a highly-opinionated selection of things happening around town, and sometimes out of town. this month's page here.

wed. sep. 30

vanishing point 9:45 PM @ new beverly theatre
hiking @ dig in
tony millionaire 7 PM @ meltdown
man on wire 7 PM, in a dream FREE @ ampas linwood dunn theater
a tribute to maurice sendak 8:00 10:30 PM @ silent movie theater


thu. oct. 1

foot village @ the smell
annie hall 9:25 PM @ new beverly theatre


fri. oct. 2

annie hall 9:25 PM @ new beverly theatre
ferris bueller's day off 7 PM FREE (w/ rsvp) @ santa monica pier
sixteen candles 8 PM, the breakfast club @ egyptian theatre
trick 'r treat 8 PM @ silent movie theatre
last year at marienbad @ lacma
killer klowns from outer space MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency
jon brion @ largo
frank fairfield @ mccabe's
toute la memoire du monde 9:10 PM, le chant du styrene @ lacma


sat. oct. 3

ron silva & the monarchs w/ nick rossi @ mind machine @ bordello
annie hall 5:35, 9:25 PM @ new beverly theatre
michael hurley @ largo
ferris bueller's day off 8 PM, weird science @ egyptian theatre
no age, fol chen FREE @ eagle rock music festival
the mystery of the wax museum 7 PM, phantom of the opera @ silent movie theatre
the boxer's omen 10 PM @ wizard battle night @ silent movie theatre
muriel ou les temps d'un retour @ lacma
night and fog 9:30 PM @ lacma


sun. oct. 4

top secret 8 PM @ comedy death-ray @ silent movie theatre
some kind of wonderful 7 PM, pretty in pink @ egyptian theatre
autoconstruccion: the film 7 PM FREE @ redcat


mon. oct. 5

frank fairfield @ redwood bar


tue. oct. 6

watch horror films-keep america strong, nightmare in blood @ grindhouse film fest @ new beverly theatre
bronson FREE @ melnitz movies @ ucla james bridges theater
the return of the jerry beck animated spooktacular 8 PM @ silent movie theatre
mildred pierce 1 PM @ lacma
helvetica 6:45 PM @ echo park film center
dirt dress @ l'keg gallery


wed. oct. 7

teenage jesus and the jerks, miko mika @ el rey
linda perhacs and friends @ redcat
soul power, wattstax @ new beverly theatre
subarachnoid space, peter kolovos @ the echo
syd barrett's first trip 7 PM @ mandrake bar
the garden 7 PM, crips and bloods: made in america @ ampas linwood dunn theater
planes trains & automobiles, the great outdoors @ aero theatre
the duel (w/ live score by the watts ensemble) 8 PM @ silent movie theatre


thu. oct. 8

soul power, wattstax @ new beverly theatre
some like it hot 8 PM @ egyptian theatre
the collector, the children's hour @ aero theatre
andrew w.k. @ largo
damon & naomi @ spaceland


fri. oct. 9

citizen kane 8 PM @ linwood dunn: celebrating a visual effects pioneer @ ampas linwood dunn theater
at midnight i will take your soul 8 PM, this night i will possess your corpse @ silent movie theatre
being there, the landlord @ aero theatre
alien 8 PM, aliens @ egyptian theatre
shaun of the dead MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency
la guerre est finie @ lacma
guernica 9:40 PM, les statues meurent aussi @ lacma


sat. oct. 10

doctor x 7 PM, dr. cyclops @ silent movie theatre
thee cormans @ redwood bar
the burning, more TBA @ all night horror show @ new beverly theatre
wooden shjips @ frisco freakout @ the parkside (SF)
spooky encounters 10 PM @ silent movie theatre
je t'aime je t'aime 7:30 9:15 PM @ lacma
dirt dress @ highland park vfw hall


sun. oct. 11

part time punks fest @ echoplex, echo
king of hearts 7 PM, georgy girl @ egyptian theatre
freebie and the bean 4:30 PM, midnight run @ new beverly theatre
fitzcarraldo @ aero theatre


mon. oct. 12

ken jacobs: towards the depths of the even greater depression 8:30 PM @ redcat
freebie and the bean, midnight run @ new beverly theatre


tue. oct. 13

freebie and the bean, midnight run @ new beverly theatre
dirt dress @ silverlake lounge


wed. oct. 14

anne coates: profile of an editing master 7 PM @ ampas linwood dunn theater
dawanatron: the eerie electronic sounds of the diabolical dewans 8 PM @ silent movie theatre
streets of fire 8 PM, purple rain @ egyptian theatre
nashville 8 PM @ new beverly theatre


thu. oct 15

ken jacobs in person @ ucla film archive
night of the creeps 8 PM @ egyptian theatre
nashville 8 PM @ new beverly theatre


fri. oct. 16

damned: the strange world of jose mojica marins 8 PM, the strange world of coffin joe, strange hostel of naked pleasures @ silent movie theatre
divorce italian style, seduced and abandoned @ new beverly theatre
jon brion @ largo
the odd couple, the fortune cookie @ aero theatre
the exorcist MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency
psycho MIDNIGHT @ nuart theatre
darker my love @ the echo
stavisky @ lacma


sat. oct. 17

the third man, night and the city @ ucla film archive
footsteps in the fog 7 PM, the picture of dorian gray @ silent movie theatre
return of the demon 10 PM @ silent movie theatre
divorce italian style 3:10 7:30 PM, seduced and abandoned 5:15 9:35 PM @ new beverly theatre
goonies, lost boys @ egyptian theatre
airport, airport '75, airport '77 @ aero theatre
inferno MIDNIGHT @ new beverly theatre
soft pack @ echoplex
mon oncle d'amerique @ lacma


sun. oct. 18

they drive by night 7 PM, on the night of the fire @ ucla film archive
jason and the argonauts 4 PM, the golden voyage of sinbad @ aero theatre
mary lynn rajskub @ steve allen theater
melvins @ club nokia
victims (US premiere) 8 PM, don't go in the house @ silent movie theatre
abbott & costello meet frankenstein 3:55 7:30 PM, the ghost and mr. chicken 5:40 9:15 PM @ new beverly theatre 


mon. oct. 19

black panther films 8 PM @ 7 dudley cinema @ the talking stick
frank fairfield @ redwood bar
abbott & costello meet frankenstein, the ghost and mr. chicken @ new beverly theatre 


tue. oct. 20

american nightmare 8 PM @ silent movie theatre
beach house @ palladium
j.d.'s revenge, blacula @ grindhouse film festival @ new beverly theatre


wed. oct. 21

the yes men fix the world FREE @ ucla film archive
jay reatard, nobunny @ el rey
haxan (w/ new live score by eddie ruscha) 8 PM @ silent movie theatre
monkey business, go west @ aero theatre
the abominable dr. phibes, theater of blood @ new beverly theatre


thu. oct. 22

dan melchior, thee oh sees @ the echo
jason lytle @ echoplex
hope sandoval & the warm inventions @ mayan theater
network, the hospital @ aero theatre
michael ian black & michael showalter @ orpheum
the abominable dr. phibes, theater of blood @ new beverly theatre


fri. oct. 23

the long haul, hell drivers @ ucla film archive
tom jones, bedazzled @ aero theatre
poltergeist MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency
jon brion @ largo
awakening of the beast 8 PM, finis hominis @ silent movie theatre
kurt vile & the violators @ spaceland
antichrist MIDNIGHT @ nuart theatre
the mission, investigation of a citizen above suspicion @ new beverly theatre
afrika bambaataa FREE 7 PM @ amoeba records



sat. oct. 24

the haunting 2 PM 8 PM @ alex theatre
abe vigoda, mi ami @ the smell
the clouded yellow, the october man @ ucla film archive
horror of dracula 7 PM, the revenge of frankenstein @ silent movie theatre
haunted cop shop 11 PM @ silent movie theatre
something wicked this way comes @ aero theatre
daniel johnston @ music box @ fonda
halloween movie TBA @ devil's night drive-in
gal costa @ ucla royce hall
haunts of angelino heights scavenger hunt 8 PM @ la conservancy
the mission 2:50 7:30 PM, investigation of a citizen above suspicion 5:15 9:55 PM @ new beverly theatre
frank fairfield FREE 2 PM @ amoeba records


sun. oct. 25

robert beavers in person 7 PM @ ucla film archive
the stunt man, ed gein @ aero theatre
cinematic titanic presents: legacy of blood @ largo
haunts of angelino heights scavenger hunt 8 PM @ la conservancy
neil hamburger @ spaceland
spine tingler! the william castle story 4:00 7:30 PM, 13 ghosts 5:45 9:15 PM @ new beverly theatre
plan 9 from outer space 8 PM @ silent movie theatre


mon. oct. 26

no orchids for miss blandish, noose @ ucla film archive
frank fairfield @ redwood bar
spine tingler! the william castle story, 13 ghosts @ new beverly theatre
cinematic titanic presents: danger on tiki island @ largo


tue. oct. 27

american scary 8 PM @ tv horror host night @ silent movie theatre
the incredible 2-headed transplant, the thing with two heads @ new beverly theatre
dr. jekyll and mr. hyde 1 PM @ lacma
cinematic titanic presents: santa claus conquers the martians @ largo
rose melberg 6 PM FREE @ vacation vinyl
rose melberg @ echo curio


wed. oct. 28

hell's bells: the cinefamily mondo remix 8 PM @ silent movie theatre
the night of the hunter 8 PM, cape fear @ egyptian theatre
cinematic titanic presents: the alien factor @ largo
dracula (1931), bride of frankenstein @ new beverly theatre


thu. oct. 29

an evening with r. crumb 8 PM @ ucla royce hall
cinematic titanic presents: east meets watts @ largo
dracula (1931), bride of frankenstein @ new beverly theatre


fri. oct. 30

embodiment of evil 8 PM, hallucinations of a deranged mind @ silent movie theatre
house of frankenstein, house of dracula @ aero theatre
carrie MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency
jon brion @ largo
fade to black, once bitten, teen wolf @ new beverly theatre


sat. oct. 31

the city of the dead, the skull @ ucla film archive
nosferatu (w/ organ accompaniment) 8 PM @ disney hall
cinefamily halloween party @ silent movie theatre
the people under the stairs, day of the dead, society, the brood, maniac, terror @ dusk-to-dawn horrorthon @ aero theatre
night of the demons, demons, demons 2 @ new beverly theatre
little wings @ rec center studio
halloween 7 PM @ cinespia @ hollywood forever


sun. nov. 1

the monkees l.a. nuggets NOON @ egyptian theatre
60s LA promotional film potpourri 4 PM, mondo mod @ egyptian theatre
riot on sunset strip, the pad (and how to use it) @ egyptian theatre


mon. nov. 2

ty segall, mike watt @ the echo


tue. nov. 3

jack oblivian @ echoplex
crumb 7 PM FREE @ hammer museum


wed. nov. 4

broadcast @ troubadour


fri. nov. 6

casablanca MIDNIGHT @ nuart theatre
jon brion @ largo


sat. nov. 7

hepcat @ house of blues (anaheim)


mon. nov. 9

dunes @ the smell


wed. nov. 11

greg ashley @ spaceland


fri. nov. 13

thirst MIDNIGHT @ nuart theatre
12 monkeys MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency
jon brion @ largo


sat. nov. 14

the homosexuals @ el rey
abe vigoda @ spaceland
patton oswalt @ largo
look back in anger 4 PM FREE @ getty center
saturday night and sunday morning 7 PM FREE @ getty center


sun. nov. 15

mission of burma @ echoplex
raymond pettibon @ mandrake bar


mon. nov. 16

lynne sachs & mark street's garden of verses 6 PM @ 7 dudley cinema


tue. nov. 17

the king khan & bbq show @ troubadour


fri. nov. 20

jon brion @ largo
mike watt @ redwood bar
easy rider MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency


sat. nov. 21

dirt dress @ pehrspace
spinal tap @ devil's night drive-in
this sporting life 4 PM FREE @ getty center
the loneliness of the long distance runner 7 PM FREE @ getty center


fri. nov. 27

the royal tenenbaums MIDNIGHT @ nuart theatre
total recall MIDNIGHT @ fairfax regency


sat. nov. 28

dum dum girls @ spaceland
three stooges big screen event 2:00 8:00 PM @ alex theatre


thu. dec. 3

earthless @ troubadour


fri. dec. 4

repo man MIDNIGHT @ nuart theatre


fri. dec. 11

bipolar bear, foot village @ the smell


mon. dec. 21

moving image art 6 PM @ 7 dudley cinema



WHAT IT IS:


THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES
(from IMDB)
A doctor, scientist, organist, and biblical scholar, Dr. Anton Phibes, seeks revenge on the nine doctors he considers responsible for his wife's death.  Dir. Robert Fuest, 1971, 94 mins.


THE ALIEN FACTOR
Warning: Baltimore is no longer safe.
Meet Leemoid, Zagatile and Interbyce. They're the three aliens whose spaceship has crashed in a small town outside of Baltimore. Soon the town folk are turning up mutilated and dead - and even in polyester pants. Then a stranger arrives to save the day. But is he who he says he is? And what about all the polyester pants? See this film they way it was meant to be seen - on the big screen live with Cinematic Titanic.


American Nightmare
A different kind of terror, American Nightmare (aka Combat Shock) is a gritty post-Eraserhead exploration of the horrors of reality. No monsters, no vampires, no masked slashers -- this film relies on war, junkies, muggings and waiting in line at the welfare office to carry and punctuate its nihilistic saga of a Vietnam vet's desperate pursuit to save his wife and mutant Agent Orange-poisoned child from the horrors of poverty and urban squalor. Ending with one of the most brutal climaxes ever committed to celluloid, it is an unforgiving and controversial masterpiece. Director Buddy Giovinazzo will bring his original uncut 16mm answer print, a batch of early shorts he made, and join us for a Q & A!
Dir. Buddy Giovinazzo, 1986, 16mm, 92 min.


American Scary
TV Horror Host Night!
(feat. American Scary)
Hey, who was your horror host? If you're tempted to respond, "Whaddaya mean, my horror host?", you probably grew up in the post-local television era. Which means you spent your childhood without a mordantly sardonic costumed creep to introduce (and heckle) your Z-grade shock/shlock fare when you were staying up way too late. Horror hosts are one of the folkways of TV, beginning in the 1950s when broadcast was both local and live, with the indelible Vampira. Each station spawned its own variations on the theme, from the classic "cool ghoul" Zacherley in New York, to Chicago's undead hippie, Svengoolie, to Cleveland's beatnik-styled Ghoulardi (director P. T. Anderson's father!) It just gets weirder from there, in the documentary American Scary, which digs deep to discover that before Mystery Science Theater 3000, there was a whole world of campy characters for every kid -- and stoned sophomore -- to call their own. And we've got our own host, Mr. Lobo, to share even more great goodies and treats that they couldn't pack into the film.....and then, continuing the fine tradition, we'll all watch a rare surprise TV-movie feature from the 70s!
American Scary Dir. John E. Hudgens, 2006, digital presentation, 91 min.


At Midnight I Will Take Your Soul
In a feat of pure will and cinematic street smarts, first-time director Marins took a few scraps of film, a 600 square-foot studio and a miniscule budget pieced together by selling his family's house and car, and created this dazzling garage Guignol masterpiece that rocked Brazil's pop culture and psyche with its extreme violence, taboo-smashing scenes, and the creation of an indelible fully-realized character that would go on to capture the imaginations of horror fans around the world -- Coffin Joe! God-defying and child-loving, philosophizing and self-aggrandizing, sadistic and ballistic, prone to proclamations and exaggerations (usually delivered via maniacally melodramatic monologues in Marins' unique acting style), Coffin Joe debuts here as a fearsome undertaker who terrorizes the citizens with his violent, narcissistic behavior. Just for kicks he ties up a woman and lets spiders crawl over her, and, even more horrifyingly, he voraciously eats meat on Good Friday! One of the great debuts in horror in history.
Dir. José Mojica Marins, 1964, 35mm, 84 min.


Autoconstrucción: The Film
Theatrical Screening of Autoconstrucción: The Film with live improvisational score by David J & Marcelo Radulovich
In conjunction with Abraham Cruzvillegas' exhibition currently on view in the gallery through November 8, REDCAT presents a special one night, theatrical screening of Autoconstrucción: The Film with a live improvisational score by musicians David J and Marcelo Radulovich.


Awakening Of The Beast
Banned for almost 20 years, this surreal and insane catalogue of debauchery was Marins’ most controversial, experimental, and provocative film -- and with a full-on, twenty-minute Technicolor trip sequence inside of Coffin Joe's world, it was also Marins’ most explicitly psychedelic. The movie links together episodic scenes of drug use, orgies, and general moral inequity with a Charlie Kaufman-like meta-story with José Mojica Marins/Coffin Joe debating with critics on the detrimental effect of drugs and phenomena like his films on Brazilian culture. And the climax is a real monster -- a bizarre "experiment" sequence in which our hosts oh-so-scientifically dose four degenerates (of various class and demographics, of course) with LSD, give them a Coffin Joe poster to stare at, and watch them all enter a brightly multi-colored hellscape of Marins' devising. Marins’ relationships with authority had always been mutually acrimonious, but here he sets out to make a film that includes everything the establishment didn't want to see. Awakening of the Beast was a cinematic act of defiance and an aesthetic revolution. Incredible.
Dir. José Mojica Marins, 1970, DigiBeta, 93 min.


BEDAZZLED, 1967, 20th Century Fox (Criterion), 107 min. Dir. Stanley Donen. The definitive Mod comedy, filled with leaping lesbian nuns, bottles of Froony Green Eyewash and Raquel Welch as Lillian Lust (the Babe with the Bust). Peter Cook wrote the screenplay and stars as the deliciously hip Devil, merrily ripping the last page out of Agatha Christie novels. Dudley Moore co-stars as the hapless hamburger chef who trades his soul for seven chances to bed the luscious Eleanor Bron. 


BEING THERE, 1979, Warner Bros., 130 min. Dir. Hal Ashby. Peter Sellers plays a wide-eyed innocent raised in isolation who learns everything that he knows from television.


BLACK PANTHER FILMS - 8pm - Rare films on the powerful movement which had provocative rhetoric, militant posture and cultural & political flourishes that permanently altered the contours of American Identity. With the Ten-Point program “What We Want, What We Believe,” they called for "Land, Bread, Housing, Education, Clothing, Justice and Peace", and captured in uncompromising language the collective economic and political grievances articulated by black radical and many black liberals since the 1930s. 6pm-rare James Brown, Sly Stone and P-Funk films.


BLACULA
This groove from beyond the grave was named best horror film of 1972 by the Academy of Horror Films and Science Fiction Films. Interior decorators buy the coffin of an African prince (William Marshall), bitten by Dracula centuries before, and bring it back to Los Angeles. The African prince starts feeding his hunger while following a woman who looks like his departed wife. With Vonetta McGee and Denise Nicholas.  William Crain---USA---1972---92 mins.


The Boxer’s Omen
wizard battle night!
(feat. the boxer’s omen)
Live! One night only! At the Silent Movie Theatre! See the ultimate video-mixed martial arts showdown between good and evil, demon and priest, wizard and ghost. Every good Kung Fu Halloween flick ends with a wicked SFX-laden wizard battle, and you're gonna see the best of the bunch. Witness wizened martial arts Merlins -- who can put you in a half-nelson with just their manly, three-foot eyebrows -- take on black magic sorcerers who use Xtreme incense burning and stone-cold Sanskrit prayers to conjure chakra-shocking creatures and hurl dharma dropkicks. And, blessed Buddha, then we're gonna watch the Wizard Battle movie to end all Wizard Battle movies -- the hexadelical, unstoppable, incredible piece of eye terrorism known as The Boxer's Omen. Guaranteed mug-melter or your money back. 


Bronson
In 1974, a hot headed 19-year-old named Michael Peterson decided he wanted to make a name for himself and so, with a homemade sawed-off shotgun and a head full of dreams he attempted to rob a post office. After making off with only 26 Pounds, he was swiftly apprehended and originally sentenced to seven years in jail. Peterson has subsequently been behind bars for 34 years, 30 of which have been spent in solitary confinement. During that time, Michael Petersen, the boy, faded away and Charles Bronson, his superstar alter ego, took center stage. Directed with brutal, operatic flair by Nicolas Winding Refn (The Pusher Trilogy), Bronson features a blazing, transformative performance by Tom Hardy. A portrait of an artist bereft of an outlet and a scathing indictment of celebrity culture. 


THE BURNING
(from IMDB)
A caretaker at a summer camp is burned when a prank goes tragically wrong. After several years of intensive treatment at hospital, he is released back into society, albeit missing some social skills. What follows is a bloody killing spree with the caretaker making his way back to his old stomping ground to confront one of the youths that accidently burned him.  Dir. Tony Maylam, 1981, 91 mins.


CAPE FEAR, 1962, Universal, 106 min. Dir. J. Lee Thompson. Gregory Peck is an ordinary family man terrorized by psychotic ex-con Robert Mitchum in this adaptation of John D. MacDonald’s THE EXECUTIONERS. A classic Bernard Herrmann score drives this relentless thriller, a finely tuned suspense piece that was remade by Martin Scorsese in 1991. 


THE CHILDREN’S HOUR, 1961, MGM Repertory, 107 min. Dir. William Wyler. Schoolteachers Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine are victimized by a vicious, gossip-minded student in this adaptation of Lillian Hellman’s play. Also starring James Garner.


THE CITY OF THE DEAD
(a.k.a Horror Hotel)
(1960) Directed by John Moxey
Sometimes compared to Psycho for its doubled narrative structure, The City of The Dead begins with college student Nan Barlow visiting the fog-shrouded town of Whitewood, Massachusetts, the site of a notorious witch burning in 1692, in order to research her thesis on the Occult. When Nan goes missing, her brother and boyfriend investigate and uncover a terrifying, centuries-old satanic conspiracy beyond their wildest nightmares. Director John Moxey makes the most of his low-budget circumstances with expressionist panache zooming into looming faces and bathing every corner with shadows and fog.
Producer: Donald Taylor, Milton Subotsky, Max Rosenberg. Screenplay: George Baxt. Cinematographer: Desmond Dickinson. Cast: Patricia Jessel, Betta St. John, Christopher Lee. 35mm, B/W, 78 min. 


THE CLOUDED YELLOW
(1951) Directed by Ralph Thomas
When British secret service agent (Trevor Howard) gets the axe, he finds a job cataloging butterflies for an eccentric family, the Fentons, on a remote English estate. But this seemingly benign business is fraught with danger once he falls for his boss’s niece Sophie (Jean Simmons), a troubled young woman who is accused of murdering a local farmhand. Determined to prove her innocence before the cops can arrest her, the pair embark on a thrilling chase across Britain’s Lake District. With echoes of both Gaslight and Hitchcock, The Clouded Yellow is a thoroughly entertaining thriller.
Based on the story by J. Green. Producer: Betty E. Box. Screenplay: Janet Green. Cinematographer: Geoffrey Unsworth. Editor: Gordon Hales. Cast: Trevor Howard, Jean Simmons, Sonia Dresdel, Barry Jones. 35mm, B/W, 95 min. 


THE COLLECTOR, 1965, Sony Repertory, 119 min. Dir. William Wyler. William Wyler’s blood-chilling adaptation of John Fowles’ first novel stars Terence Stamp as a disturbed young Londoner who graduates from collecting butterflies to imprisoning Samantha Eggar. 


Crips and Bloods: Made in America
Directed by Stacy Peralta
Produced by Baron Davis, Dan Halsted, Peralta, Jesse Dylan
Tracing the origins, rise and four-decades-long feud of two Los Angeles gangs, “Crips and Bloods: Made in America” (previously titled “Made in America”) gives viewers unprecedented access into a little understood world. Current and former gang members offer street-level testimony that paints a stark portrait of life in South Central L.A. Digital. 93 mins.


Crumb
A brilliant chronicle of the life and twisted times of a most unlikely bad boy, a skinny, four-eyed, sex-obsessed misanthrope with no weapons to fire back at the society that rejected him save one: The nerd can draw. —Peter Travers, Rolling Stone
Shot over a period of six years, director Terry Zwigoff's Crumb is an illuminating portrait of the controversial comic artist. The film uses uncensored interviews with the artist, his family, colleagues, critics, and ex-lovers, along with footage of his work, to paint a riveting picture of Crumb and the influences that have endowed his creativity. (1995, 119 MIN., DIR. T. ZWIGOFF) 


Damned: The Strange World of José Mojica Marins
The only thing stranger than the Coffin Joe films is the story of the man who made them. José Mojica Marins spent his childhood literally living in a movie theatre, and -- with almost no education or financial support -- began making awesome and outrageous horror movies on Ed Wood-like budgets that turned him into a pop sensation and a household name. This Sundance award-winning documentary uses interviews, a wealth of archival footage and clips from the films themselves to tell the tales of Marins’ unconventional methods (including fear tests for actresses with live spiders and snakes, and burying an actor alive), his long-standing battle with censors and authorities, and his seemingly-cursed productions. Lovingly made, informative, and fun, The Strange World of José Mojica Marins is a wonderful primer for those unfamiliar with Coffin Joe, and total paydirt for those who are already fans.
Dirs. André Barcinski & Ivan Finotti, 2001, DigiBeta, 65 min.


DANGER ON TIKI ISLAND
An atomic bomb test in the South Pacific creates an isolated world of terror.
Strange things are happening on this remote island in the Pacific, where a Peace Corps volunteer, a researcher and his love-starved lady arrive to find that nearby atomic testing has mutated some of the plants. It that weren't bad enough, a monster terrifies the villagers in its lust for blood. The man-beast must be stopped - but how? With sarongs a-plenty, this film was a staple at drive-ins in its day. Now experience it live with Cinematic Titanic.


DEMONS
Co-written and produced by Dario Argento, this stylish and extremely gruesome shocker has earned plenty of admirers as well as detractors for its excesses. Two girls attend a special screening of a horror film at an isolated Berlin cinema. The film proves to be an overwhelming force of evil, transforming the theater patrons into demons who attack those who remain unaffected. Director Lamberto Bava is the son of cult film legend Mario Bava. Includes original songs by several 1980s rock acts, including Rick Springfield, Motley Crue, the Scorpions, Billy Idol, Go West and Accept. Lamberto Bava---Italy---1985---88 mins.


DEMONS 2
Lamberto Bava and co-writer/producer Dario Argento bring back the kill-happy demons from their 1985 hit in this equally outlandish, gore-packed horror show. This time the demons emanate from a TV screen, and before long they have possessed most of the residents of a high-security apartment building. When first released in America, Demons 2 had a few brief scenes cut in order to attain an "R" rating. The soundtrack includes songs by the Smiths, the Cult, Art of Noise, Peter Murphy and Dead Can Dance. Lamberto Bava---Italy---1986---91 mins.


Dewanatron!:
The Eerie Electronic Sounds of the Diabolical Dewans!
Brian Dewan makes his terrifyingly triumphant return to the Cinefamily with cousin Leon Dewan; together as Dewanatron they've come to tickle your spooky bone. Mad musical scientists that they are, they will tend to their self-created musical machines for an October harvest of spooky silent shorts featuring ghostly horror, monster pathos, and creepy experiments. Some instruments hang on the wall and unsettlingly play themselves. Some, such as the Dual Primate Console, require not one, but two people to make them sing. The demented Dewan brothers have scored early animations, Soviet cartoons, Castle educatonal films and even Fritz Lang's Metropolis with their spooktacular devices. Like a carnival side show, freaky and fun, they will reveal their collection of sonic music-making machines and aurally weird you out.


Dr. Cyclops 
Director Ernest Schoedsack and an uncredited assist from Merian C. Cooper (best known as one of the team behind King Kong) together prove yet again that size matters -- this time in reverse. Character actor Albert Dekker stomps the terra as a mad jungle genius who responds to those who dare attempt to thwart his quest to harness “the cosmic force of creation” by shrinking them to the size of lab rats. From there, cotton ball asphyxia is just one of the jumbo horrors faced by our half-pint heroes. If a combination of matte work, split-screens, and scaled-down sets wasn’t pleasing enough, Dr. Cyclops is probably the only film to capture these OG effects in two-strip Technicolor, making it an extra-special treat.
Dir. Ernest Schoedsack, 77 Minutes, 35mm, 1940


Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
1941/b&w/127 min. | Scr: John Lee Mahin; dir: Victor Fleming; w/ Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman, Lana Turner.
A scientist's investigations into the nature of good and evil turn him into a murderous monster. 


Doctor X
Rape! Prostitution! Voyeurism! Cannibalism! Technicolor! For 1932, you may wonder which was the most shocking? The answer is -- Technicolor! 'Cause in those pre-Code glory days, it was anything goes! Join Lionel Atwill’s intrepid Dr. Xavier and his beautiful blonde daughter (Fay Wray) on the hunt for the voracious and rapacious "Moon Killer”, who's been preying on the hookers and charwomen of Lower Manhattan. Unavailable for decades, this adaptation of the Howard W. Comstock/Allen C. Miller stage play was greenlit by Warner Brothers (with not atypical foresight) as part of an attempt to get out of their contract to make six films with Technicolor's newfangled and obviously dead-end process. Released before King Kong, this marks the first genre appearance of Wray, who enters...screaming.
Dir. Michael Curtiz, 1932, 35mm, 76 min.


Don’t Go In The House 
Next, we're showing Don’t Go In The House, a gritty, disturbing and blackly comic portrait of a pyromaniac struggling to cope with his abusive mother's death. Don’t Go In The House is best described as Psycho Redux -- with flamethrowers! Beautifully shot by Oliver (The Bourne Ultimatum) Wood. Not for the fainthearted!  Dir. Joseph Ellison, 1980, 35mm.


Duel
(w/ live score by The Watts Ensemble)
Duel: the 1971 man-vs.-evil-gigantic-truck TV-movie thriller that sent a 25-year-old Steven Spielberg on his way to becoming one of cinema's most major directors. The Watts Ensemble: a 13-piece crime jazz "arkestra" started by a punk-rock drummer with no formal compositional training, but the ear of a Stravinsky-damaged Devo fan. Tonight: they're pitted against each other for a sound-and-vision battle royal. Duel stands out in the Spielberg canon for its extended sequences of pure image; in a one-time only experiment, we're going to turn it into the silent film it was meant to be,—and bring back the sound and fury in a full free jazz wall of sound. Action, adventure--and arpeggios--will fly.
Dir. Steven Spielberg, 35mm, 1971, 90 min.


EAST MEETS WATTS
Kung Fu hits the streets!
Young Larry Chin arrives from China looking for his long-lost brother and stumbles into some shady characters that'd just as soon see him go home - or get dead. He crosses paths with Stud Brown, and the two become an unlikely duo as they fight to clean up the 'hood, and make time for some lady loves they meet along the way. And hang on tight for the surprise twist ending. It's all living color kungsploitation glory, live with Cinematic Titanic.


Embodiment Of Evil
“Higher than God. Lower than Satan.” Marins’ demonically anticipated, decades-delayed finale to the "Zé do Caixão" trilogy is finally here! More than 45 years after the underbelly of Brazilian cinema was re-carved in his image, Marins has been blessed with the biggest budget ever afforded to him, giving him access to larger, crazier sets and state-of-the-art special effects through which he could unleash his most twisted of visions. This is also the first time that Marins has made a film entirely free of censorial constraints. There will be moments when you absolutely will not believe what you’re seeing! Grotesquery and surrealism abound, drenched in sex, poetry, blasphemy and blood. Spiders crawl over torsos both living and dead, Zé takes a fantastical journey through a giant uterus, hooks tear flesh, and bodies tear in half. Politically charged and unrepentantly transgessive, Embodiment of Evil marks the return of a wildly unique maverick of the fantastic, rougher, freakier, more perverse than he’s ever been before. Your blackest prayers are about to be answered. -- Mitch Davis, Fantasia Festival
Dir. José Mojica Marins, 2008, DigiBeta. 94 min.


FADE TO BLACK
Dennis Christopher (Breaking Away) stars in this unusual horror film about a sympathetic, lonely young man with an obsession for the movies. A series of humiliations sends him off the edge of reality and he begins eliminating his enemies while disguised as some of the film characters he loves. Vernon Zimmerman---USA---1980---102 mins. 


Finis Hominis (End of Man)
Financially crippled by the banning of Awakening of the Beast, and threatened with imprisonment if he ever dared release it, Marins decided with his next film to abandon his gruesome obsessions, and emphasize the fantastical imagination and elemental myth-making skills that led critics to compare him to Bunuel, Arrabal and Jodorowsky. So exit Coffin Joe, and enter Finis Hominis - -a wholly new archetypal creation that, in a sly wink to his censors, is the Jungian opposite of his evil-embodying Coffin Joe character. Or is he? Who is this benevolent, messianic Christ-figure who emerges naked from the sea, puts on the outfit of a sideshow fakir, and goes about leaving a trail of happiness and spiritual fulfillment wherever he goes? Stripped of the horror elements that usually cloak Marins' vision in blood and guts, what is laid bare by Finis Hominis is a director capable of focusing his feelings and observations into intriguing and personal parables -- a philosopher, and an artist.
Dir. José Mojia Marins, 1971, DigiBeta 79 min.


FITZCARRALDO, 1982, IPMA, 158 min. Rubber baron and music fanatic Fitzcarraldo (Klaus Kinski) journeys down the darkest byways of the Amazon to build an opera house in the heart of the rainforest. Discussion following with director Werner Herzog, who also will be signing copies of his recently published diary Conquest of the Useless: Reflections From the Making of "Fitzcarraldo" at Every Picture Tells A Story at 6:00 PM.


Footsteps in the Fog
With its eerie staring portraits, hissing black cats, ghostly bells and an angry mob hunting down a murderer through the streets of this London “pea souper,” Footsteps in the Fog lurks just outside the box of balls-out Gothic horror. Stewart Granger plays an Edwardian cad who has murdered his wife, Jeanne Simmons is the ambitious scullery maid who knows he did it and, like Eliza Doolittle's evil twin, she sees it as a way to raise her station quicker than learning an accent. But beyond its raging paranoia and perversity (the screenplay was adapted from a tale by W. W. Jacobs, author of "The Monkey’s Paw") this is a love story, or at least a lust story -- Simmons and Granger's real-life marriage may have helped them generate the smoldering heat that blazes under all their stiff button-down clothes. Captured in gorgeous Technicolor photography by Christopher Challis, who shot many a hypersatured classic for Michael Powell, so you can envelop yourself in all those black carriages, smutty subtext, fog, and muuuuuuurder.
Dir. Arthur Lubin, 1955, 35mm, 90 min.


THE FORTUNE COOKIE, 1966, MGM Repertory, 125 min. Dir. Billy Wilder. In a career filled with savage, unforgiving comedies, this may be Billy Wilder's darkest (and funniest). Hapless cameraman Jack Lemmon is injured during a football match, then latched onto by shyster lawyer Walter Matthau, who wants to milk the situation for all its worth. 


FREEBIE AND THE BEAN, 1974, Warner Bros., 113 min. This cop-buddy action film directed by Richard Rush (THE STUNT MAN) was mercilessly savaged by critics who found it disturbingly offensive – but it packed them in at the box office. Contrary to most then-current reviews, Rush’s approach is so insanely over-the-top, so remorselessly profane and politically incorrect, it transcends into an anarchic, anything-goes, live-action cartoon universe. Sensitive though hot-tempered Latino cop Alan Arkin is repeatedly provoked by his abusive, foul-mouthed partner James Caan as they wreck most of San Francisco in a nonstop demolition derby trying to capture mobster Jack Kruschen. Valerie Harper is a standout as Arkin’s put-upon wife. "…rife with racism, homophobia and sexism. That it entertains rather than appalls is down to James Caan and Alan Arkin's brilliant badinage which, together with some excellent action sequences, ensure director Richard Rush's movie gets away with its detours into bad taste."  – Channel 4 Film (U.K.) NOT ON DVD


The Garden
Directed and produced by Scott Hamilton Kennedy
In response to the 1992 L.A. riots, the South Central Farmers started a 14-acre community garden as a form of healing. As this film unfolds, the future of the garden hangs in the balance as developers look to bulldoze the area. 35mm. 80 mins.


GEORGY GIRL, 1966, Sony Repertory, 99 min. Dir. Silvio Narizzano. Lynn Redgrave stars in this breezy comic relic of Mod London as the hopelessly unhip Georgina, pining for close chum Alan Bates while roommate Charlotte Rampling jets around looking fabulous. James Mason co-stars as the older businessman who offers to make Redgrave his mistress.


GO WEST, 1940, Warner Bros., 80 min. Dir. Edward Buzzell. The Marx Brothers head for the Wild West in one of their late classics, a film featuring typically hilarious antics from Groucho, Chico and Harpo as they travel via railroad. Groucho’s grandson Andy Marx will introduce the screening.


Guernica
1950/b&w/12 min.; Dir: Alain Resnais, Robert Hessens
With the aid of Picasso's enormous fresco and an impassioned text by surrealist poet Paul Éluard, Resnais's Guernica offers a protest against war and a hopeful hymn to innocence and peace.


Hallucinations of a Deranged Mind
Hallucinations of a Deranged Mind is a flat-out freakout multi-movie montage of the most insane footage censored from Marins' entire career up to this film's release, and framed by a self-reflexive plot about a man driven to madness by the films, who's convinced that Coffin Joe will come to steal his wife. Marins himself is brought in to cure the man, requiring him to scream in his ear repetitively, "Coffin Joe does not exist! Coffin Joe does not exist!", among other things. During the extended hallucination sequences that make up the bulk of the film, everything, (and we mean everything), is infused with a tripped-out delirium. The soundscapes are distorted and hypnotic, the compositions radical, the colors lurid, the editing associative and assaultive, and the images ripe with potent imagery. We can say without hesitation this is one of the top ten mind-blowers in head film history.
Dir. José Mojica Marins, 1978, DigiBeta, 86 min.


Haunted Cop Shop
Before he hit the big time with Chungking Express, sensitive art house director Wong Kar-Wai cut his teeth by writing this knockabout scream-fest, starring a young Jacky Cheung who went on to star in many of Wong’s biggest films. Still pretty obscure, and hard to find with English subtitles, it’s the first in a string of “spooky police” films -- this case pits a precinct against a horde of vampiric foes on the day of “The Feast of the Hungry Ghosts,” complete with dire warning from an ex-cop monk. Surprisingly creepy, often hilarious and sometimes wildly tasteless, this 1987 oddity feels like a better version of the Joe Piscopo vehicle Dead Heat with a healthy dose of Eastern action mayhem. Lots of exorcisms, acrobatic feats and a grisly game of mahjong add seasoning to a fun stew that manages to take its scares very seriously while tickling your funny bone.
Dir. Jeffrey Lau, 1987, 35mm.


The Haunting
Robert Wise adapted Shirley Jackson’s novel The Haunting of Hill House into one of filmdom’s most memorable horror films.
A paranormal investigator (Richard Johnson) decides to investigate a 90-year old haunted house aided by two women with recent psychic experiences (Julie Harris and Claire Bloom) and the owner’s skeptical nephew (Russ Tamblyn).
A true ghost story of the first degree, THE HAUNTING is perfect spook fare to put you in the Halloween spirit.
Presented In 35mm black and white and CinemaScope. (M-G-M, 1963)
Is the Alex Haunted?
Join World renowned Psychic-Medium & Parapsychological Investigator Michael J. Kouri who will appear live on stage!
Runs 2 1/2 hrs. 


Haxan
(w/ new live score by Eddie Ruscha)
The beautifully disturbing 1922 granddaddy of all shockumentaries, Haxan employs a variety of techniques to weave its historic tale of the occult. Mixing and mashing actual documentary footage with "re-enactments" and slide shows (one of such slide shows was so famously used in the opening of The Exorcist), Danish director Benjamin Christensen made a film full of vivid and haunting visuals just waiting to be underscored by an audial equivalent. Enter Eddie Ruscha (of Future Pigeon), a gifted artist and electronic experimental musician with a score he composed to complement the film, one that wowed audiences at the Hammer earlier this year.
Dir. Benjamin Christensen, digital presentation, 1922, 74 min.


HELL DRIVERS
(1957) Directed by Cy Endfield
Cy Endfield, another of this series’ refugees from the Hollywood blacklist, delivers a raw critique of capitalist exploitation in the form of a full-throttle thriller. Stanley Baker plays an ex-con who drifts into a job hauling gravel for Hawlett’s, a trucking company where only the desperate need apply. Spurred on by openly ruthless management, marginal men—including pious, naive "Italian" Herbert Lom and a young Sean Connery—vie to beat the pace set by the unhinged Irishman at the wheel of truck Number 1: Patrick McGoohan, before he was The Prisoner’s Number 6. There’s plenty of action in the rattle and roar of trucks careening along country roads, but the film’s suspense comes from social pressures rather than speed as the rivalry between Baker and McGoohan becomes increasingly explosive. The ultimate use of all those rocks is never mentioned; hauling endless tons of cargo in a race none of them can ever really win, the drivers are embodiments of labor as a road to nowhere. —Juliet Clark, Pacific Film Archive.
Based on a story by J. Kruse. Screenplay: Cy Endfield, John Kruse. Cinematographer: Geoffrey Unsworth. Cast: Stanley Baker, Herbert Lom, Peggy Cummins, Patrick McGoohan, William Hartnell. 35mm, B/W, 108 min. 


Hell's Bells:
The Cinefamily Mondo Remix
If Halloween is the Devil's favorite holiday, then surely heavy metal is his favorite music. Our Sound of Horror series ends with a mind-bending, soul-stealing, ear-shattering tribute to the Satanic roots of heavy metal -- from the born-again perspective. As our primary source material, we're doing a remix of Hell's Bells -- an incredibly well-argued and researched Craig Baldwin-esque video essay exposing heavy metal's awesome power to corrupt our youth. Witness how rock and roll mocks Christ, tempts the libido and promotes the worship of Satan, all through album covers, music videos, backwards messages and occult iconography. Convincing as hell, you'll believe rock n' roll is stuff of Beelzebub -- turn it up! And, as our final piece of damning evidence, we present a live performance from hell's houseband Nilbog, specializing in covers of themes from our favorite horror movies.


HELVETICA
Gary Hustwit’s Helvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture. It looks at the proliferation of one typeface (which celebrated its 50th birthday in 2007) as part of a larger conversation about the way type affects our lives. The film is an exploration of urban spaces in major cities and the type that inhabits them, and a fluid discussion with renowned designers about their work, the creative process, and the choices and aesthetics behind their use of type.


Horror of Dracula
The poster child for pre-Exorcist modern horror, Hammer’s thrilling and unapologetically blood-stained adaptation of the Bram Stoker novel made bona fide movie stars out of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee. And, fifty years after the fact, Horror of Dracula remains a tent pole of the horror genre. Director Terence Fisher and cinematographer Jack Asher use the lush palate of Technicolor to create the first romantic and fully seductive vampire film. Not since the heyday of the Universal monster rallies had a nightmare-scape seemed so palpably alive, and able to infect the waking world. Lee brings to his undying Count all of the “wrath and fury” that Jonathan Harker wrote home about. “This is better than Citizen Kane,” somebody once said. “And it’s in color.” Technicolor, to be precise.
Dir. Terence Fisher, 1958, 35mm, 82 min.


THE HOSPITAL, 1971, MGM Repertory, 103 min. Dir. Arthur Hiller. In a film that remains strikingly timely today, Paddy Chayefsky dismantles New York City’s disintegrating public healthcare system with this darkly comic indictment that won an Oscar for best screenplay. His personal life in a shambles, George C. Scott is the chief of medicine at a hospital where patients are dying from caregivers’ errors and mistaken identities, and absurdity takes over from science. Also starring Diana Rigg.


HOUSE OF DRACULA, 1945, Universal, 67 min. Dir. Erle C. Kenton. Once again, Lon Chaney Jr. reprises his role as Lawrence Talbot, the Wolf Man. Both Talbot and Count Dracula (John Carradine) seek a cure for their afflictions, so they secure the help of renowned scientist Dr. Edelman (Onslow Stevens) and his hunchbacked nurse (Jane Adams).


HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, 1944, Universal, 71 min. Dir. Erle C. Kenton. Mad scientist Boris Karloff is at the center of this horror classic, which gathers the most popular Universal icons -- the Wolf Man, Frankenstein’s Monster, Dracula -- in one highly enjoyable film.


In a Dream
Directed by Jeremiah Zagar
Produced by Jeremy Yaches
Over the past four decades, artist Isaiah Zagar has covered Philadelphia with mosaic murals. “In a Dream” chronicles this work and his tumultuous relationship with his wife, as a new chapter in their life unfolds. Digital. 78 mins.


The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant
(from IMDB)
Dr. Roger Girard is a rich scientist conducting experiments on head transplantation. His caretaker has a son, Danny, who, although fully grown, has the mind of child. One day an escaped psycho-killer invades Girard's home, killing Danny's father before being gunned down himself. With the maniac dying and Danny deeply unsettled by his father's death, Dr. Girard decides to take the final step and transplant the killer's head onto Danny's body.  Dir. Anthony M. Lanza, 1971, 87 mins.


INFERNO
Something of a sequel to his classic Suspiria, this is Dario Argento's second film loosely inspired by the opium-fueled writings of Thomas DeQuincey. A young woman discovers a mysterious diary that reveals the secrets of "The Three Mothers" and unleashes an unstoppable force of demonic evil. Music by Keith Emerson.  Dario Argento---Italy---1980---106 mins.


J.D.'s REVENGE
Glynn Turman (Cooley High) and Louis Gossett, Jr. star in this well-made "blaxploitation" film that combines horror and crime film elements. An innocent law student is possessed by the vengeful spirit of a '40s mobster.  Arthur Marks---USA---1976---95 mins.


Je t'aime, je t'aime
1968/color/91 min. | Scr: Jacques Sternberg; dir: Alain Resnais; w/ Claude Rich, Van Doude, Olga Georges-Picot.
After a failed attempt at suicide, Rich is chosen as the first guinea pig for a time-travelling experiment. But a technical malfunction lands him in a maze of his own fractured memories. He re-experiences his seduction of a beautiful, rebellious Picot, their idyllic vacation on the Riviera, and a fateful sojourn in Glasgow. Little seen in the U.S. and featuring cameos by such Resnais collaborators as Robbe-Grillet and Semprún, Je t'aime, je t'aime is perhaps Resnais's most underrated work. "With Marker's La Jetée and Tarkovsky's Solaris, it constitutes a holy trinity of meditation on the horrors of eternal life."—Raymond Durgnat. 


KEN JACOBS IN PERSON
"A stereo-photo of an ocean wave slowly turns and churns. The hidden forces of Cinema conspire with an instant of history to produce actions that never were or could be. 3D for everyone (one eye will do)."—Ken Jacobs
One of the key American media artists of the postwar era, Ken Jacobs (Tom, Tom, The Piper’s Son; Star Spangled to Death) has crafted a unique, powerful and ever-evolving body of work over a career that has spanned five decades. Appropriating and reinterpreting existing media artifacts, and subverting conventional modes of presentation, Jacobs has applied his highly original techniques to both formal considerations and social and political topics with equal aplomb.
This program showcases some of Jacobs’ most recent work, much of which creates new forms of three-dimensional depth, and is presented as part of a week-long artist residency in Los Angeles, in cooperation with RedCat, LA Filmforum, and CalArts.


Ken Jacobs: Towards The Depths of The Even Greater Depression
A Nervous Magic Lantern Performance
West Coast premiere
“Makes Monsters vs. Aliens in 3-D look as flat as an episode of South Park.” The New York Times
The revered avant-garde filmmaker (Star Spangled to Death) and “paracinema” champion has a repertory of techniques to realize astonishing optical effects. In his live 3-D shows, Jacobs variously manipulates a film projector’s mechanisms, painted plastic cells, and sometimes objects, to summon otherworldly abstractions with vertiginous depth of field. “My self-constructed ‘Lantern’ uses neither film nor video,” he explains. “Abstraction can offer the opportunity to meet and grapple directly with risky situations, taking real chances instead of identifying with some actor-proxy on a movie set. The question of what we are looking at becomes of less urgency than from where in space we are viewing, and where and of what consistency and shape and size is the mass confronting us at any one moment. It might be best to think of what you and others see as a group hallucination.” Jacobs is also screening Disorient Express (1906/1996, 30 min., 35mm, silent).
In person: Ken Jacobs


KING OF HEARTS, 1966, MGM Repertory, 110 min. Dir. Philippe De Broca. After a German bomb goes off in a small French town at the end of World War I, the British send soldier Alan Bates in for a reconnaissance mission, where he discovers the only survivors are the patients at a local mental hospital. This hilarious farce connects literal insanity with the ridiculousness of war.


La Guerre est finie (The War is Over)
1966/b&w/123 min. | Scr: Jorge Semprún; dir: Alain Resnais; w/ Yves Montand, Michel Piccoli, Ingrid Thulin, Geneviève Bujold, Jean-François Rémi. | Print courtesy of the Academy Film Archive.
Montand stars as a Spanish communist party chief who lives under multiple assumed identities. A revolutionary without a cause or a country, he's exiled in Paris. Engulfed by fears, fantasies, and futilities, he begins a love affair with young radical Bujold. Contemplating a return to Franco's Spain even with the risk of capture by the police, Montand is powerfully moving and romantic as a lost man of ideals in Resnais's powerful illustration of a troubling question: what happens to political commitment in the rush of time?


THE LANDLORD, 1970, MGM Repertory, 112 min. Dir. Hal Ashby. In this sharp, funny dramedy, Beau Bridges plays the title role, a man who buys a tenement building with the intention of renovating it himself -- only to change his plans after he interacts with the tenants. 


Last Year at Marienbad
1961/b&w/93 min./Scope | Scr: Alain Robbe-Grillet; dir: Alain Resnais; w/ Delphine Seyrig, Giorgio Albertazzi, Sacha Pitoëff.
Not just a defining work of the French New Wave but one of the great, lasting mysteries of modern art, Resnais's epochal second feature has been puzzling appreciative viewers for decades. Before its U.S. debut in 1962, The New York Times called it the "most controversial French film ever produced" while a week of pre-release, fundraiser screenings at MoMA provided guests with programs that read, "The film you are about to see will, in all probability, upset every normal viewing habit you have formed." Written by Alain Robbe-Grillet-the radical master of the nouveau roman received an Academy Award nomination for his screenplay-this sumptuous waking dream lucidly fuses the past with the present (and maybe even the future) as it recounts the mysterious romance between bachelor Albertazzi and married Seyrig. They may or may not have met a year ago, perhaps at the very same cavernous manor they now find themselves wandering. Unforgettable in its enigmatic details (gilded ceilings, diabolical parlor games, a loaded gun) and nearly supernatural scope, Resnais's investigation into the nature of memory is an unparalleled cinematic experience.


Le Chant du Styrène 
Le Chant du styrene was hailed by Godard as Resnais's "fantastic farewell to the short film." Commissioned by the Pechiney Corporation and filmed in their ultramodern polystyrene factory, it traces the production of plastics—from finished product back through the primeval raw material from which it derives—with the lighthearted vim of an Astaire and Rogers musical number.  


LEGACY OF BLOOD
The Dean family patriarch has died and left a fortune to his children and servants. The occasion soon turns grim when they discover they must all must spend an entire week at the family estate - together. It's all the same old family routine: backbiting, billiards, rumors and innuendo, canings, pantsuits and ham - until one by one, they start turning up dead.


Les Statues meurent aussi (Statues also Die)
1953/b&w/30 min.; Dir: Alain Resnais, Chris Marker.
Long suppressed by the French government, Resnais and Chris Marker's Les Statues meurent aussi explores European culture's misuse of African sacred art. 


THE LONELINESS OF THE LONG DISTANCE RUNNER
1962, Warner Bros., 103 min. As he did in ANGER, director Tony Richardson once more perfectly captures the ashen, grey atmosphere of working class England, a kingdom of crushed dreams. Tom Courtenay is the oldest son of his large, nearly impoverished family. When his father dies, he is pushed over the brink into a hopeless rat race of trying to live up to his new role as breadwinner. Caught after robbing a bakery, he’s sent to a reform school run by tradional, yet fair governor, Michael Redgrave. Recognized as a potential long distance runner during soccer, Courtenay’s soon offered the opportunity to compete, something that could lead to a brighter future... or not.


THE LONG HAUL
(1957) Directed by Ken Hughes
Racketeering is the principal cargo in this well-tuned tale about a trucker in trouble. Victor Mature (in a role intended for Marlon Brando) plays Harry Miller, a deactivated G.I. stranded in England with his Liverpudlian wife. Harry signs on as a driver for a lorry combine only to find that mobsters rule the road. Joe Easy (Patrick Allen), the ruthless thug who runs Easy Hauling, plays it fast and loose with his freight, but not as loose as his curvaceous cohort Lynn (Diana Dors, the British Monroe). Once Harry catches sight of her, Dors becomes the soft shoulder on a road to nowhere. Though Hell Drivers emphasizes rivalry among the drivers themselves, both of these big wheelers saw the hauling biz as a shiftless world of lowballers and hijackers. Caught up in the momentum, Harry must choose between a pedestrian life with wife and child and the felonious fast lane.The Long Haul offers no rest stop for the wicked. ––Steve Seid, Pacific Film Archive.
Based on the novel by Mervyn Mills. Producer: Maxwell Setton. Screenwriter: Ken Hughes. Cinematographer: Basil Emmott. Editor: Raymond Poulton. Cast: Victor Mature, Diana Dors, Gene Anderson. 35mm, B/W, 88 min. 


LOOK BACK IN ANGER
Richard Burton stars in Tony Richardson's adaptation of John Osborne's  explosive "angry young man" play. Claire Bloom co-stars in the intense drama, one of the definitive British "kitchen sink" films of the 1950s and '60s. Tony Richardson---Great Britain---1959---99 mins.


LYNNE SACHS & MARK STREET'S GARDEN OF VERSES. 6-10pm. From archival snips of an educational film on the weather to cine-poems in full blossom, New York film "avant-gardeners" Sachs & Street cultivate an evening of cinematic seeds and mordant vines. Short films=2 0reap audio-visual crops from the fertile soil of the filmmakers' florid imaginations. In this mulch of visual ruminations on nature's topsy-turvy shakeup of our lives, they ponder a city child's tentative excavation of the urban forest,winter wheat, and the great American deluge of the 21st Century.


MANIAC, 1980, Analysis Film Releasing, 87 min. Dir. William Lustig. Character actor extraordinaire Joe Spinell wrote the script and plays the title role in this deeply disturbing portrait of a man whose abusive upbringing turns him into a serial killer.


Man on Wire
Directed by James Marsh
Produced by Simon Chinn
In 1974, Philippe Petit stepped out on a wire illegally rigged between New York’s twin towers, in a feat that became known as “the artistic crime of the century.” Petit and some of his co-conspirators recall this extraordinary adventure in this Oscar®-winning documentary. 35mm. 94 mins.


Mildred Pierce
1945/b&w/113 min. | Scr: Ranald MacDougall; dir: Michael Curtiz, w/ Joan Crawford, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Ann Blyth.
A woman turns herself into a business tycoon to win her selfish daughter a place in society. 


MONDO MOD, 1967, 72 min. Dir. Bethel Buckalew. Narrated by KHJ disc jockey Humble Harv, the film is a full-color, self-indulgent pastiche of what made Los Angeles teenagers tick in '66. You'll hit Belinda boutique on the Sunset Strip, where the owner encourages wearing micro-minis with nothing underneath. Check Hollywood Boulevard hip at Lewin’s Records. Karate is clearly mod, as inspired by the Green Hornet’s Bruce Lee. LSD trips, bongo-blastin’ pot parties, a bird’s-eye view of dancing inside Whisky a Go Go, surfing and more. Those of us who lived here then feel as if we were cast out of Eden, so at the very least, MONDO MOD provides a glimpse of that time. 


The Monkees, L.A. NUGGETS
approx. 120 min. Revisit the ’60s with four episodes of the Monkees' Emmy Award-winning television series: "The Case of the Missing Monkee," "Monkees Marooned," "The Chaperone" and "The Frodis Caper." These rare 35mm prints have never been screened theatrically and feature unique soundtracks unheard since 1973 (and unavailable in this form on DVD)! Monkees authority Andrew Sandoval will treat the audience to some rare trailers and commercials featuring the pre-fab foursome.  Discussion with key songwriter Bobby Hart and other surprise guests.


MONKEY BUSINESS, 1931, Universal, 77 min. Dir. Norman Z. McLeod. The Marx Brothers are stowaways on an ocean liner, wreaking havoc and getting mixed up with gangsters as well as Thelma Todd.


Mon oncle d'Amérique
1980/color/123 min. | Scr: Jean Gruault; dir: Alain Resnais; w/ Gérard Depardieu, Nicole Garcia, Roger Pierre.
Interweaving fact and fiction, science and art, biography and melodrama, Resnais's playful hit film finds workaholic Depardieu in the middle of a downsizing panic, ambitious intellectual and media executive Pierre pursing a political career, and talented but seldom employed actress Garcia lost somewhere in between.  All three take solace in the hope of being delivered from the pressures of their lives by a sudden inheritance from the mythical "American uncle" of the title. Interspersed with scientific interludes by real-life biologist Henri Laborit—whose theories describe how our most basic drives and "natural" instincts are determined by cultural forces—Mon oncle d'Amerique melds free associations, recurring motifs, and evocative details into a work hailed by Richard Roud as "one of the greatest films about the human condition ever made." Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and a best screenplay Oscar nominee.


MOVING IMAGE ART - 7:30pm. Probing survey of cinema from pioneer Melies and experimentalist Vertov to maverick Welles and preservationist Henri Langlois. 6pm: rare Motown film of The Temptations.


Muriel ou Les temps d'un retour
1963/color/115 min. | Scr: Jean Cayrol; dir: Alain Resnais; w/ Delphine Seyrig, Jean-Pierre Kerien, Jean-Baptiste Thierrée.
Perhaps the purest expression of Renais's central theme—how the present is held captive by the past—Muriel returns the director to the concrete reality of the everyday world while maintaining an aura of mystery and strangeness. Hélène (Seyrig) is an antique dealer in the provincial port town of Boulogne-sur-Mer who obsesses on the memory of her ex-lover Alphonse (Kerien), as her stepson (Thierrée) is haunted by agonizing thoughts from his army stint in Algeria. "Offers ample rewards in the radiant surface of Sacha Vierny's color photography, Delphine Seyrig's superb performance, and the breathtaking precision of Resnais's conception."—Tom Milne.


The Mystery of the Wax Museum
This classic Technicolor thriller set in a wax museum combines the eerie atmosphere of the silent German Expressionist classics, elaborate and intimidating Art Deco set design, and classic '30s horror tricks –- dark, rainy London streets, lengthy periods of silence, long shadows on the wall -– to make one of the creepiest mystery films of its decade. The third and final Warner Brothers feature filmed in the improved two-color Technicolor system, which enhanced both the color and clarity of the film, Mystery of the Wax Museum features gorgeous, sensual pastel tones in its rendering of 1921 London and 1933 New York City. From prolific Hungarian director Michael Curtiz, of The Mad Genius and Doctor X (not to mention later classics like Casablanca) fame, Mystery of the Wax Museum is a landmark of early color, and early-'30s pre-Code horror films.
Dir. Michael Curtiz, 1933, 35mm, 77 min.


Night and Fog (Nuit et brouillard)
1955/b&w and color/32 min. | Scr: Jean Cayrol; dir: Alain Resnais.
Resnais' immortal short film is a lucid meditation on the Nazi concentration camps ten years after their liberation. The director's subtle counterpoint of present and past, color tracking shots of the camps' ruins, and stark black and white newsreel footage, is heightened by the lyrical narrative of Cayrol.


NIGHT AND THE CITY
(1950) Directed by Jules Dassin
Richard Widmark’s trademark combination of sleazy glibness and sweaty desperation finds its ideal expression in the role of London club tout and compulsive striver Harry Fabian. Described by a rival as "an artist without an art," Fabian attempts to make his mark as a promoter in the Greco-Roman wrestling racket, a sport that takes brutality to the level of art both in and out of the ring. With its chiaroscuro cinematography and stylized portrayals of underworld characters—Francis L. Sullivan as a grotesque club owner, Googie Withers as his ambitious wife, Herbert Lom as a vicious racketeer, Polish champion wrestler Stanislaus Zbyszko as "Gregorius the Great"—the film sketches a place that is nominally London but really a realm of fevered urban imagination. The recurring image is of Fabian scrambling through dark alleys, trying and failing to get ahead of his fate—an appropriate motif for director Jules Dassin, who made the film while in exile from McCarthy-era Hollywood. —Juliet Clark, Pacific Film Archive.
Twentieth Century Fox. Based on the novel by Gerald Kersh. Producer: Darryl F. Zanuck. Screenplay: Jo Eisinger. Cinematographer: Max Greene. Cast: Richard Widmark, Gene Tierney, Googie Withers, Hugh Marlowe, Francis L. Sullivan. 35mm, B/W, 95 min. 


NIGHTMARE IN BLOOD
A horror film convention comes to town, bringing with it the mysterious actor Malakai, known for his many roles in vampire films. What the unsuspecting film fans don't know is that Malakai is a real creature of the night and hungry for human blood. A tongue-in-cheek spoof of horror films, this feature provides a few good scares and a ton of in-jokes for the horror buffs.  John Stanley---USA---1978---90 mins. 


NIGHT OF THE CREEPS
1986, Sony Repertory, 88 min. Director’s Cut.  When a couple of pledges thaw out the corpse of a fraternity member who was infected by aliens, they unleash a zombie epidemic on campus. A loving homage to the B movies of the 1950s. MONSTER SQUAD auteur Fred Dekker directs this cult favorite that gave Tom Atkins the role of a lifetime. "The good news is your dates are here. The bad news is...they're dead." Discussion following with director Fred Dekker.  


NIGHT OF THE DEMONS
All hell breaks loose at a Halloween party held at an abandoned funeral home when a very ugly, malevolent evil possesses the guests in this low-grade B-horror flick. A variety of imaginative, gory killings and dismemberments steal the show, including one of the weirdest moments in splatter film history.  Kevin Tenney---USA---1988---90 mins.


THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER, 1955, Sony Repertory, 93 min. Dir. Charles Laughton. Robert Mitchum is astonishing as a sociopathic wandering preacher who uses his fire-and-brimstone fundamentalism to mask his schemes to bilk money from gullible yokels or, when that doesn’t work, to blithely rob and murder them.


NO ORCHIDS FOR MISS BLANDISH
(1948) Directed by St. John L. Clowes
"It has all the morals of an alley cat and the sweetness of a sewer!" blared a contemporary review of this controversial 1948 noir. No Orchids bubbled forth from the depths of British Poverty Row studio Renown to shock the English nation with its casual brutality (multiple murders in cold blood in the opening reel, another killing involving a grandfatherly innocent bystander) and leering perversion ("I don’t have ta drink ta want you," opines one ruthless Romeo). The film concerns a hard-partying society dame who falls for her vicious kidnapper, a crime syndicate overlord. Simultaneously revolting and revolutionary, its Z-grade budget, inexpressive cast, and total disregard for bourgeois sensibility make No Orchids play like some unholy alliance of Ed Wood and Georges Bataille, a Poverty Row Grand Guignol. Monthly Film Bulletin declared it "the most sickening exhibition of brutality, perversion, sex and sadism ever to be shown on a cinema screen"—in other words, unmissable. —Jason Sanders, Pacific Film Archive.
Based on the novel by James Hadley Chase. Producer: George Minter. Screenplay: St. John L. Clowes. Cinematographer: Gerald Gibbs. Cast: Jack La Rue, Linden Travers, Hugh McDermott. 35mm, B/W, 102 min. 


NOOSE
(a.k.a. The Silk Noose)
(1948) Directed by Edmond T. Greville
"We don’t have any gangsters here," claims a London newspaper editor to his hot-to-trot reporter from Chicago at the beginning of this energetic programmer, a fascinating combination of American noir aesthetics with British slang, style, and location. Yankee fashion hound Linda Medbury (Carole Landis, who died tragically after the film was made) quickly proves her boss wrong, uncovering a ruthless London crime ring led by the fast-talking Bar Gorman and the slick Sugiani, neither of whom will stop at killing women to keep their empire going. Fortunately Linda’s got her British hubby on her side, an ex-commando who’s organized a gang of his own (complete with Chelsea jerseys) to help smash the syndicate. A John Alton–esque sense of light and shadow, as well as director Edmond Greville’s impressive visual flourishes, provide a flair that’s pure Hollywood noir, but the zippy insults, class concerns, and seedy postwar settings are as British as they come. —Jason Sanders, Pacific Film Archive.
Producer: Edward Dryhurst. Screenplay: Richard Llewellyn. Cinematographer: Hone Glendining. Cast: Carole Landis, Derek Farr, Joseph Calleia, Nigel Patrick, Stanley Holloway. 35mm, B/W, 95 min. 


THE OCTOBER MAN
(1947) Directed by Roy Ward Baker
"I couldn’t have done it . . . could I?" In a twist on the wrong-man theme, this hybrid of playful murder mystery and psychological melodrama stars John Mills as an innocent man whose own self-doubt makes him a suspect. After a bus accident kills a child in his care and leaves him with a fractured skull and troubled mind, Mills seeks refuge in a small hotel whose very proper residents greet him with a mixture of curiosity and condescension. When an attractive lodger goes out to post a letter and doesn’t return, the neighbors, the police, and Mills himself all begin to wonder whether he might be responsible. Erwin Hillier’s cinematography shrouds the action in an atmosphere of misty, pervasive melancholia, and Mills brings an otherworldly, fretful presence to Eric Ambler’s alternately sardonic and empathetic scenario, which hints at the struggles of men shattered not by accident but by the recent war. —Juliet Clark, Pacific Film Archive.
Based on the novel by E. Ambler. Producer: Eric Ambler. Screenplay: Eric Ambler. Cinematographer: Erwin Hillier. Cast: John Mills, Joan Greenwood, Edward Chapman. 35mm, B/W, 110 min.


ONCE BITTEN
(from IMDB)
A vampire Countess needs to drink the blood of a virgin in order to keep her eternal beauty. It seems that all is hopeless, until she bumps into Mark Kendall (Jim Carrey)...  Dir. Howard Storm, 1985, 94 mins. 


ON THE NIGHT OF THE FIRE
(1939) Directed by Brian Desmond Hurst
Ralph Richardson stars as Kobling, an upwardly mobile barber desperate to escape the crushing poverty of his grubby neighborhood. When his status-conscious wife racks up debts at the local department store, Kobling pays the proprietor with stolen Pounds Sterling. When the cops trace the store’s bank deposit to stolen bills, the proprietor threatens Kobling with blackmail. What begins as a petty theft soon turns to murder and a frightening witch-hunt by the townspeople. With noir-ish elements, this frank and fatalistic drama paints a nightmarish vision of working class Britain.
Based on the novel by F.L. Green. Producer: Jeff Somlo. Screenplay: Brian Desmond Hurst, Patrick Kirwan, Terence Young. Cinematographer: Günther Krampf. Cast: Ralph Richardson, Diana Wynyard, Romney Brent. 35mm, 84 min.  


THE PAD (AND HOW TO USE IT), 1966, 88 min. Dir. Brian G. Hutton. This obscure ’60s feature (adapted from a stage play) follows the exploits of a lonely bachelor hoping to find love at a symphonic recital who instead finds himself mixed up with a sexy swinger turned on by the Sunset Strip scene. A color copycat combination of Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine in THE APARTMENT and Richard Lester’s 1965 THE KNACK AND HOW TO GET IT, THE PAD’S ’66 L.A. spin features a healthy dose of Whisky a Go Go footage when the place was still cool, and folks there knew how to DANCE. Red Velvet house band The Knickerbockers (of "Lies" and "One Track Mind" fame) are featured on stage; that alone makes this rarely seen Hollywood hacker flick a worthy trip for the discriminating L.A. Nuggets audience.


Pee-Wee's Big Adventure
Paul F. Tompkins presents
Pee-Wee's Big Adventure
For September’s CDR night, we welcome comedian Paul F. Tompkins (Mr. Show, The Sarah Silverman Progra),  who's picked Tim Burton's 1985 debut Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, a film which never ceases to delight. Paul: "The movie is funny and silly and inventive and old-fashioned, yes, but overall it seems to revel in the pure joy of comedy. It's as if the movie is saying, 'What's better than laughing?'"
Dir. Tim Burton, 1985, 35mm, 90 min. 


Phantom of the Opera 
This grand version of Gaston Leroux’s classic is as much a grand romantic opera as it is a horror film, which may be why it got the Technicolor treatment usually reserved for westerns, musicals, and other spectacles. And while perhaps not as beloved among horror fans as other versions of the tale (the emphasis here is on the word OPERA), it has a real and understandable following among music lovers and classic film fans. Claude Raines (beloved for his work in Casablanca & The Invisible Man) delivers a sympathetic performance as the Phantom, and real opera singers like Nelson Eddy and 18-year-old songbird Suzanne Foster were hired to play the leads and sing its Oscar-nominated music. This million-dollar risk for Paramount paid off; crane-shots, massive and spectacular sets (including a full-scale re-creation of the Paris Opera house), and gorgeous photography make this the most lush adaptation of the tale set to celluloid.
Dir. Arthur Lubin, 92 minutes, 35mm, 1943.


The Picture of Dorian Gray 
Though The Picture of Dorian Gray came several years after a cycle of “classic” horror films like Dracula, Frankenstein and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Albert Lewin’s version of Oscar Wilde’s strange tale is psychological horror at its best. Lewin, a friend of the Surrealists and collector of their art, began directing after decades of working as a writer-producer. His penchant for high stylization and his fascination with unusual protagonists with dark obsessions made for the best, and most faithful adaptation of Wilde’s famous novel to date. Harry Stradling’s deep focus photography earned an Academy Award while the infamous Technicolor reveal of the eponymous portrait is an iconic fright film image; the painting itself -- an original by American magical realist Ivan Albright -- is one of the most horrifying images ever featured in film, a surreal reflection of what each of us can become if we lose our humanity to careless egotism.
Dir. Albert Lewin, 1945, 35mm, 110 min.


Plan 9 From Outer Space
For the uninitiated, Mr. Wood was a filmmaker who pooled all his resources to make movies in the '50s and '60s; the thing is, the films aren’t very good. In fact, they're legendarily "bad", at least by any conventional definition -- glued together with the no-budget, eager showmanship that later gave him the unfair title of "Worst Director Ever" and a fervent cult following from Danzig to Tim Burton. But let’s destroy the “so-bad-it's-good” term. Ed Wood made lovable movies with strong atmosphere, awkward dialogue, implausible plots and a static style that is as strange and seductive as it is hilarious. It's been 50 years since he made his magnum opus, Plan 9 from Outer Space -- with an all-star cast of Tor Johnson, Vampira, Criswell, Bela Legosi -- and we're here to celebrate with a rare 35mm screening!
Dir. Ed Wood, 1959, 35mm, 79 min.


Return of the Demon
(brand-new HD Transfer!)
An unjustly overlooked entry in the late ‘80s horror-comedy craze that swept Hong Kong, the generically-titled but definitely outstanding Return of the Demon pits a trio of treasure hunters against a brain-sucking demon who’s determined to become human again by killing off 47 people, extracting hteir gray matter via his spiky and very lethal headband. Wizards, hateful cops plucked from Cruising, a shitload of smashed eggs, an inexplicable human-to-canine transformation and a libidinous ghost with one hell of a nasty streak provide plenty of entertainment here, but the real surprise is a batch of sprinting zombies way before Danny Boyle made them mainstream in 28 Days Later. Good stuff all the way and still insanely hard to find, this is vintage fun from the writer of Mr. Vampire and more fun than being kicked upside the head by a pissed-off Chinese demon from hell.
Dir. Ying Wong, 1987, HDCAM, 96 min.


The Return of the Jerry Beck Animated Spook-tacular!
Trick or treat, a few weeks early. For the second year in a row, animation historian Jerry Beck will be screaming… err, screening a selection of strange and creepy Halloween related animated cartoons using vintage prints in 16mm and 35mm. Prepare to be dazzled by animated witches, warlocks, goblins, pumpkin-heads, black cats and friendly ghosts! Milton the Monster, Casper, and all the famous monsters of filmland will be here. Special guest animators will show their films and discuss their ghastly influences.


The Revenge of Frankenstein 
The true superstars of Hammer horror -- director Terence Fisher and DP Jack Asher -- are back in action for this first sequel to the taboo shattering The Curse of Frankenstein. Tossing Mary Shelley right out the window, Hammer advertised the entirely original creation as “the World’s Greatest Horrorama” in “Supernatural Technicolor.” While British critics declared it “a crude sort of entertainment for a crude sort of audience,” your mileage may vary. Peter Cushing is in top form as the indefatigable Baron F, but the one to watch is Michael Gwynne as Frankenstein’s Monster, a devilishly handsome sod who passed through society’s meat-grinder to become a slobbering hunchback with a ravening hunger for human flesh. Hammer’s crowning glory is its “Frankenstein” series, of which this entry is one of the best.
Dir. Terence Fisher, 1958, 35mm, 89 min.


ROBERT BEAVERS IN PERSON
This presentation of work by avant-garde filmmaker Robert Beavers represents the filmmaker’s Los Angeles debut, after a career spanning from the mid-1960s to the present day, and is organized in conjunction with the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, who will present Beavers’ complete cycle.
"Beavers’ films occupy a noble place within the history of avant-garde film, positioned at the intersection of structural and lyrical filmmaking traditions. They seem to embody the ideals of the Renaissance in their fascination with perception, psychology, literature, the natural world, architectural space, musical phrasing and aesthetic beauty." -Susan Oxtoby, Pacific Film Archive


SANTA CLAUS CONQUERS THE MARTIANS
The children of Mars are in a funk, and nothing on the red planet seems to be able to cheer them up. Martian King Kimar comes up with the only reasonable solution: kidnap Santa Claus from Earth's North Pole and bring him to their planet to make toys for their joyless, listless little green kids. Meanwhile, two Earth children get wise to the plan and are abducted along with Santa to prevent them from talking to the authorities. Luckily for them, Dropo, the Jerry Lewis of the fourth planet from the sun, is there to help them. The fiendish plot doesn't go according to plan, and there's plenty of intrigue, double-crossing, mistaken identity and stock footage for kids of all ages and planets to enjoy.
Poorly conceived, sloppily made, and unfailingly bizarre, "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians" is the ultimate Christmas movie-riffing classic (as fans of MST3K know) which is why Cinematic Titanic chose to revisit, re-riff, and release this holiday hamfest with all new jokes. Merry Crap-mas!



SATURDAY NIGHT AND SUNDAY MORNING
Albert Finney became a star and made this British New Wave film--Reisz' first feature--a box office hit with the defiant phrase, "Don't let the bastards grind you down." Finney's brooding performance as the young Nottingham factory worker lashing out at the working class and his "dead from the neck up" parents is still fresh today. With Shirley Anne Field, Bryan Pringle, Hylda Baker, Norman Rossington, Colin Blakely and Rachel Roberts. Karel Reisz---Great Britain---1960---89 mins.


SEDUCED AND ABANDONED
One of the funniest Italian films ever--a comedy about the Sicilian code of honor, in which an unexpected chain of events is set in motion after an equally unexpected seduction, with truly hilarious results. With Stefania Sandrelli. "About as brutal as a comedy can be and still be funny" (The New York Times). In Italian with English subtitles.  Pietro Germi---Italy---1964---117 mins. 


60s L.A. Promotional Film Potpourri.  From deep in the archives of local arcana, we bring you back to a time when "music videos" were known by a name better suited to their true purpose: "promotional films." As part of this flavor-based presentation, see The Mamas & The Papas foolin’ around inside Sunset Strip youthquake boutique deVoss, Sonny & Cher recording at Gold Star Studios, Boyce & Hart trapezing around Hollywood Boulevard singing "Out and About" and The Turtles prancing all over the Strip, with stops at The Plush Pup and Pandora’s Box. 


THE SKULL
(1965) Directed by Freddie Francis
Do you dare look through the eyes of the Marquis de Sade? How about through his eye sockets? That’s just one of the shocking special effects shots in this Technicolor creepfest starring Peter Cushing as Dr. Christopher Maitland, a collector of Occult objects who acquires the Marquis’ skull only to become possessed by the evil spirit it holds within. Christopher Lee plays a fellow collector who tries to warn his friend before the skull strikes again! Director Freddie Francis, better known as the cinematographer on such films as Karel Reisz’s Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960) and David Lynch’s The Elephant Man (1980), fills the Cinemascope frame with the lurid details of the devilish artifacts in Maitland’s study, stoking the atmosphere of doom and dread in this psychological tale of terror.
Producer: Milton Subotsky, Max Rosenberg. Screenplay: Milton Subotsky. Cinematographer: John Wilcox. Editor: Oswald Hafenrichter. Cast: Peter Cushing, Patrick Wymark, Christopher Lee, Jill Bennett, Nigel Green. 16mm, 83 min. 


SOCIETY, 1989, Zecca Films, 99 min. Dir. Brian Yuzna. Billy suspects something isn’t quite right in his upper-class suburban neighborhood, and he’s right: Cannibalism and incest are just the beginning of the horrors going on behind closed doors.


SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES, 1983, Disney, 95 min. Dir. Jack Clayton. A strange carnival comes to a small town, bringing with it Mr. Dark (Jonathan Pryce), a sinister impresario who bewitches many of the town’s inhabitants with apparent answers to their dreams. Or is it their nightmares? Ray Bradbury adapted the screenplay from his novel. Writer Ray Bradbury will introduce the screening. From 4 - 7 PM, Ray Bradbury will attend a reception and book signing at Every Picture Tells A Story, introducing a new limited edition print of his painting, THE DARK CARNIVAL.


Spooky Encounters
While the most famous “hopping” vampire film ever made is still Mr. Vampire (yes, hopping -- in China, vampires literally hop around), this tasty fix of hilarious horror came first, and is actually better in many respects. A vehicle for moon-faced martial arts favorite Sammo Hung (who also directed), it’s better known in American Chinatown circles as Encounters of the Spooky Kind. The plot’s your standard haunted house chestnut about a guy who decides to show off his bravery by staying in a spooky house overnight, while the nasty guy who’s schtupping his wife decides to bump him off by hiring a black magician to infest the house with the undead. Armed with only a few handy Taoist tips, our hero faces the spoooooookiest night of his life! Only slightly more mature than your average Scooby-Doo episode, this turbo-charged horror comedy pays off with a slam-bang climax you have to see to believe. Spring on over for the coolest bouncing bloodsucker movie you’ll ever see on the big screen!
Dir. Sammo Hung Kam-Bo, 1980, 35mm 


Stavisky
1974/color/115 min. | Scr: Jorge Semprún; dir: Alain Resnais; w/ Jean-Paul Belmondo, Charles Boyer, François Périer, Anny Duperey, Claude Rich, Michael Lonsdale.
Resnais returned from a long hiatus with this voluptuous film based on the real story of Serge Alexandre Stavisky, a small-time swindler whose big connections elevated him to the level of international financier, and whose downfall caused a major political scandal that almost undid the French government in 1933. Set in the seaside resort of Biarritz and boasting elegant Art Deco sets and a Sondheim score, Resnais's Stavisky is no mere biography but an opulently staged and delicately constructed mediation on the fragility of time. Belmondo is a perfect Stavisky, Sacha Vierny's cinematography shimmers, and Boyer's Baron Raoul is peerlessly charismatic.


Strange Hostel of Naked Pleasures
This low-budget, smash-and-grab '70s Coffin Joe vehicle finds our anti-hero as an otherworldly and omnipotent demigod of death, whos dayjob is running a hotel....of death!!!! Strange Hostel of Naked Pleasures is a bit of a patchwork, with Marins even sharing directing credit, but nonetheless it features some of his best moments. The playfully smutty opening sequence in which Coffin Joe is summoned by a harem of skillfully choreographed dancers in multicolored negligees plays like a diabolical Scopitone -- the kind in which men wearing monkey masks and plastic breasts are jabbed harshly into the otherwise smooth editing flow. Of the many hypnotic and spell-casting incantations that traditionally open his films, the cosmic and colorful mobile of planets that float through the frame is one of his most beguiling. And as a cloud of strangeness encircles our hostel and its patrons in the last act, Coffin Joe implements some of his undeniable raw editing talent to create a montage of obscure imagery, striking close-ups, and simple yet stimulating effects with the natural flow of a gifted experimental filmmaker. A late night treat for us Coffin Joe connoisseurs.
Dirs. José Mojica Marins & George Michel Serkeis, 1975, DigiBeta, 90 min.


The Strange World of Coffin Joe
Based on his television series of the same name -- a kind of cross between The Twilight Zone and Tales From the Crypt -- The Strange World of Coffin Joe is an omnibus film of three tales of depravity and horror, all filmed in that silvery, Night of the Living Dead black-and-white that made gore looks so good and nightmarish in 1968. Never before has Marins’ love of horror comics seemed clear; each episode plays like a grizzly and fun E.G. Comics "monsterpiece", complete with ghoulishly ironic twist endings, lurid sexuality, and caricatured villains that meet their demise to our delight. The final sequence is of special note, with Marins joining the cast as a professor proving to a young couple through a "scientific" and sadistic experiment that love does not in fact exist, but ends in a crescendo of cannibalism that proves it does -- we all love a good Coffin Joe movie!
Dir. José Mojica Marins, 1968, DigiBeta, 80 min.


STREETS OF FIRE, 1984, Universal, 93 min. Director Walter Hill’s rock ’n’ roll-fueled pulp classic roars at you like a souped-up roadster with the radio going full blast. B-movie god Michael Pare stars as an enigmatic loner who comes back to town to see his sister (Deborah Van Valkenburg) and save former gal-pal Diane Lane from the clutches of sinister biker Willem Dafoe. 


THE STUNT MAN, 1980, 20th Century Fox, 131 min. Dir. Richard Rush. Steve Railsback plays an escaped convict who stumbles onto a film set and accidentally causes the death of a stunt man. Peter O’Toole stars as the enigmatic, god-like director who offers to hide him from the police if he will replace the stunt man and help finish the film. 


TERROR, 1979, Crown International Pictures, 87 min. Dir. Norman J. Warren. A supernatural force attacks the troubled Garrick dynasty, killing the family members off one by one.


THEATER OF BLOOD
Vincent Price plays Edward Lionheart, a demented Shakespearean actor who adds murder to his repertoire when he takes gruesome revenge on the eight critics who slighted him. With Diana Rigg, Ian Hendry, Jack Hawkins, Robert Morley and Milo O'Shea. The great cast has a lot of fun with this one.  Douglas Hickox---Great Britain---1973---105 mins.


THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT
(1938) Directed by Arthur B. Woods
Just released from prison, small-time hustler Shorty Matthews (Emlyn Williams) pays a visit to an old girlfriend–only to find her murdered in her room. Assuming the cops will finger him for the crime, he hits the road, finding refuge with long haul truckers, and later with a dance hall hostess (Konstam) and a sex crime fetishist (Ernest Thesiger, in a memorable performance). Not to be confused with the American film starring Humphrey Bogart, this British proto-noir is unapologetically gritty. "An exceptional thriller with fine feeling for locale–seedy dance halls, rain-swept highways, shabby pubs." – Elliot Stein (adapted from a note from Film Forum).
Based on the novel by J. Curtis. Producer: Jerome Jackson. Screenplay: James Curtis, Paul Gengelin, Derek Twist. Cinematographer: Basil Emmott. Cast: Emlyn Williams, Ernest Thesiger, Anna Konstam, Allan Jeayes. 35mm, 84 min. 


THE THING WITH TWO HEADS
(from IMDB)
A rich but racist man is dying and hatches an elaborate scheme for transplanting his head onto another man's body. His health deteriorates rapidly, and doctors are forced to transplant his head onto the only available candidate: a black man from death row.  Dir. Lee Frost, 1972, 93 mins.


13 GHOSTS
This haunted house classic by gimmick-loving director William Castle finds a family on the hunt for a fortune that is hid in their deceased uncle's creepy mansion populated by ghosts. Castle added an extra dimension of fun to this flick by presenting it in "Illusion-O," a process which allowed the viewer to detect hidden ghosts on the screen using special red-and-blue glasses.  William Castle---USA---1960---84 mins.


This Night I Will Possess Your Corpse
After the overwhelming success of At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul, Marins pulled out all the stops for his second picture, making the Coffin Joe movie that was perhaps his masterpiece -- and, oddly enough, a romance of sorts. Focusing on Coffin Joe's "love life," the plot is about his attempt to find a single superior woman to be his ideal mate, one that will help him in his quest to continue his bloodline by creating the "perfect" spawn, using his own perverse selection process—a kind of cross between "The Bachelor" and "Fear Factor". In almost every way, Marins ups the ante from the first film, but without losing At Midnight’s punk filmmaking pleasures (the scratched-on-film title sequence alone is shatteringly cool). You likes the tarantula crawling up a girl’s nightie? Here's an army of tarantulas! Here's a roomful of cuties for them to crawl all over! You like the nightmarish ending of the first movie? Here, in a hallucinatory and bravura dream sequence, Coffin Joe is dragged into an incredibly realized carnivelesque hell, with undulating flesh carpets and Cocteau-like body parts sticking out of icy cavernous walls, all exploding onto the screen in full bleeding color! Viva la Coffin Joe!
Dir. José Mojica Marins, 1967, 35mm, 108 min.


THIS SPORTING LIFE
Richard Harris stars as a Yorkshire coal miner who turns in his pick and helmet for a rugby uniform. First-time feature director Lindsay Anderson (If...) brings a documentary sensibility to this gritty, realistic, and intense drama about human determination. With Rachel Roberts, Alan Badel, Colin Blakely and Arthur Lowe. Nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor (Harris) and Actress (Roberts). Lindsay Anderson---Great Britain---1963---135 mins.


Top Secret!
"Weird Al" Yankovic presents
Top Secret!
Weird Al takes the Cinefamily stage for October's edition of Comedy Death-Ray! Sharing insight, music videos, and other surprises, Weird Al has also selected a classic Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker comedy to share with you all. Al sez: "It's underrated and often overlooked, but for my money, Top Secret! is the funniest movie ever made." Years before he rocked the screen as Jim Morisson, Val Kilmer played his first feature role as another kind of rock n' roller, Nick Rivers, and yes, that is actually Val Kilmer singing. A demented and hilarious cross-spoof of Elvis flicks and WWII spy thrillers in the tradition of other Zucker brothers comedies such as The Naked Gun and Airplane! Join us on the patio afterwards for beer and hot dogs.
Dir. Jim Abrahams, Jerry Zucker and David Zucker, 1984, 35mm, 90 min.


Toute la Mémoire du Monde (All the World's Memory)
In his 1956 short, Resnais channels Borges as he glides through Paris's labyrinthine Bibliothèque Nationale, which at the time housed some six million books and five million prints, and contemplates it as both a supreme ornament of civilization and a representation of the mind's inner workings. 


A Tribute To Maurice Sendak
In 1963, with just 10 short sentences, a dark and dreamy emotional landscape of hairy monsters and tropical jungles, and one wannabe feral child, Maurice Sendak created one of the most critically acclaimed and popular childrens' books of all time-- "Where the Wild Things Are".  In this loving tribute to everyone's first favorite author, the Cinefamily will show original animated adaptations (on 16mm!) of "Where the Wild Things Are" and "In the Night Kitchen", along with new short films made by Lance Bangs and Spike Jonze while the new live action adaptation of "Wild Things..." was in production. Jonze had been friends with Maurice Sendak for more than five years before he began working on his feature film, and these new short films capture a sometimes melancholy but always wickedly funny Sendak as he reflects on his Depression-era childhood in the Brooklyn shtetl, a joyous day at the World’s Fair, the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, his books "In The Night Kitchen" and "Higgledy Piggledy Pop!", his two beloved Hermans (Melville, and his German shepherd namesake), and a long-buried secret. Lance Bangs, co-director of Tell Them Anything You Want: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak will be in attendance! 


Trick ‘r Treat
A killer of a directorial debut from X2/Superman Returns screenwriter Michael Dougherty, Trick ‘r Treat is the best Halloween movie you’ve never seen. This film has been played only once before in Los Angeles and seen only by a few thousand nationwide. A vivid intersection of Halloween folk traditions, throwbacks to classic Hollywood scare fests, smart storytelling, and morbid humor, Trick ‘r Treat is a reminder of why we fell in love with Halloween in the first place. With four interwoven narratives that create the perfect poetic rhythm between horror and comedy, this film is like a gore buffet, unified by the appearance of the most adorable, devious, and memorable Halloween mascot yet. It has the perfect amount of creativity injected into a genre that has gotten way too comfortable with campy and kitschy remakes and sequels. Director Mike Dougherty will be in person to present the film, show some rare early work, and do a Q & A!
Dir. Michael Dougherty, 2008, HDCAM, 100 min.


VANISHING POINT
With its peculiar combination of drive-in movie sensationalism and a vaguely existential theme, this car chase thriller has built up a loyal cult following over the years. A former cop and race car driver (Barry Newman), now moving cars for a living, makes a bet that he can drive a spiffy Dodge from Denver to San Francisco in 15 hours. Pumped up on amphetamines and guided by the words of a blind disc jockey (Cleavon Little), the driver's high-speed gamble makes him a counter-culture hero and the police's most wanted man. A blockade seems to mark the end of the ride, but the driver has his own, unexpected plan for escape. A memorably odd film that falls somewhere between the absurd, action excesses of Gone in 60 Seconds and the far more artful Two-Lane Blacktop.   Richard C. Sarafian---USA---1971---99 mins. 


Victims
(US Premiere!) 
Cinefamily’s favorite book on exploitation cinema is the massive, well-researched tomb by Stephen Thrower, "Nightmare USA: The Untold Story Of The Exploitation Independents". Going where no in-depth study has gone before, "Nightmare USA" is the reader's guide to what lies beyond the mainstream of American horror, dispelling the shadows to meet the men and women behind fifteen classic years of exploitation's golden age of terror! We’ve asked Mr. Thrower to curate a night for our Halloween festival, and he’s cooked up a doozie. The evening starts with an incredibly rare 35mm screening of Victims (this is the US Premiere after 30 years!), a criminally-neglected gem of psychological horror bolstered by superb naturalistic performances -- a film which never even had an American theatrical release! Paulie (played by writer/director Daniel DiSomma, aka Tony Vorno) is falling to pieces. His every encounter with the opposite sex ends in violence, while stirring up memories of his prostitute mother and her brutal pimp.  Dir. Daniel DiSomma, 1977, 35mm


THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD
(2008) Directed by Andy Bichlbaum, Mike Bonanno, and Kurt Engfehr
Andy Bichlbaum and Mike Bonanno are "The Yes Men," a unique duo of disrupters who infiltrate corporate events disguised as participants to expose the dangers of a market-ruled world as their hosts/victims look helplessly on. Their second feature documentary tracks the daring pair from Bhopal, India to post-Katrina New Orleans as they pursue the unsuspecting targets of their scathingly funny brand of activism.
In person: Andy Bichlbaum, Mike Bonanno.
35mm, 90 min.