepens. So get off your duffs and go out to see an old movie, for cryin’ out loud!

Rome’s seventh annual Capitolfest offers vintage cinema treasures

For one summer weekend every year since 2003, Rome’s Capitol Theatre, 220 W. Dominick St., has been the vacation destination for die-hard movie buffs anxious to enjoy the hard-to-see flicks at Capitolfest. This year’s seventh incarnation has cast an even wider net of travelers, according to Capitol executive director Art Pierce. Folks from California, Virginia, Ohio, Missouri, Minnesota, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and parts of Canada will be seated near Central New Yorkers as a slew of 35mm prints will unspool on Saturday, Aug. 8, and Sunday, Aug. 9, at the 1928-era movie palace.

Holy Bat Signal! The Syracuse Nationals celebrates its 10th year with this weekend’s appearance of one of the most iconic chassis of the 1960s. The Batmobile, or rather a replica of the 1955 Lincoln Futura concept car, which underwent an extensive retooling by legendary car customizer George Barris to be used for the equally legendary ABC-TV series Batman (1966 to 1968), will be large and in charge at the State Fairgrounds.

The Pink Panther 2. (MGM/Columbia; 92 minutes; PG; 2009). Steve Martin again tries to recapture the magic of the late Peter Sellers’ bumbling gendarme, Inspector Jacques Clouseau, the comedic centerpiece of director Blake Edwards’ slapstick series during the 1960s and 1970s.

Finger Lakes Drive-In notches 62 summers as Auburn’s remaining outdoor theater

This weekend’s Shaun Luu Horror Fest offers gore galore for a good cause

Terror-flick fan and Word As a Virus hardcore singer Shaun Luu passed away from brain cancer in June 2005 at age 22, which was reason enough for Luu’s buddy, Jeff Meyer, to inaugurate a film festival in his memory. Becoming more grandiose with each successive year, the fifth annual Shaun Luu Horror Fest is the biggest one to date, with a weekend that encompasses eight movies and performances by a dozen rock bands. It’s all for a good cause, too: Proceeds will benefit the Golisano Children’s Hospital at University Hospital, 750 E. Adams St.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop. (Columbia; 90 minutes; PG; 2009). Sitcom pro Kevin James is probably the last person you’d expect to headline the year’s most inexplicable box-office hit thus far; budgeted at about $26 million, the January release had sufficient box-office legs to amass a jaw-dropping $146 million. This who-da-thunk-it frantic farce makes its DVD debut this week from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, yet it’s still getting theatrical playdates, including its co-feature billing this weekend at Minetto’s Midway Drive-In.

Original appearance: 10-30-96

Big Night’s Italian restaurateurs provide a tasty treat for audiences

By Bill DeLapp