"Wow! I can't wait to see that on the big screen," said Chuck Koplinski, film critic, English teacher and James Jones Symposium panel member, when he heard From Here to Eternity  was going to be shown at Champaign's Virginia Theatre during the 16th Annual James Jones Symposium on Nov. 10-11.  

That's the way film can effect you on a huge screen in a classical old theater that was built in the early days of film and vaudeville when such performers as the Marx Brothers, Buster Keaton and W.C. Fields would get off the train a few blocks away and go over for a show and get back on the train bound for Chicago or St. Louis.   Seeing classics such as The Shining, Patton, The Sound of Music, Gone With The Wind  and any number of other great movies that were made for these large screens at Champaign's Virginia Theatre is a different experience for any movie lover.  

So the James Jones Literary Society is teaming up with the Virginia Theatre and The News-Gazette to sponsor the symposium at the 1920s theater that was brought back to life by the efforts of the community, a state grant and the Roger Ebert Overlooked Film Festival. The event will feature three movies made from Jones' and his daughter's novels and examine the process of adapting a novel into a movie and how that effects the work.   A $5 admission will be charged for each of the three feature films, with the Virginia Theatre and the James Jones Literary Society sharing the proceeds. The other events of the symposium are free to the public.  

A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries was one of the most popular movies at the 2002 Overlooked Film Festival when author Kaylie Jones and actor Kris Kristofferson came to the festival and talked with Ebert about the movie and its themes.

Former University of Illinois Rare Book Librarian Barbara Jones will finish off the morning with a presentation on James Jones and the UI connection. Now librarian at Wesleyan University, Barbara Jones worked with the James Jones collection for several years and will talk about what is in the UI Library and how it can be used for research. The library will have two glass cases of Jones material on display.  

The original manuscript ofEternity, all 12 inches thick or so of it, will be at the theater on Saturday. Also on display will be a copy of Jones' novella, The Pistol, that he signed to Judy Garland in a Brooklyn night club where she was singing.  

After a short lunch break, the rest of the day includes various short films about Jones, his life and his work. A Dawn Shapiro documentary trailer will start off the afternoon. Shapiro has interviewed members of the Handy Writers Colony (operated by Lowney Handy and financed by her husband, Harry, and Jones) and others like Norman Mailer, who visited the colony in the early 1950s and offers his insights about the colony and the Handy method of teaching writing.  

Then there's the Mike Lennon documentary, James Jones: From Reveille to Taps, and a short interview Jones did with Edward R. Murrow after the success of From Here to Eternity  and the screening of the 1953 Academy Award-winning film version that was credited with rejuvenating Frank Sinatra's career.

The symposium will conclude with the screening of Terrence Malick's Academy Award-nominated 1997 production of The Thin Red Line, Jones' epic account of the 25th Division Tropic Lighting's experiences on Guadalcanal in 1942-43 and how it affected the men in the battle.  

Throughout the symposium, a World War II exhibit from Mahomet's Early American Museum will be on display, and copies of Kaylie Jones' novel, A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries  and other books will be available for sale.  

The following week, Kaylie Jones will be presenting the winner of the James Jones Short Story Award through the Illlinois Center for the Book's Emerging Writers competition, which includes the Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Award. Jones will also give a short writing workshop on Saturday afternoon and participate on another panel after the showing of A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries  to conclude the Illinois Authors Book Fair at the Lincoln Presidential Library theatre.  

Another James Jones film festival is also in the works. A group at Eastern Illinois University is in its third year of sponsoring film festivals of artists with an EIU or area connection. This past September, the Burl Ives Film Festival was held in Charleston where Ives went to college. Next year, James Jones is being considered. Anyone wanting more information or help with the festival should contact Joy Pratte at 217-345-9334.