Friday December 5th, the cool people at Nuarte are blessing the citizens of L.A. with another great cinematic experience. Purple Rain in 35mm. One of the most visual films of its era, Purple Rain marked the beginning of a full scale artistic revolution that would change America forever. Everyone knows Purple Rain, but often we don't reflect on what it truly is about the movie (and album) that makes it so impactful. The eccentric Prince was an extension of the great androgyny of rock heroes such as Little Richard, Brian Eno, Marc Bolan, and David Bowie to name a few. He blended elements of traditional black American soul music with garage rock of the 60's, and the then current post punk of the late 70's and early 80's. Purple Rain peeks into the Paisley scene of 1980's Minneapolis, a city often not recognized for its cultural impact on music, fashion, and perception of race and sexuality. Rick James recognized this in Prince from an early point in his career and thusly brought him along on tour. Prince would usurp Rick in such a fashion that he would never fully rebound.
A fun fact regarding Purple Rain the film is that Warner Bros. originally planned a feature to star Rick James as a musician/motorcycle hero, a concept he had been working on for years. The success of Prince, and the effect he had on music by crossing genres and thusly creating new sub genres of people, fashion, and clubbing was so strong that Warner Bros. decided to pass on Rick's idea, and float it over to Mr. Nelson forever creating a tension that would rarely be understood by outsiders. See this movie from a different perspective, see it in 35mm as if its in fact 1984...
