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For more than 30 years, John Kiesewetter has been the source for information about all things in local media — comings and goings, local people appearing on the big or small screen, special programs, and much more. Contact John at johnkiese@yahoo.com.

Two Ways To See 'The Old Man & The Gun'

Courtesy FIlmDayton
Robert Redford as Forrest Tucker robbing a bank in the old Liberty Savings Bank in Dayton, Ohio.

Can't wait to see Robert Redford's Old Man & The Gun? Want to tour the Dayton bank where Redford, Danny Glover and Casey Affleck filmed scenes a year ago?

Here's the deal:

FilmCincinnati hosts the Cincinnati premiere of The Old Man & The Gun on Friday, Sept. 21,  at the Mariemont Theater, 6906 Wooster Pike.  A $40 ticket purchased at the FilmCincinnati site includes "early entrance," champagne, popcorn and access to a cash bar. The reception begins at 6 p.m.; the screening starts at 7 p.m.

Credit Courtesy Fox Searchlight Pictures
/
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.
Sissy Spacek plays Redford's love interest in the film.

The Old Man & The Gun, which received positive reviews at the Toronto International Film Festival, opens in major markets Sept. 28, and in Cincinnati and Dayton on Oct. 12. Redford stars as bank robber Forrest Tucker, who escapes from prison and goes on a crime spree with Glover, Sissy Spacek and Tom Waits, while pursued by a detective played by Casey Affleck.

FilmDayton is celebrating its 10th anniversary on Thursday, Sept. 27, with a party in the soon-to-open Grande Hall at Liberty Tower, an event center in the old art deco Liberty Savings Bank at 120 W. Second St. downtown. Redford, Glover, Waits and Affleck filmed scenes there in May 2017. The Dayton location portrays a St. Louis bank in the movie, says Lisa Grigsby, FilmDayton executive director.

Tickets to the party are $15 and include appetizers and access to the cash bar. For $100, you get a swag bag and a ticket to the sold-out Oct. 11 Dayton premiere of The Old Man & The Gun at The Neon cinema, 130 E. Fifth St., in downtown Dayton. (Only three $100 tickets remain on the FilmDayton website.)

For $50, you can attend the party and get a ticket to The Old Man & The Gun at The Neon when it opens to the public Friday, Oct. 12.  Dayton scenes are in the trailer.

The "sneak peak will give guests a chance to stand where Robert Redford did, enjoy appetizers on the mezzanine where Tom Waits stood lookout, or have a cocktail in the bank vault where Casey Affleck investigated the robbery," says a story on the WHKO-FM (99.1) website.

Grigsby hopes that the exposure and the producers' experience in Dayton will lure many more filmmakers to the city, as has happened in Cincinnati.

Credit Courtesy Fox Searchlight
Poster for "The Old Man & The Gun."

"This is our first major motion picture, the first of many to come. Another movie is looking at that bank, and other banks in town," said Grigsby, one of the founding FilmDayton board members. "Cincinnati (film commision) has been around 30 years. This is just another movie for Cincinnati."

Since George Clooney's The Ides of March in 2011, more  than a dozen feature films have been shot in Greater Cincinnati with Bruce Willis, Jim Parsons, Nicole Kidman, Alec Baldwin, John Travolta, Cate Blanchett, Faye Dunaway, Nicholas Cage, Ewan McGregory, Don Cheadle, Nick Jonas, Jenna Malone, Christian Slater, Zac Efron and Colin Ferrell.

Bruce Willis is currently filming his third movie in Cincinnati, called 10 Minutes Gone. He's working again with director Brian A. Miller, who filmed his Reprisal last year. 10 Minutes Gone also stars Michael Chiklis (The Shield, The Commish), Kyle Schmid (Being Human, Six, CSI: Cyber) and Meadow Williams (Den of Thieves, The Harvest). 

John Kiesewetter, who has covered television and media for more than 35 years, has been working for Cincinnati Public Radio and WVXU-FM since 2015.