Week of Sep 22
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This Friday, September 26, marks the 50th anniversary of the premiere screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and all over LA, audiences will be doing the time warp again! The cult classic cross-dressing human-animating goth musical comedy, complete with live shadow casts and callbacks, makes several appearances across LA--as does new documentary Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
SOLD OUT: Sep 26, 7:30 PM @ Academy Museum
Tim Curry, Lou Adler, and Sins O’ The Flesh in person
SOLD OUT: Oct 04, 7:15 PM @ Hollywood Forever Cemetery
Sep 27, 11:45 PM @ Art Theater Long Beach
Bit O'Mustard in person
If you love Queer cinema, you probably watched this movie a lot in high school. Rocky Horror needs no intro--but when do you get a chance to see it on the big screen ? See venue websites for info on additional ticket drops and stand-by ticketing:
Tickets from Academy Museum
Hollywood Forever Tickets from Cinespia
Tickets from Art Theater Long Beach
Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror
Sep 25, 7:30 PM; Sep 26 & 27, 7:00 PM @ Landmark Nuart
Director Linus O'Brien in person
A wild journey into the origins of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, the biggest cult film of all time, its impact on popular culture and socio-political resonance to this day.
Tickets from Landmark Theatres
Beyond Fest
The biggest genre film festival in America is an LA institution, and returns this year with 90 films in 15 days -- the perfect transition from summer fun into spooky season. We're still combing through the list to find all the queer picks -but definitely don't miss a FREE screening of The Serpent's Skin, the sixth feature from 20-year-old Australian trans wonderkind Alice Maio Mackay, or "zombies in a drag bar" horror comedy Queens of the Dead.
Hollywood Queer Short Film Fest
The Hollywood Queer Short Film Festival brings four short film program blocks for its 9th year, October 4 & 5, screening at the Founders MCC Church.
Community Notes
A collection of items of interest to the QFLA community at large:
- New sapphic webseries "capital g great" is looking for volunteers for their LA shoot, October 6 - 15. If you're interested, fill out their interest form, or tell a friend!
- The Los Angeles LGBT Center celebrates the third annual Queerceañera celebration of Queer Latine culture, honoring drag artist Lushious Massacr and community leader Oliver Alpuche. October 3, 5:30pm : tickets available here.
- LA Center of Photography hosts a solo exhibition from Matthew Finley, whose works imagine a world in which Queer people live without shame. Opening Reception and book signing October 4 @ LACP Headquarters, RSVP here.
NewFest Streaming Online
NewFest, New York's LGBT film festival, is back this year for their 37th year October 9 - 21. That's a long trip to see some Queer movies, but their streaming pass is available to the whole United States! The virtual pass is $95 and includes all the short programs, plus some amazing feature picks including animated Teddy Award winner Lesbian Space Princess, Frameline true crime breakout Night In West Texas, and more!
Also This Week
Highway Hypnosis
Sep 28, 8:00 PM @ Whammy Analog Media
Director Ken Camp in person
Unseen since its 1984 premiere at West Hollywood’s EZTV Video Gallery, Ken Camp’s Highway Hypnosis is a disturbing meditation on the eroticism of violence and a major work of both narrative video art and queer horror.
The Los Angeles freeway killer takes a drive to Las Vegas—and back. This video by Ken Camp is both trancelike and troubling, taking the viewer across the desert of California, through Nevada, and into “the frightening zone where lay the genetic codes and memories that make us all killers.”
Tickets from Whammy Analog Media
Querelle
Sep 22, 7:30 PM @ Academy Museum
The final film made by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, this adaptation of the Jean Genet novel follows a sailor on leave in France as he simultaneously tries to cover up his involvement in a murder and embarks on a sexual odyssey of self-discovery.
¡PRESENTE!: Queer Diaspora's L.A. Latine Short Film Program!
Sep 23, 7:00 PM @ Philosophical Research Society
Filmmakers in attendance
Queer Diaspora & Friends celebrate Latine Heritage Month with a special program of shorts by local LA queer filmmakers! Co-presented by El Cine and Wachale Cineteca.
The Wedding Banquet
Sep 24, 7:30 PM @ Culver Theater
A Taiwanese-American man is happily settled in New York with his American boyfriend. He plans a marriage of convenience to a Chinese woman in order to keep his parents off his back and to get the woman a green card. Chaos follows when his parents arrive in New York for the wedding.
Camera On My Lap
Seven Short Films by Experimental South African Filmmaker Shelley Barry
Sep 25, 7:00 PM @ University of Southern California
Filmmaker Shelley Barry in person
Join for the first-ever West Coast screening of select short films by Shelley Barry, which engage disability-centered filmmaking practices to interrogate queerness, sexuality, race, and disability in the Global South.
Rebel Without a Cause
Sep 22, 7:00 PM @ Landmark Sunset
"It is of course vita that there be no inference of a questionable or homosexual relationship between Plato and Jim" wrote the MPPC censors, scolding this film from bisexual director Nicholas Ray with bi star James Dean and the "first gay teen on screen" played by out Sal Mineo.
Tickets from Landmark Theatres
All That Heaven Allows
Sep 22, 7:20 PM @ Alamo Drafthouse DTLA
The 1950s domestic melodramas of Douglas Sirk have gone on to inspire generations of Queer filmmakers: Todd Haynes, John Waters, Almodóvar, Fassbinder and more have all cited his influence on their work. This Rock Hudson starrer is a great introduction to Sirk.
Jennifer's Body
Sep 25, 7:15 PM @ Rooftop Cinema Club DTLA
Panned on release, queer film fans have since reclaimed this Diablo Cody-written horror film about a (literally) man-eating undead cheerleader and the... um... complicated relationship she has with her best female friend.
Tickets from Rooftop Cinema Club DTLA
Teorema
Double Feature with Toby Dammit
Sep 25, 9:30 PM @ Los Feliz 3
Sep 26, 8:00 PM @ Eastwood Performing Arts Center
A wealthy Italian household is turned upside down when a handsome stranger arrives, seduces every family member and then disappears. Each has an epiphany of sorts, but none can figure out who the seductive visitor was or why he came. From gay Italian auteur Pier Paolo Pasolini.
Tickets from American Cinematheque
Tickets from Eastwood PAC
Beyond Terror: Vincent Price on Television
Sep 27, 7:30 PM @ Hammer Museum
Victoria Price, author and daughter of Vincent Price in person
Golden Age horror star Vincent Price became a board member of PFLAG when his daughter Victoria came out to him in 1984, and she has written that he confided in her about intimate relationships with men. See a collection of Price's TV work in this special event.
Tickets from UCLA Film & TV Archive
Dorian Gray in the Mirror of the Yellow Press
Sep 28, 6:30 PM @ Academy Museum
Director Ulrike Ottinger in person
The final installment in Ulrike Ottinger’s Berlin Trilogy (following TICKET OF NO RETURN and FREAK ORLANDO) casts Delphine Seyrig as the nefarious Fritz Lang supervillain Dr. Mabuse, here the head of a powerful media empire that seeks to create headlines by manufacturing (and then publicly destroying) its own celebrity: the wealthy, handsome playboy Dorian Gray.
Next Week
FREE: The Serpent's Skin
Sep 30, 10:00 PM @ Los Feliz 3
Editor Vera Drew in person
Two young women form a romantic bond after discovering they have supernatural powers. Their insecurities unknowingly release a demon, which possesses one of their exes and begins feeding on their friends. As the bodies pile up, it becomes up to the women to face their pasts and stop the growing evil.
Queens of the Dead
Oct 05, 6:00 PM @ Aero Theater
Filmmaker Tina Romero and actors Nina West and Riki Lindhome in person
When a zombie apocalypse breaks out in Brooklyn on the night of a giant warehouse party, an eclectic group of drag queens, club kids, & frenemies must put aside their drama and use their unique skills to fight against the brain-thirsty, scrolling undead.
Griffin in Summer
Sep 29 & 30, 7:00 PM @ Vidiots Eagle Theater
Griffin is the most ambitious playwright of his generation. He’s also fourteen years old. When his mom hires a handsome 25-year-old handyman, Griffin’s life and his new play take an inspired turn.
Ed Wood
Oct 01, 7:30 PM @ Academy Museum
Tim Burton's biopic of legendary "worst director of all time" 1950s B-movie king (and lifelong crossdresser) Ed Wood turns 30! Make it a double feature with "Glen or Glenda." Wood's 1953 first movie about gender-crossing characters.
The Night of the Hunter
Oct 04, 4:00 PM @ Vidiots Eagle Theater
It's not just the camp value of Lillian Gish with a shotgun--this film is the only directorial effort from closeted actor Charles Laughton, and through that lens you can't help but see more in its serial-killing preacher targeting women whose sexual freedom he resents.
Psycho
Oct 05, 7:00 PM @ Old Town Music Hall
It's probably the OG problematic gender-crossed serial killer movie, but there's more Queer connections to Psycho. Anthony Perkins was boyfriend to Tab Hunter before his star turn in Psycho, and died of AIDS in 1992. The film was also remade in 1998 by gay director Gus Van Sant.
Tickets from Old Town Music Hall
