Movies Under The Stars

Every Saturday night in August, the good folks behind the Victoria Independent Film and Video Festival will be showing free B-grade movies, starting at 9 pm at the Cameron Bandshell in Beacon Hill Park. Jason and The Argonauts (August 5) and The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (August 12) by stop-motion animation legend Ray Harryhausen are both great fun, but the one local history buffs will really want to see is Stampede (August 19), a 1936 western filmed in Victoria to take advantage of British rules favouring movies made in the Empire, and the studios that stood at Oak Bay’s Willows Exhibition Grounds.

Stampede stars Charles Starrett as a cattleman who crosses the border into Canada to buy livestock; he runs afoul of a gang of rustlers who murder his brother, and then chases them down one by one to bring them to justice. It can’t possibly be any good, but it should be fun trying to identify the local landmarks. Bring blankets, homemade popcorn, and a big fat doobie.