The Cramps: Live at the Napa State Mental Hospital
A review of the film and the venue, Vidiots
It’s rare that my girlfriend wants to go see a movie, so when she said she wanted to buy us tickets for one, I just agreed to go on general principle. I heard it was a Cramps film in the newly reopened video store, but didn’t look more into it than that. She’s gone with me to see a lot of films, and she has really great taste in what we watch at home, but she’s usually reluctant to go out to a regular theater on her own accord. I would like to make a tangental statement that we saw Heathers in the theater when it came out—that’s how long we’ve known each other.
I really like watching a film that I don’t know anything about and letting the surprise wash over me. But this time it bit me in the ass as far as this review is concerned. I had a great time but I’m missing a lot of details, since I thought I could just grab them later off the venue’s Instagram or something. I wish I had copied and pasted out the promo stuff, but oh well, this is as good as you’ll get it.
If you want to see the three films I saw, you may buy them here as one set. Grasshopper Films has a Blu-ray with a bunch of extra goodies. But Bucky, you say, I don’t own a Blu-ray player! I don’t know what to tell you. A good one will cost like, $60. And maybe it will be streaming eventually on some place like Night Flight.
On June 13, 1978, I had a birthday party, which was a masquerade party, for which I dressed as a Jawa. A bunch of my friends came and it was the last really cool birthday party I had until my early 20s when I got friends of mine who worked at a movie theater to unlock the doors for a speakeasy-style midnight showing of Danny Plotnick’s Super-8 films. But these stories are but another rambling tangent.
On that same day, the Mutants and the Cramps played live at the Napa State Mental Hospital, mostly for inpatients, but also for a few fortunate scenesters. As I watched the film, I realized this was one of those legendary Bay Area shows that the older generation of punks—I really hesitate to call them Boomer Punx, for fear it will catch on—always talked about, along with endless talk about the Mabuhay Gardens and the time that Johnny Thunders played the Chatterbox. The show was filmed by a independent group of artists from the punk scene.
Unfortunately, the tech at the time was poor. They were using the Sony Portapak, latest in home video equipment, but it only filmed in black and white and they had a maximum run time of 20 minutes before having to change out the tapes. The Cramps part of the show was released by Target Video but the Mutants tape was lost for over forty years.
Vidiots, a video store with two cinemas recently reopened on Eagle Rock Boulevard. Does that mean it’s in Eagle Rock? Or Highland Park? I can’t tell the neighborhoods apart. Whatever. The point is, is that in this age of declining physical media, we are seeing a resurgence in video akin to the vinyl resurgence of years prior. I’m all for it. But the best thing about the store is they are catering to film nerds like me and providing affordable programming and concessions not only in the take-home variety but with two theaters.
So what I saw were the two sets from the Mutants and the Cramps, which sandwiched a short documentary called We Were There to be There, which was all about the show and how it came to pass.
Now, I saw the Cramps play right before Ice-T at the Shoreline in 1990. Yes, that happened. It was at the beginning of combining rap with “alternative rock” on big festival lineups. But this was late-era for the Cramps for sure. But I had no other idea of how they looked or sounded in their early days. And I’ve never seen any video of the Mutants before.
Because of the tech involved there’s just not much good footage of ‘70s era punk shows. We’ve seen most of what does exist, which is what makes it so exciting that there’s one new set that most of the world hasn’t seen before. Contrast it to now, when we have seemingly endless amount of unwanted video flying around on social media platforms of people’s acoustic guitar covers and mumbled rap songs.
These films and the venue itself were all wins for me. The films are definitely must-view for Bay Area punk fans. And the venue is definitely a win for the local community. Hop on their site and give them a visit if you can.