Gaslight Square: The Legend Lives On. (Not Rated) A beatnik hangout in the 1950s and a legendary, anything-goes entertainment district by the 1960s, St. Louis' Gaslight Square served as the career launching pad for hometown stars Phyllis Diller, Dick Gregory, and Ike and Tina Turner; it also showcased the talents of Lenny Bruce, Woody Allen, the Smothers Brothers and Barbra Streisand during their salad days on tour. The rise-and-fall story of Gaslight Square is told here in a somewhat plodding style, with lots of elderly talking heads who once lived the scene but, sadly, little archival film footage from the days of the scene itself. Still, there are lots of first-person anecdotes to enjoy here, especially from Diller and Gregory. Years after its literal halcyon days -- when 100 gas-powered streetlamps lit the way for some three dozen restaurants, cafés and nightclubs (with names like The Dark Side, The Gilded Cage, The Crystal Palace and Pepe's-a-Go-Go) -- Gaslight Square is now just another new housing development. It's an evolution the filmmakers trumpet and applaud without question, rendering the film's ending more of an infomercial than a critical look at one of St. Louis' most cherished bygone eras. Screens at 7 p.m. Wednesday, July 20, with the short film "The Turtle Park Story." (Rose Martelli) Tivoli
HairKutt. (Not Rated) Bryant Johnson -- a.k.a. HairKutt, a heroin user for seventeen years and a barber for not quite as long -- doesn't speak much through the first half of this namesake documentary. In 2002, three of Johnson's childhood friends chose to stage (and videotape) an intervention to help the 33-year-old beat his smack habit, driving him ten hours from St. Louis to a rented cabin in rural Tennessee where they kept him for one week (rigging his bed with restraints and laying plastic sheets on the floor to prevent shit and vomit stains on the carpet). Displaying an easygoing, silent smile while taking his last pre-trip hit, Johnson's expression morphs into a pissed-off scowl by the time his quarantine at the cabin begins, which finally turns into a face screwed up and twisted with sickness and pain as he goes through withdrawal. Intercut with interviews of Johnson's friends and footage chronicling St. Louis' own riches-to-rags fall from grace during the latter half of the twentieth century, HairKutt is as tense and harrowing as any horror flick. Screens at 6 p.m. Thursday, July 21, with the short film "Secret." (Martelli) Tivoli
Kid Stuff. (Not Rated) These twelve short works by or about children give young filmmakers a chance to shine in nicely paced, information-packed presentations. Gateway Elementary School's third-grade computer club uses "Manners" to remind friends of polite behavior, and eighth graders at Carr-Lane Middle School celebrate a "2005 Black History Program" featuring musician Moacyr Marchini and artist Robert Ketchens. Equally up to the challenge of seamlessly interweaving archival photographs, interviews, myriad details and effective music, the St. Margaret of Scotland students highlight (in separate videos) Jackie Robinson, the Underground Railroad, SARS, Bob Dylan, the Pony Express, Korean War veteran Paul Fehrmann and the 1904 World's Fair Birdcage. These four- to nine-minute-long pieces are packed with thorough research. Three additional works dramatize childish play to add amusing diversions, but the promise of young filmmakers as illustrated by their own creations bodes well for many showcases to come. Screens at 5 p.m. Wednesday, July 20. (Carson) Tivoli
