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Looking Back

January 1982

Step back in time to see what area movie theaters were presenting in January 1982. Film titles are linked to the Internet Movie Database.

For more information about these theaters, see Cinema Treasures or Water Winter Wonderland.

The Michigan Theatre celebrated its 54th anniversary with tributes to the past, present and future. On Friday, Jan. 8, afternoon entertainment included the movie Love Me Tonight (1932), a newsreel from 1932, and a Rupert Otto organ concert. "Friday Night at the Movies" featured Broken Lullaby and Chandu the Magician (both 1932).

Also on Friday evening, a national preservation plaque for the Michigan was unveiled, with a speech by William Murtaugh of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. On Saturday, Jan. 9, "Ann Arbor's own" Judith Dow sang Broadway and patriotic music with the Ann Arbor Chamber Orchestra. On Sunday, Jan. 10, Michigan visitors looked to the future with electronic music from organist John Lauter, locally produced films, and a movie on "Ann Arbor and the Space Age".

The new Detroit Film Theatre season opened on Jan. 15-17 with Cutter's Way (1981), part of the theater's Festival of New Masterworks. On Jan. 22-24, DFT fans took a break from Super Bowl XVI excitement in Pontiac to see Louis Malle's My Dinner with Andre. The afternoon film program of the Detroit Institute of Arts saluted Ernst Lubitsch with Lady Windermere's Fan (1925), Monte Carlo (1930), and Design for Living (1933).

On Jan. 29-31 at the DFT, Andrzej Wajda's Man of Iron (1981) showed the rise of the Solidarity labor movement in Poland, but ironically appeared one month after martial law was declared in Poland. "Maybe viewers who saw the film earlier last year saw the jubilant workers and rejoiced with them," wrote Detroit Free Press Editorial Writer Jeanne Moore on Jan. 29, 1982. "But there's no way you can see it now, in light of last month's repression, without hearing the government's message: we don't share power."

Man of Iron was a sequel to Man of Marble (1977), which opened at the Maple Theatre on Jan. 15. Part of the proceeds from Man of Marble went to the Polish American Congress for food and medical supplies for Poland, according to the Jan. 8, 1982 Detroit Free Press. Man of Marble kicked off "the Maple's drive to establish itself as Detroit's commercial outlet for special interest films," noted the Free Press.

Creatures of very different sizes visited the Redford. On Jan. 8-9, patrons who had recently enjoyed the modern adventure Raiders of the Lost Ark thrilled to the pounding excitement of the original 1933 King Kong. Jeanette MacDonald took a break from her singing partnership with Nelson Eddy to star with Allan Jones in The Firefly (1937), at the Redford on Jan. 22-23. In 1936, Jones appeared in Show Boat, The Great Ziegfield, and the MacDonald/Eddy musical Rose-Marie.

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