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Funeral Parade Of Roses is the next film in our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series! In the neon-lit underworld of 1960s Tokyo, Funeral Parade of Roses follows Eddie (played by gender-nonconforming pop icon Pîtâ), a young transgender nightclub performer navigating love, identity, and rivalry in the city's queer nightlife scene. As Eddie rises in popularity at a gay bar called Genet, she becomes entangled in a love triangle with Gonda, the bar’s manager, and Leda, her older rival and Gonda’s lover. An electrifying and groundbreaking brew of French New Wave, underground documentary, and psychedelic experimentalism, Funeral Parade Of Roses has always been a favorite for audiences at The Frida Cinema! 

The rumors are true! John Wilson's The History of Concrete is coming to The Frida Cinema! The plot is super normal and simple: after attending a workshop on how to write and sell a Hallmark movie, filmmaker John Wilson tries to use the same formula to sell a documentary about concrete. Don't miss this extremely informative documentary on the big screen! Enhanced Accessibility: this film has Closed Captioning capability!

Please note: the 10:00PM screening on Friday, October 16th will have an intro by our friends at Cinematic Void and The American Cinematheque! Andrzej Żuławski's unforgettable cult classic Possession is the next film in our Art House of Horrors: Presented by MUBI series! When Mark (Sam Neill) returns home to West Berlin, he discovers that his wife Anna (Isabelle Adjani) wants a divorce, and that something far stranger than another man may be tearing their marriage apart. As their relationship spirals into obsession, jealousy, and violence, Mark begins to suspect that Anna is hiding a horrifying secret. It's unclassifiable, and yet...it's a total masterpiece that finds its way back to our screens at least once a year. It's is a fever dream of marital breakdown, anchored by two astonishing performances. Isabelle Adjani (winner of Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival that year) throws herself into one of cinema’s most legendary displays of emotional and physical extremity, while the late, great Sam Neill gives a raw performance that helped introduce audiences to a face they would come to know and love for the next forty years.

It'll come as no surprise to any Jonathan Demme fan to find one of his films in our Unsung 80's Soundtracks series. From the filmmaker who gave us Q Lazzarus’ “Goodbye Horses,” Bruce Springsteen’s Oscar-winning “Streets of Philadelphia,” and, of course, the electrifying sounds of Talking Heads in Stop Making Sense, comes 1986's Something Wild, a quirky romantic comedy that gradually turns into...well, something quite wild. Jeff Daniels stars as Manhattan businessman Charles Driggs, a relatively square individual whose uneventful life is upended when he meets the mysterious and free-spirited Lulu (Melanie Griffith). After she impulsively “kidnaps” him from a restaurant, the two head out on a road trip that becomes increasingly unpredictable adventure when they cross paths with Lulu’s dangerous ex-husband, Ray Sinclair (Ray Liotta). Funny, sexy, strange, and surprisingly unsettling, Something Wild is one of the great genre-shifting movies of the 1980s, and an early showcase for the late, great Liotta. Demme fills his film with a remarkably eclectic mix of ’80s new wave, punk, rock, and pop, featuring Talking Heads, New Order, The Feelies, The Pretenders, and others. The music doesn't simply serve as background decoration; it helps chart the film’s transformation from playful road movie to something darker. The soundtrack was released as a compilation alongside the film, and like so much of Demme’s work, it reflects a director with an unusually sharp ear for music, and a knack for finding exactly the right song for the moment.

Just added: Pain in the Neck stars Lauren Payton and Alyssa Eells will be joining us in-person to host our Sapphic Vampire Double Feature! We're giving you a double dose of lesbian vampire cinema with our Daughters of Darkness + The Vampire Lovers showcase! First, travel to a secluded Belgian hotel for Harry Kümel’s Daughters of Darkness (1971), where newlyweds Stefan and Valerie encounter the mysterious Countess Elizabeth Báthory (Delphine Seyrig) and her beautiful companion Ilona. What begins as an uneasy encounter soon becomes a decadent nightmare with all kinds of twist and turns. And then, after a 10 minute intermission... Sink your teeth into Hammer’s The Vampire Lovers (1970), Roy Ward Baker’s lush adaptation of Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla. Ingrid Pitt stars as the seductive and deadly Carmilla, who sets her sights on a succession of young women, including the innocent Emma Morton (Madeline Smith), in one of Hammer’s most unabashedly sensual horror films. About Pain in the Neck: After the apocalypse hits Hollywood, Ruby’s acting career is dead, her landlord’s a chatty zombie, and her roommate, Helena, is a vampire that drinks her blood in exchange for protection. As the two big personalities clash, Ruby and Helena struggle through self-tapes, jealousy, and sharing a bedroom. Ruby and Helena’s arrangement should be simple– it shouldn’t involve falling in love. (Spoiler: none of the gay characters die, because one of them is already undead.) ⁠ Pain in the Neck is an 8-episode series that premiered on 9/17 on YouTube @ButterflyAndBat.TV, with weekly episodes leading up to Halloween! One ticket gets you access to both films. There will be a ten minute intermission. Frida Cinema discounts and comp passes DO apply!

Two unforgettable faces from the strange world of David Lynch are taking center stage in a very special one-night-only double feature at The Frida on October 22nd: I Don’t Know Jack + I Know Catherine, the Log Lady. And as an added bonus, the directors of both films, Chris Leavens and Richard Green will be joining us for a Q&A between screenings! And Robert Broski (Episode 8 "Gotta Light" Woodsman) will be the judge for the costume contest! First up is I Don’t Know Jack (2002), the documentary portrait of Jack Nance, the unforgettable star of Eraserhead and one of Lynch’s most distinctive recurring collaborators. Through interviews with friends, family, and fellow artists, including David Lynch and Catherine Coulson, Chris Leavens’ film explores the complicated life and career of the man behind Henry Spencer, Pete Martell, and so many other unforgettable characters. Then, meet the woman behind the log. Director Richard Green’s I Know Catherine, the Log Lady (2025) goes far beyond Margaret Lanterman, exploring the extraordinary life of Catherine Coulson as an actress, artist, mother, friend, and longtime Lynch collaborator. Featuring Lynch, Kyle MacLachlan, Grace Zabriskie, Mark Frost, and many others, the film culminates in Coulson's final days, when she returned to the role of the Log Lady for Twin Peaks: The Return. Two documentaries. Two remarkable artists. One beautifully Lynchian family tree. Please join us for this very special event.  One ticket gets you access to both films. Doors open at 7:00PM, and the films will begin at 7:30PM. There will be a Q&A during the intermission. 

Asylum Brewing is hosting its first short horror film festival, Asylum after Dark! They'll be showcasing 8 independent short horror films. The full lineup is below: The Projectionist directed by Dean Dezara, Bluebeard's Bride directed by Enrique Carlos Acosta, Quarantine directed by Russ Emanuel, The All Star Massacre directed by Sam Gentile, The Strawberries directed by Nicholas Luciano, Amongst Us directed by LiLi Educo, The Trail directed by Steven Alfred Neino & Daniel BadApple Ramirez, and There's Some Gold in Them Hills directed by Jonathan Davis Austin! This program is a venue rental engagement. Member discounts and Frida Cinema comp passes not valid. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of The Frida Cinema or its staff.

Are you ready to make television history? The Frida Cinema is bringing in a limited run of Primetime, the fascinating new docudrama from director Lance Oppenheim, starring Robert Pattinson, Merritt Wever, Skyler Gisondo, and Phoebe Bridgers. In 2006, To Catch a Predator host Chris Hansen sets out to make television history. When a high stakes operation goes fatally wrong, his veneered dream of fame curdles into a nightmare of performative justice. About as provocative as mainstream art house thriller can get, Primetime is an electric and audacious entry into the A24 canon filled to the brim with with brilliant performances. Enhanced Accessibility Options: this film has Closed Captioning, Assisted Listening, and Audio Description capability!

You can’t run from who you are. Our first Volunteer of the Month pick for October 2026 comes courtesy of Dorian, who has Luca Guadagnino's cannibalistic road trip movie, Bones and All!   Abandoned by her father, a young woman embarks on a thousand-mile odyssey through the backroads of America where she meets a disenfranchised drifter. But despite their best efforts, all roads lead back to their terrifying pasts and to a final stand that will determine whether their love can survive their otherness. With Taylor Russell delivering a heartbreaking performance alongside Timothée Chalamet, Mark Rylance, and Michael Stuhlbarg, Guadagnino turns cannibalism into an unexpectedly tender metaphor, culminating in one of the oddest films of his career. Which, if you know his work, is really saying something! 

Jointly with The Cricket and the Muddy Adventure, In Waves is the first animated feature to be accepted to Viet Film Fest. They will be presenting the English dub of the film, which is being shown out-of-competition. And as an added bonus, director Phương Mai Nguyễn and author AJ Dungo will be joining us for a post-screening Q&A! Adapted from AJ Dungo’s 2019 graphic novel of the same name, Phuong Mai Nguyen’s adaptation of In Waves follows AJ (Will Sharpe) and Kristen (Stephanie Hsu) in a romantic drama set amid Southern Californian suburbia and beaches. AJ, a shy skateboarder and illustrator, meets Kristen, a surfer, at a dance. From there, they will share a love that will be tested when Kristen falls ill. Over time, that love will endow both with warmth and the strength they need to persevere, expressed through both drawing and surfing. Director Phuong Mai Nguyen returns to VFF a decade after winning the Grand Jury Trống Đồng Award for Best Short Film with Chez moi (My Home; VFF 2016) – still the only animated film that has ever won an award at VFF. Her film’s visual style is a blend of influences: Dungo’s graphic novel, French animation’s diverse heritage and present, the portraits of David Hockney, and its distinct SoCal setting (including VFF’s native Orange County). And that style is thanks to a number of animation studios across France using Blender to create the film’s distinct 2D/3D hybrid aesthetic. Bringing down the curtains on VFF 2026’s in-person screenings is this unique piece of independent European animation, upholding the love that makes it beautiful.

Grab your favorite broom and caldron and head to The Frida Cinema as we team up with our friends at OC Pride for our annual screening of the 1993 classic Hocus Pocus!  After 300 years of slumber, three sister witches are accidentally resurrected in Salem on Halloween night, and it is up to three kids and their newfound feline friend to put an end to the witches' reign of terror once and for all. Although Hocus Pocus did not achieve major box office success upon its release, it has since become a cult classic. Its mix of humor, magic, and Halloween-themed adventure has cemented its place as a seasonal favorite. The film’s playful take on witchcraft, combined with its memorable characters and enchanting soundtrack, continues to captivate audiences of all ages.

Just added: Author Julian David Stone will be joining us to introduce the film and sell copies of his novel, It’s Alive!, in the lobby in the lobby!  Before Frankenstein. Before the Wolf Man. Before the Mummy. There was… Dracula! Our Universal Monster Movie Weekend begins with the film that started it all: Tod Browning’s immortal 1931 classic Dracula! When solicitor Renfield (Dwight Frye) travels to a remote castle in Transylvania to help Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) finalize a real estate transaction, he has no idea he’s dealing with one of the most dangerous creatures on Earth. Soon, the seductive vampire has followed him to London, where he sets his sights on the innocent Mina Seward (Helen Chandler) and begins feeding on the city’s unsuspecting residents. Adapted from Bram Stoker’s legendary novel and featuring Bela Lugosi’s iconic, hypnotic performance, Dracula transformed the vampire from literary monster into one of the most recognizable figures in popular culture. Its eerie atmosphere, expressionistic shadows, unforgettable imagery, and Lugosi’s unmistakable screen presence helped establish the Universal Monsters as one of Hollywood’s greatest cinematic legacies.

Just added: Author Julian David Stone will be joining us to introduce the film and sell copies of his novel, It's Alive!, in the lobby!  One man. One monster. One of the greatest horror films ever made. Our Universal Monster Movie Weekend continues with James Whale’s Frankenstein, the 1931 masterpiece that gave the movies one of their most enduring monsters. Obsessed with unlocking the secret of life, the brilliant but reckless Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) robs graves and assembles a body from stolen parts, bringing his creation to life with a bolt of lightning. But the creature (Boris Karloff) is not the mindless monster Henry expected. Rejected and feared by everyone he encounters, he soon becomes the target of a terrified mob. Adapted from Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel, Frankenstein remains one of the foundational works of American horror, balancing genuine terror with a surprising amount of sympathy for its misunderstood creature. Boris Karloff’s performance turned the Monster into an icon, while James Whale’s striking production design and unforgettable laboratory sequence helped define the visual language of the Universal Monsters for generations to come.

Get your popcorn ready and start your Halloween week with a fright! The Frida Cinema would like to invite you to the 6th Annual Spooktacular Special on Saturday, Oct 24th! The Spooktacular is an opportunity for local filmmakers and artists to showcase their work on the big screen. This year’s film submissions have a variety of flavors and emotions, from the macabre to the melancholy. There’s something spooky for everyone, so come on down! The show starts at 5:00PM! Special thanks to Santa Ana’s own Tony Ochoa for curating and hosting the event!  Please note: we are still taking submissions. If interested in submitting, please see the link below. Deadline is October 18th. Link to submit - https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfr2-QRveG_PIpntzij8tezeCusMr-PW9QqpgEnXP6VuV86Tg/viewform

Our Universal Monster Movie Weekend howls on with The Wolf Man! When Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr.) returns to his family’s ancestral home in Wales, a chance encounter with a mysterious gypsy named Maleva (Maria Ouspenskaya) and a bite from a werewolf named Bela (Bela) sends his life spiraling into terror. As the full moon rises, Larry transforms into a bloodthirsty beast...and with every transformation, he becomes less certain that there’s anything left of the man he once was. Directed by George Waggner and written by Curt Siodmak, The Wolf Man gave Universal its definitive werewolf, complete with the silver bullets, full-moon mythology, and tragic curse that would become staples of the genre. But beneath the makeup and monster mayhem is a genuinely melancholy story about a man desperately trying to escape a fate he cannot control, brought to life by Lon Chaney Jr. in the defining performance of his career.

After you've spent all day with Universal’s greatest monsters, it’s time to unleash them on Abbott and Costello! Universal Monster Movie Weekend comes closes its opening night with the 1948 classic Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein! Wilbur (Lou Costello) and Chick (Bud Abbott) are a couple of freight handlers who have the unfortunate job of delivering the remains of Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) and the Frankenstein Monster (Lon Chaney Jr.) to a wax museum. Naturally, the crates don’t stay closed for long. Soon, Wilbur finds himself caught in a scheme involving Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster, and the Wolf Man...and nobody is more terrified than the guy who thinks the whole thing is a joke. Directed by Charles Barton, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein is far more than a monster mash comedy. It’s a loving send-off to Universal’s classic horror cycle, bringing Bela Lugosi back to his most iconic role and giving Lon Chaney Jr. and Glenn Strange one last glorious collision of monsters and mayhem. 

After a decade of silence...the buzz came back. HorrorBuzz is slicing up our October lineup with a 40th anniversary party of unhinged insanity: Tobe Hooper’s gloriously deranged sequel The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2! When late-night DJ Stretch accidentally records a pair of murders committed by the Sawyer clan, she teams up with the unhinged Lieutenant “Lefty” Enright (a chainsaw-wielding Dennis Hopper in one of the wildest performances of his career). Their mission: descend into the Sawyer family’s subterranean lair of meat, madness, and twinkling Christmas lights to put an end to the carnage once and for all. Horror Movie Night takes filmgoing to another level with a full night of entertainment, including a themed HMN Video Pres-how, Trivia, Games, Prizes, and another outstanding horror short from HorrorBuzz’s The Screaming Room Film Festival at Midsummer Scream. Doors open and video pre-show video begins promptly at 7:30 pm. Games, prizes, and short film begin at 8:00PM. Feature starts at 8:30PM. This program is a venue rental engagement. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of The Frida Cinema or its staff.

Enter the darkness of Begotten, the next film in our Art House of Horrors: Presented by MUBI series!  A mysterious figure known only as God kills himself. From his corpse, Mother Earth emerges. From their union, a Son is born. What follows is a nightmarish cycle of birth, death, violence, and rebirth played out across a barren, otherworldly landscape. E. Elias Merhige’s Begotten is less a traditional horror film than it is a true cinematic night. Shot in stark black and white, with every frame painstakingly processed to resemble a decaying photograph, the film unfolds without conventional dialogue or narrative. Its haunting imagery is the stuff of avant-garde cinema legend.  A legendary midnight movie experience that has influenced generations of experimental filmmakers and horror artists, Begotten is an unsettling vision of creation itself. Don't miss this brand new 4K restoration on the big screen!

Just added: Latin horror expert, journalist, and former Frida volunteer Justina Bonilla will be introducing this screening! Think you’ve seen Universal’s Dracula? Think again! Our Universal Monster Movie Weekend kicks off its Sunday lineup with Drácula, the extraordinary Spanish-language version of the 1931 vampire classic. While Tod Browning and Bela Lugosi were filming their English-language Dracula by day, director George Melford and an entirely different cast, including Carlos Villarías as the Count, were shooting their own Spanish-language version on the same Universal sets by night. The story is familiar: Count Dracula arrives in Transylvania, travels to London, and sets his sights on the beautiful Eva, but this version brings its own distinct style, atmosphere, and interpretation of Bram Stoker’s immortal vampire. Long overshadowed by Lugosi’s iconic performance, Drácula has undergone a major critical reevaluation, with its inventive camerawork, striking compositions, and more expansive approach earning it a reputation as one of the most fascinating alternate versions in early horror cinema. Villarías even studied footage of Lugosi’s performance during production, but the result is anything but a copy.

Jealousy and violence take center stage in Insiang, our Members Only screening for October 2026, celebrating Filipino American History Month. This claustrophobic melo­drama, a tautly constructed character study set in the slums of Manila. Lino Brocka crafts an eviscerating portrait of an innocent daughter and her bitter mother as women scorned. Insiang leads a quiet life dominated by household duties, but after she is raped by her mother’s lover and abandoned by the young man who claims to care for her, she exacts vicious revenge. A savage commentary on the degradations of urban poverty, especially for women, Insiang was the first Philippine film ever to play at Cannes. Insiang was restored by the Cineteca di Bologna/ L’Immagine Ritrovata. Restoration funded by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project and the Film Development Council of the Philippines. Not a Frida Cinema Film Club member? Sign up here!

The dead have a way of coming back... Universal Monster Movie Weekend continues with one of the most haunting figures in the Universal canon: The Mummy! Ten years after an ancient Egyptian mummy is accidentally resurrected by a mysterious scroll, the man once known as Imhotep (Boris Karloff) walks among the living under the name Ardath Bey. But Imhotep has not returned simply to conquer the world. He has spent centuries searching for the reincarnation of his lost love, and now he believes he has finally found her. Directed by Karl Freund, the legendary cinematographer of Metropolis, The Mummy trades the gothic castles of Dracula and Frankenstein for ancient curses, Egyptian mythology, and an eerie tale of love that refuses to die. Boris Karloff delivers one of his great horror performances, barely needing the famous mummy makeup once Imhotep emerges from his tomb.

Up next in our Walt Disney Studies series is a pair of remarkable documentaries from renowned director Leslie Iwerks that tell the story of Disneyland in two directions: the influence of film design professionals on the building of Disneyland, and how Disneyland has in turn impacted and influenced film professionals over seven decades. During the interval between the features, there will a discussion moderated by Disney Historian Jeff Kurtti entitled Disneyland: Creation and Innovation, featuring authors Roland Betancourt and Thomas K. Morris, and dovetails the concepts of the two films with the viewpoints and expertise of these scholars, their careers, and their authoritative books. After the screening, Dr. Betancourt’s book, Disneyland and the Rise of Automation: How Technology Created the Happiest Place on Earth, will be available for purchase in the theatre for the author to sign. Disneyland Handcrafted documents the exhilarating year that gave rise to The Happiest Place on Earth. Assembled entirely from rare archival footage and original audio recordings, this film reveals the extraordinary artistry, grit and pressure it took hundreds of craftspeople to build Walt Disney’s impossible dream into a reality, from groundbreaking to Opening Day. Disney Worldbuilders goes behind-the-scenes of how movies and franchises such as Frozen, Zootopia, and more are turned into immersive worlds across the global Disney parks. James Cameron, Kevin Feige, Jon Favreau, Pete Docter, Jennifer Lee and Jared Bush are among the filmmakers who feature in the documentary.

Just added: Bekah Phillips, The Frida Cinema's Director of Marketing, will be introducing this screening!  Universal Monster Movie Weekend disappears into the shadows one of our all-time favorites: James Whale’s The Invisible Man! A mysterious stranger arrives at a remote English inn, his face completely hidden beneath bandages and dark glasses. But there’s more to Dr. Jack Griffin (Claude Rains) than meets the eye...literally. After discovering a way to make himself invisible, Griffin begins to lose his grip on morality, using his newfound power to terrorize anyone who stands in his way. Based on H.G. Wells’ groundbreaking novel, The Invisible Man was a technical marvel in 1933, with effects that still impress nearly a century later. But what really makes the film unforgettable is Claude Rains, whose entire performance is delivered through his voice, turning Griffin from brilliant scientist into an increasingly unhinged menace. Add James Whale’s darkly comic touch, and you get a Universal Monster movie that is as funny as it is frightening.

SHE’S ALIVE! After a weekend of vampires, werewolves, mummies, mad scientists, and invisible men, there’s only one way to bring Universal Monster Movie Weekend to a close: Bride of Frankenstein! Having survived his own creation, Dr. Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) is once again drawn into the experiments of the sinister Dr. Pretorius (Ernest Thesiger), who has a new proposition: create a mate for the Monster (Boris Karloff). But while the Monster longs for companionship, Henry’s new creation (Elsa Lanchester) may have a mind of her own. James Whale returned to the world of Mary Shelley for this extraordinary 1935 sequel, expanding the original’s themes and making them somehow more tragic. From Elsa Lanchester’s unforgettable entrance as the Bride to Karloff’s heartbreaking performance, Bride of Frankenstein is widely regarded as one of the greatest horror films ever made, and one of the rare sequels that surpasses its predecessor.

Lived any good books lately? Our three film tribute to our favorite scream king, Sam Neill, continues with John Carpenter's In The Mouth Of Madness in a stunning brand new 4K resotration via Warner Brothers! When best-selling horror novelist Sutter Cane (Jürgen Prochnow) mysteriously vanishes, skeptical insurance investigator John Trent (Sam Neill) is sent to track him down. But as Trent digs deeper into Cane’s disappearance, he discovers a terrifying world where fiction infects reality, madness spreads like a virus, and the boundaries of existence dissolve into nightmare. A Lovecraftian and meta-cinematic mind warp, Carpenter’s cult classic is a supremely underrated descent into cosmic terror that also contains another one of his all-timer synth scores.

Celebrate 50 years of the Antichrist at The Frida as we present the original The Omen as part of our Art House of Horror: Presented by MUBI series!  When American diplomat Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck) and his wife Katherine (Lee Remick) welcome their new son Damien, they believe their prayers for a child have finally been answered. But as a series of increasingly horrifying deaths surrounds the family, Robert begins to uncover a terrifying possibility: Damien may not be the child they thought he was. Richard Donner’s supernatural horror classic turns a seemingly perfect family into the center of an apocalyptic nightmare, elevated by Jerry Goldsmith’s Oscar-winning score, an unforgettable performance by Peck, and some of the most infamous death scenes in horror history. A massive box-office success that spawned sequels, a remake, and decades of imitators, The Omen remains one of the defining horror films of the 1970s.

Continuing our journey through the many forms Queer Cinema can take, The Frida Cinema is proud to present Kantemir Balagov’s devastating postwar drama: Beanpole. In the ruins of Leningrad just after the end of World War II, two young women struggle to rebuild their lives after serving together on the front lines. Iya, a physically imposing nurse known as “Beanpole,” suffers from mysterious seizures that leave her incapacitated, while her fiercely determined friend Masha returns from the war carrying a secret that binds their futures together. As the two women attempt to find some semblance of normalcy amid the devastation, their intense and often volatile relationship becomes the center of their shattered world. Winner of the Best Director prize in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes, Balagov’s Beanpole is a haunting portrait of survival. Less explicitly queer as some of the other films in this series, this is an overwhelming portrait of two women searching for connection in a world that has been almost completely destroyed.

Experience Benjamin Christensen’s 1922 silent occult classic Häxanlike never before, reimagined with a haunting live metal score by The Silent Light. This hallucinatory descent into witchcraft, superstition, and the occult will be performed one night only live at The Frida Cinema on October 27th, 2026! About The Silent Light Founded in 2015 by Michael Formanski, The Silent Light is a musical endeavor that breathes new life into classic silent films through the power of live heavy metal. Formanski, composer and film director, crafts each score drawing from the dark and intense realms of black metal, doom metal, and original fantasy soundtracks with influences such as The Body, Sunn O))), Emperor, Summoning, and Nobuo Uematsu. Accompanying Formanski is Matt Hardy, the steadfast drummer who has been a key member for the past several years, along with a rotating ensemble of skilled musicians who contribute to the project’s ever-evolving sound. The Silent Light’s performances transform silent films like Metropolis, Faust, and Nosferatu into contemporary masterpieces with their haunting and powerful metal scores. They continue to push the boundaries of what silent film scoring can be, inviting audiences to experience the classics in a way they never have before. To learn more about The Silent Light, check out their website.

Ernest P. Worrell once saved Christmas, but this time, he has to save Halloween! End your October right at The Frida Cinema with a 35th anniversary screening of the 90's family  Halloween classic, Ernest Scared Stupid, hosted by our friends over at Nostalgic Nebula! Featuring out of this world creature effects by the Chiodo Bros (Killer Klowns from Outer Space), the side-splitting comedy antics of Jim Varney, and the legendary Eartha Kitt's indelible presence on screen, this film is every bit a master class in comedy and Halloween nostalgia. So grab a nice fresh jar of Miak, and join us in celebrating this "whacky" yet terrifying tale of Man vs. Troll!  Be sure to arrive early for a themed photo op, trivia and prize games before the show!

Trash-Mex is back at The Frida Cinema to present the Mexican horror classic Hasta el viento tiene meido aka Even The Wind is Afraid! A group of college students, led by Claudia, decide to investigate a local tower that has figured prominently in disturbing reoccurring dreams Claudia has been having. They are suspended from school for their antics, but Claudia learns from one of the female staff members that the person in the dream is a student who killed herself years before and that the headmistress has seen her ghost. Invoking Dario Argento’s Suspiria and the works of Mario Bava, Even The Wind is Afraid is a Mexican horror film draped in macabre moods and stunning Gothic ambience. Any appetite for genuine chills will be sated in full!

An annual Frida tradition continues as John Carpenter and Debra Hill’s landmark slasher Halloween headlines our Art House of Horrors: Presented by MUBI series! Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again. Ya know, that old story! Halloween is a seminal film in not just the horror genre, but was a pioneering influence on low budget cinema entirely. Its legacy endures almost 50 years later, making it an essential watch for any movie fan! There have been many sequels and imitators, but nothing beats the original. Come see it on the big screen with fellow horror fiends!

If you can't meet your perfect boyfriend…make him. Our second Volunteer of the Month pick for October 2026 comes courtesy of Tessa, who has chosen Lisa Frankenstein, one of the 2020s most exciting new cult classics! Lisa (Kathryn Newton) is having a rough time. She’s stuck in a miserable home life, haunted by the memory of her late mother, and nursing a crush on a handsome corpse buried in the local cemetery. Then, after a freak electrical storm, that corpse comes back to life...and suddenly Lisa’s dream date is six feet under and very much ready to fall in love. From writer Diablo Cody (Juno, Jennifer’s Body) and director Zelda Williams, Lisa Frankenstein is a neon-soaked tribute to ’80s teen romance, gothic horror, and everything between. Kathryn Newton and Cole Sprouse make for an unlikely and irresistibly strange couple as Lisa’s quest for love turns into a very unconventional resurrection romance.

Our Art House of Horrors: Presented by MUBI series ends with The Shining, the legendarily disturbing 1980 adaptation of Stephen King's horror novel. The film follows Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson), an aspiring writer and recovering alcoholic, who takes a job as the winter caretaker of the remote Overlook Hotel. Along with his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and young son Danny (Danny Lloyd), who possesses psychic abilities called "the shining," Jack hopes to find peace and inspiration for his writing. However, the hotel's malevolent supernatural forces and Jack’s descent into insanity turn their stay into a nightmare.  Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation is one of the most meticulously crafted horror films ever made, transforming an isolated hotel into a labyrinth of psychological terror. From the Steadicam’s eerie glide through The Overlook, to Jack Nicholson’s unforgettable descent into madness, to Frida Cinema favorite Shelley Duvall's manic performance as Wendy Torrance, Kubrick created an atmosphere so unnerving that its images have become permanently embedded in the cinematic imagination.

Every neighborhood has its secrets... See It On 16mm is back to unspool a late-October screening of the 1989 Tom Hanks horror comedy The 'Burbs! Ray Peterson (Tom Hanks) just wants to enjoy a quiet week at home. Unfortunately, the new neighbors at the end of the cul-de-sac are acting… strange. Really strange. When Ray and his fellow neighborhood busybodies begin investigating the mysterious Klopeks, their suburban snooping quickly spirals into a full-blown conspiracy—and maybe something much darker. Joe Dante’s The 'Burbs is a pitch-perfect collision of suburban comedy and horror, turning the American dream of the perfect neighborhood into a paranoid nightmare. With Tom Hanks at his gleefully neurotic best, plus Carrie Fisher, Bruce Dern, Corey Feldman, and Henry Gibson, the film skewers nosy neighbors, backyard boredom, and the terrifying possibility that the people living next door might actually be monsters.

Trash-Mex is back at The Frida Cinema to present four classic Mexican horror films from the 1950s & ’60s, kicking off with Fernando Méndez’s El vampiro (1957)! The beautiful, bereaved Marta (Ariadna Welter) travels with Enrique (Salazar) to her ancestral home. There, the mysterious neighbour Duval (German Robles) offers to buy her decrepit hacienda. However, Duval is really Count Karol de Lavud, a vampire whose aim is to drain Marta of her blood in order to revive his entombed brother. Widely regarded as the film that kickstarted Mexico’s golden age of horror, El vampiro is a landmark of Mexican genre cinema, complete with a villain whose influence would haunt vampire movies for decades. Don’t miss your chance to sink your teeth into this immortal classic!

Our Walt Disney Studies series continues on November 1st with a very rare screening of Swiss Family Robinson! And as an added bonus, special guest Kevin Kidney will be giving a special post-screening presentation entitled "A Swiss Family Robinson Adventure"! This spectacular screen version of the literary classic is full of breathtaking South Seas scenery, exotic animals and treacherous pirates. The heroic tale chronicles the courageous exploits of the Robinson family after they are shipwrecked on a deserted island. Using teamwork and ingenuity, they skillfully overcome the obstacles of nature and transform their new home into a "civilized" community. But the ultimate challenge comes when a band of cutthroat pirates threatens to destroy the Robinsons' impromptu paradise. "A Swiss Family Robinson Adventure": Kevin Kidney shares his research on the creation of Swiss Family Robinson, from its initial production to his personal journey to find and explore the original filming locations—including the castaway island and the legendary tree house.

Our Spielberg Summer series turns its attention to one of the most powerful and influential war films ever made with Saving Private Ryan, a landmark achievement that forever changed how combat is portrayed on screen. In the aftermath of the D-Day invasion, Captain John Miller (Tom Hanks) and his squad are assigned an extraordinary mission: locate Private James Ryan (Matt Damon), whose brothers have all been killed in action, and bring him home. As the soldiers journey deeper into war-torn France, the mission forces each man to confront difficult questions about the value of a single life amid unimaginable loss. Famous for its visceral opening depiction of Omaha Beach, Saving Private Ryan goes far beyond just technical brilliance. Spielberg combines staggering realism with his signature humanism, creating a film that honors both the chaos of war and the ordinary people "asked" to endure it.

Our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series is headed to the Philippines for one of the most daring and influential films in the country’s queer cinema history: Macho Dancer. After being expelled from the military, a young man named Pol leaves his provincial home for Manila, where he finds work as a macho dancer in a seedy nightclub. But beneath the glitter and spectacle of the club lies a dangerous world of exploitation, drugs, prostitution, and corruption. As Pol becomes increasingly entangled in the lives of the men and women around him, his search for survival becomes inseparable from a society rotting beneath the surface. Directed by Lino Brocka, one of the giants of Philippine cinema, Macho Dancer is a provocative film about sexuality and political oppression. Made during the final years of Ferdinand Marcos’ dictatorship, Brocka uses the world of male sex work to expose the desperation and corruption of a society where virtually everything, including the concept of desire itself, can become a commodity. Come support this landmark of Filipino queer cinema and a powerful act of cinematic resistance on the big screen.

"Get the funk up!" Our Unsung 80's Soundtracks series continues with Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman - or what happens when a movie studio also owns the recording contract of a pop superstar! One of the defining films of its decade, Batman stars Michael Keaton as billionaire Bruce Wayne, who secretly spends his nights stalking the streets of Gotham City as the costumed vigilante Batman.  As Batman closes in on dastardly villain Joker (Jack Nicholson, oozing charismatic menace), he also finds himself drawn to photojournalist Vicki Vale (Kim Basinger). With Burton’s gothic visual style, Danny Elfman’s soaring score, and Oscar-winning Art Direction-Set Decoration by Anton Furst and Peter Young, Batman proved that a comic-book movie could be dark, stylish, and strange, while also humorous and wildly entertaining. Batman is something of an unusual entry in the soundtrack canon, with two very different albums coming out of the film. Danny Elfman’s orchestral score became one of the most recognizable superhero themes ever written, while Prince was brought in to create a separate album of songs inspired by the film. The resulting Batman soundtrack became a massive commercial success, spending six weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, and spawning hits including “Batdance,” “Partyman,” and “Scandalous.” The album was conceived around the Joker and Vicki Vale, with Burton reportedly giving Prince a rough cut of the film to inspire the songs. Elfman’s score and Prince’s album rarely appear together in the film, but both became essential parts of the movie’s identity, making Batman one of the biggest soundtrack phenomena of the 1980s.

Just added: Helena Odeh, daughter of Alex Odeh, will be joining us before the 8:30PM screening on 11/5 to introduce the film!  Who Killed Alex Odeh?, the powerful new documentary from directors Jason Osder and William Lafi Youmans, is coming to The Frida Cinema for a limited run on November 5th-10th. In October 1985, Santa Ana, California was shaken by a brazen act of political violence when Palestinian American Alex Odeh, a beloved teacher and community leader, was killed by a tripwire bomb planted in his office. Despite substantial evidence and identified suspects, the case was never solved. Who Killed Alex Odeh? reopens the mystery, tracking a renewed investigation in real time as new leads emerge, long-buried records come to light, and the forces behind a political assassination are finally confronted. Alex Odeh was a Palestinian-born American citizen, a father of three, a teacher, a poet, and an advocate for Arab American civil rights and peaceful coexistence. According to Carnegie Mellon University and Grand Central Art Center, the statue of Alex that sits outside of the Santa Ana Public Library (just a ten minute walk from The Frida Cinema) is the only public monument to an Arab American in the United States.

At Reclaiming Your Power you’ll hear from powerful speakers who have reclaimed their power: A Two-Day Experience to Reclaim Your Voice, Your Story & Your Power November 6th & 7th, 2026 | The Frida Cinema | Orange County, CA What if the next chapter of your life begins with one decision: start reclaiming. Reclaim Your Power is an immersive two-day experience designed to inspire you to reconnect with who you are, what you carry, and what becomes possible when you stop giving your power away. Walk the red carpet and join Dr. Azadeh Atzberger, L.H.D., founder of Power With-IN Publishing, speaker, best-selling author, educator, and transformational leader, alongside an incredible lineup of speakers and thought leaders for two unforgettable days of stories, connection, insight, inspiration, and transformation.

Our Spielberg Summer series ventures off-path and into the Fall as we visit the future in A.I. Artificial Intelligence, a haunting Science Fiction fairy tale that stands among the director’s most ambitious and deeply misunderstood works. In a world where advanced robots live alongside humans, a young android named David (Haley Joel Osment) is programmed with the ability to love. When he is abandoned by the family he was created to join, David embarks on an extraordinary journey to become “real,” believing it is the only way to win back the affection he longs for. Originally developed by Stanley Kubrick and ultimately realized by Spielberg, A.I. is an unsettling vision of technological loneliness. Over two decades later, its questions about what it means to love feel more relevant than ever, revealing a far more profound than many audiences recognized upon its release.

See It On 16mm is digging in the woods, the Ozarks, and Appalachian trails to find the most obscure 16mm film reels about our myholigical friend, Bigfoot aka Sasquatch, to hit the big screen on Saturday, November 7th at The Frida Cinema! They're presenting the Secret Bigfoot Triple Feature! That's right, folks! 3 films. 3 Bigfoot 1970s deep cuts. All on original 16mm prints! The doors will open at 5:00PM and the films begin at 6:00PM. There will be a 15 minute intermission between each film. Tickets are $20. Frida Cinema membership discounts and comp passes do not apply!

Calling all ghouls, ghosts, and hopeless romantics! Join us at The Frida Cinema on Sunday, November 8th, for a spooky celebration of Tim Burton and Mike Johnson’s Corpse Bride, presented by our pals at FanMail Cinema Club! In a gloomy Victorian village where arranged marriages are the norm, nervous groom-to-be Victor Van Dort (Johnny Depp) accidentally proposes to the wrong bride...and she just happens to be dead! Swept into the underworld by the ghostly and gorgeous Emily (Helena Bonham Carter), Victor finds himself caught between the drab world of the living and a fantastical land of the dead that might just have more life in it. The festivities kick off when doors open at 12:00PM, with vendors set up in the parklet and outside the theater on both sides of the entrance. Strike a pose at our photo-op inside the auditorium before the main event: a cosplay contest just before the film starts at 1:00PM! Whether you’re Team Victor, Team Emily, or simply here for Danny Elfman’s unforgettable music, come dressed to impress in your finest gothic wedding attire. Tickets to this event are $20. Frida Cinema member discounts and comp passes do not apply.

Our 4 Clásicos De Terror: Presented by Trash-Mex continues with Fernando Méndez’s Misterios de ultratumba (1959)! Doctor Mazali (Rafael Bertrand) makes a pact with his dying colleague, Dr Aldama (Antonio Raxel), in order to learn the secrets of the afterlife. Instead, the spirit of Aldama exerts a supernatural influence on him from beyond the grave, summoning his daughter, Patricia (Mapita Cortés), to Mazali’s asylum, where a series of horrific events ensue. From the director of El vampiro, this atmospheric Mexican horror gem is steeped in gothic dread and deals with the terror of what awaits us beyond the grave. The dead have a message...and you won’t want to miss it!

The penultimate film in our Hong Kong Action Essentials series is Bullet In The Head, which also happens to be our final John Woo film in the series, as well. There's no better way to end his chapter in this lineup than with his most brutal and personal film to date. Three friends fleeing Hong Kong after a violent crime find themselves trapped in the chaos of the Vietnam War, where their loyalty and morality are tested beyond repair. What begins as a desperate bid for escape descends into a harrowing portrait of friendship under unimaginable pressure. As war strips away ideals and innocence, the bonds between the men fracture, leading to betrayals that cut deeper than any bullet. Fueled by rage and grief Bullet in the Head trades balletic elegance for raw emotional devastation. This is heroic bloodshed turned inward, and a legendary filmmaker pushing himself into completely new territory. Our Hong Kong Action Essentials series explores the time from the mid-’80s through the early ’90s, where Hong Kong filmmakers rewrote the grammar of action cinema forever. Directors like John Woo, Tsui Hark, Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Ringo Lam, and Lau Kar-Leung fused balletic gunplay, risky stunts, martial arts virtuosity, and raw emotional intensity into a new cinematic language that would be oft-imitated but never replicated. (sorry, The Matrix, we love you too!) Join us every month in 2026 as we explore this golden age where style and emotion collided to change movies forever.

Just added: film critic and author Alonso Duralde will be joining us for the 8:00PM screening on November 9th to introduce the film and sign copies of his book Hollywood Pride! Few filmmakers have embraced queer desire with as much style, humor, and glorious melodrama as Pedro Almodóvar. So of course we had to include his work in our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series! We've played the hits before, so now we're diving headfirst into one of his earliest and most deliriously queer films: Law of Desire. Pablo Quintero is a successful filmmaker whose latest movie has just premiered to acclaim, but his personal life is considerably less orderly. His former lover has disappeared from his life, his trans sister Tina is dealing with her own complicated romantic history, and a handsome young admirer named Antonio has become dangerously obsessed with him. When Pablo rejects Antonio’s advances, desire quickly curdles into jealousy...and so much more. Made just a few years after Spain emerged from Franco’s dictatorship, Law of Desire finds Almodóvar throwing open the doors to a world of queer sexuality, gender fluidity, artistic ambition, and unapologetic excess. Anchored by unforgettable performances from Eusebio Poncela, Carmen Maura, and Antonio Banderas, the film is a feverishly funny and dare we say...very sexy. Don't miss your chance to see it on the big screen!

Our Classic Movie Nights series is getting real screwy as we present the Katharine Hepburn/Cary Grant comedy classic Bringing Up Baby! David Huxley, a mild-mannered paleontologist on the eve of marrying his longtime fiancée, has his carefully ordered life thrown into complete disarray when he crosses paths with the wildly unpredictable Susan Vance. After Susan mistakes him for a zoologist, the pair become entangled in a series of increasingly ridiculous mishaps involving a tame leopard named Baby. Starring Grant and Hepburn at their most effortlessly hilarious, Bringing Up Baby is one of the defining films of Hollywood's screwball comedy era. Howard Hawks' knack for balancing plates during the escalating absurdity (and of course the chemistry of the two legendary leads) make it a timeless comedy that must be seen on the big screen! Please make sure to get to this showtime early, as our beloved Marketing Director, Bekah, will be doing a pre-screening presentation on the film! 

After 55 years...The Devils are finally unleashed! Censored. Controversial. Practically impossible to see in its intended form. Now, Ken Russell’s The Devils is back. And this time, it’s in a brand new 4K restoration from the original camera negative, referencing the edit he privately constructed in 2004. Based on the infamous true story of 17th-century French priest Urbain Grandier (Oliver Reed), The Devils follows a charismatic priest whose defiance of church and state makes him the target of a political conspiracy. When a sexually repressed nun (Vanessa Redgrave) accuses Grandier of witchcraft, an entire convent becomes consumed by an eruption of violence that threatens to tear the town apart. This 1971 masterpiece is one of the most audacious films ever made and became one of the most notoriously censored films in British cinema. Don't miss this extremely rare treat on the big screen!

Don't miss out your chance to see La bola negra, the Oscars' next big foreign language phenomenon, on the big screen at The Frida Cinema this November! Spanning three different eras of Spanish history, La Bola Negra follows three men whose lives become mysteriously intertwined through secrets passed down through generations. From the shadow of the Spanish Civil War to a contemporary search for a forgotten family history, Los Javis (the name the two directors have lovingly been given over the years) weave together a sweeping queer epic about the people whose stories were erased. The film's Cannes premiere earned Los Javis the festival’s Best Director prize, it just won the prestigious Audience Award at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival (the first non-English language film to do so in fifteen years) and now...the Oscar buzz is very real. With Spain officially putting La Bola Negra forward for the 99th Academy Awards, the question is no longer whether this is one of the year’s major international films, it’s how far this extraordinary, wildly ambitious movie can go in the Best Picture race. 

Get ready to shrink down and relive the wild adventure of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids with Friends of the Mouse! Eccentric inventor Wayne Szalinski's (Rick Moranis) experimental shrinking ray accidentally miniaturizes his teenage kids and their next-door neighbors. The four tiny children are mistakenly thrown out with the trash and must navigate the perilous, jungle-like terrain of their own backyard. To make it back home safely, they have to dodge giant lawnmowers, treacherous sprinklers, and backyard insects, all while their frantic parents launch a desperate search to find them before it's too late! Along with prizes and a special cartoon, star Amy O'Neill (Amy Szalinski) will be joining us for a post-show Q&A as well as a meet & greet/autographs before the film. Tickets for this event are free but you must RSVP each attendee. Priority seating is available for Friends of the Mouse members. Memberships are available for $20/yr per family and can be purchased at this link.

What would you do if were framed for a murder…you had not committed yet? The penultimate film in our Spielberg Summer series is the Tom Cruise-starrer Minority Report, a dazzling Sci Fi Thriller that imagines a world where crime can be stopped before it happens. In Washington, D.C., of 2054, police captain John Anderton (Tom Cruise) leads a revolutionary unit that uses psychic visions to arrest murderers before they commit their crimes. But when Anderton himself is identified as a future killer, he goes on the run, determined to uncover the truth behind a system he once believed was infallible. Based on the novel by Philip K. Dick, the film combines breathtaking action, Noir intrigue (something you'd think would be in more Spielberg projects), and startlingly prescient ideas about surveillance and predictive technology, making it one of smartest blockbusters of the 21st century.

One of the greatest achievements in recent art house cinema and a seminal work of “slow cinema,” Sátántangó, based on the book by László Krasznahorkai is the third film in our Béla Tarr Retrospective. The film follows members of a small, defunct agricultural collective living in a post-apocalyptic landscape after the fall of Communism who, on the heels of a large financial windfall, set out to leave their village. As a few of the villagers secretly conspire to take off with all of the earnings for themselves, a mysterious character, long thought dead, returns to the village, altering the course of everyone’s lives forever. Shot in stunning black-and-white by Gábor Medvigy and filled with exquisitely composed and lyrical long takes, Sátántangó unfolds in twelve distinct movements, alternating forwards and backwards in time, echoing the structure of a tango dance. Tarr’s vision, aided by longtime partner and collaborator Ágnes Hranitzky, is enthralling and his portrayal of a rural Hungary beset by boozy dance parties, treachery, and near-perpetual rainfall is both transfixing and uncompromising.  Sátántangó has been justly lauded by critics and audiences as a masterpiece and inspired none other than Susan Sontag to proclaim that she would be “glad to see it every year for the rest of [her] life”. Sátántangó has been restored in 4K from the original 35mm camera negative by Arbelos in collaboration with The Hungarian Filmlab.

Trash-Mex continues their 4 Clásicos De Terror series with Chano Urueta’s El espejo de la bruja (1962)! When Elena (Dina de Marco) is murdered by her husband, Eduardo (Armando Calvo), the couple's housekeeper, Sara (Isabela Corona), plots to take revenge. Summoning Elena through the witch’s mirror, Sara exacts ghastly vengeance upon Eduardo and his new wife, Deborah (Rosita Arenas). A wicked slice of Mexican Gothic horror, El espejo de la bruja is a deliriously atmospheric descent into the macabre. Look into the mirror if you dare!

For the next film in our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series, we’re looking through the eyes of a filmmaker who brought her own cultural experience to a story about family, identity, and falling in love: Alice Wu’s Saving Face. Wil is a successful young surgeon living in New York’s tight-knit Chinese-American community, where her single life is already a source of concern for her traditional mother. But when her mother unexpectedly becomes pregnant and is sent to live with Wil, the pressure to maintain the family’s reputation only intensifies. Then Wil meets Vivian, a beautiful and openly queer ballet dancer, and finds herself falling in love, forcing her to choose between the expectations placed upon her and the life she actually wants. Drawing from her own experiences as a queer Chinese-American woman, Alice Wu’s Saving Face is a deeply personal romantic comedy about the complicated ways sexuality shape who we allow ourselves to become. With its charming performances and refusal to choose between cultural tradition and queer identity, Wu created a film that understands that sometimes the hardest person to come out to is yourself.

Yes...or yes?  Our Heist Hallucinations series is going back to the criminal underworld with Jonathan Glazer's 2000 cult classic Sexy Beast! Retired safecracker Gal Dove (Ray Winstone) is enjoying a quiet life in Spain when a visit from his old associate Don Logan (Ben Kingsley) threatens to drag him back into the business. Logan has one last job in mind...a daring safe deposit heist in London. Oh, and he's not taking "no" for an answer. What follows is an unhinged descent into the criminal underworld unlike any other crime film you've ever seen.  Glazer’s electrifying debut balances a meticulously-planned heist with a psychological showdown between two unforgettable characters. And then there’s Ben Kingsley, giving one of the great left-field performances of his career as the absolutely terrifying Don Logan. Add in Ray Winstone, Ian McShane, Amanda Redman, and a script that crackles with menace, and Sexy Beast is one hell of a way to get your heist on.

As we turn the corner towards the end of our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series, we’re celebrating one of the essential voices of contemporary queer cinema with a double feature from French filmmaker Céline Sciamma: Water Lilies + Tomboy. Sciamma’s debut feature, Water Lilies, plunges into the charged world of teenage desire, where a sexual awakening can feel impossibly intense. When Marie befriends Floriane, the star of a local synchronized swimming team, she becomes fascinated by her new friend, even as Floriane’s complicated relationship with her own sexuality begins to blur the boundaries between admiration and desire. Then, in Tomboy, Sciamma turns her gaze toward gender identity through the eyes of a ten-year-old child. After moving to a new neighborhood, Laure introduces herself to the other children as “Michaël,” beginning to navigate friendships, play, and first love while keeping her secret from her family. What begins as a simple childhood game gradually becomes a tender exploration of discovering who you might be. Long before Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Sciamma was already making some of the most quietly radical films about queer desire and identity. This double feature is an exemplary early showcase of her extraordinary talent. There will be a 10 minute intermission between the movies. One ticket gets you access to both films.

Plunging into the 1970s Berlin underground, this unforgettable portrait stands as one of the most harrowing films ever made about drug addiction. Based on the true story of Christiane Felscherinow, whose shocking memoir made her the face of a generation of troubled German youth, this bracing dramatization follows the alienated thirteen-year-old Christiane (Natja Brunckhorst) as she goes from popping pills to shooting heroin amid West Berlin’s infamous club scene. An instant cult sensation on account of its authentically grimy location shooting and electrifying soundtrack by David Bowie, Christiane F. (original title: Christiane F.: Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo) remains a haunting vision of a young life in free fall. As part of our Unsung 80's Soundtracks series, we will be presenting Janus Films' new 4K digital restoration, approved by director Uli Edel, featuring a new 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. The soundtrack album is essentially a David Bowie compilation created around the film, rather than a conventional original film score. Bowie also recorded the German-language version of “Heroes,” “Helden,” specifically for the German market/film connection. Bowie also appears as himself in concert footage, and his music is deeply woven into the film's atmosphere and Christiane's obsession with him. This film contains mature themes and intense subject matter that may be triggering for some viewers. Viewer discretion is advised.

The final film in our Béla Tarr Retrospective is The Turin Horse, his 2011 swan song. Inspired by the legendary 1889 incident where philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche witnessed a cab driver whipping a stubborn horse in Turin, Italy, and collapsed after embracing the animal. The film tracks the bleak, repetitive daily survival of the aging driver, his daughter, and their horse amid a relentless windstorm. Declared by Tarr as his final feature film, it is celebrated as a masterpiece of modern minimalist cinema and long-take cinematography. Don't miss this new restoration on the big screen! 

On Saturday, November 28th, 2026, an annual Frida Cinema tradition continues. It's The Lord Of The Rings Extended Edition Trilogy Marathon! Come watch these three masterpieces back-to-back-to-back on the big screen! The schedule will be as follows: 11:00AM - LOTR VIP guests are admitted early to get their seats and perks! 11:30AM - LOTR General Admission guests are admitted to get their seats! 12:00PM - The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (208 minutes) 3:30PM - 15 minute break for Second Breakfast (30 min with credits) 3:45PM - The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (225 minutes) 7:30PM - 45 minute break for Dinner (1 hour with credits) 8:15PM - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (252 minutes) 12:30AM - Our journey comes to an end! We are offering GA ($40) and VIP ($60) passes this year! Tickets are limited for the VIP tier, so move fast! And as always, our LOTR GA pass ($40) gets you in at 11:30AM and come-and-go access to three of the greatest films ever made! The LOTR VIP pass ($60) gets you 30 minutes of early access to get your favorite seat, free coffee all day in our lobby from our friends at Coffee Muse, and a special LOTR goodie bag from The Frida!  Throw on your comfiest clothes, grab a pillow and blanket, and take a 13-hour journey with us through Middle Earth! Member discounts and Frida Cinema comp passes not valid.

Our Spielberg Summer series concludes with some post-Thanksgiving screenings of War of the Worlds, his hauntingly realistic reinvention of a Sci Fi classic that transforms an alien invasion into a terrifying story of survival. When colossal extraterrestrial machines suddenly emerge from beneath the Earth and begin annihilating entire cities, divorced dockworker Ray Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is forced to protect his children as civilization collapses around them. As humanity struggles to comprehend the scale of the catastrophe, Ray’s desperate journey becomes a fight not to save the world, but simply to keep his family alive. Released in the shadow of a newly changed America, War of the Worlds channels post-9/11 anxieties into some of the most intense and visceral spectacle of Spielberg’s career. Stripping away triumphalism in favor of fear, the film stands as one of his darkest works. It's a reminder that even at his most pessimistic, Spielberg never loses sight of the human beings at the center of the story, making it the perfect film to conclude our 14 film retrospective of his work. 

Trash-Mex is closing our their series of four classic Mexican horror films with one of the wildest films ever made: Chano Urueta’s El barón del terror (1962), aka The Brainiac! In 1661, the Inquisition sentences Baron d'Estera (Abel Salazar) to be burned at the stake for his sorcery. Three hundred years later, the Baron returns to Mexico City on a comet, to exact a peculiar form of vengeance upon the descendants of his tormentors... by sucking out their brains! Starring Abel Salazar as the resurrected aristocrat with a taste for gray matter, El barón del terror is a deliriously demented slice of Mexican horror, serving up grotesque creature effects and one of the wildest monster designs in the genre. Come for the cursed Baron, stay for the brain buffet!

Our Walt Disney Studies series charters new territory with a double feature of the 2008 documentary Walt & Grupo, followed by the 1942 short film Saludos Amigos in an evening we're calling South of the Border with Walt Disney! And during the interval between the features, a discussion and Q&A with the director, Theodore Thomas, will be hosted and moderated by Disney Historian Jeff Kurtti. Walt & El Grupo: It was 1941, a critical time for the world and for the Walt Disney Studio. When the U.S. Government asked Walt to be a cultural ambassador to South America, the stage was set for his very own real-life adventure. With a group of handpicked artists, later called "El Grupo," Walt's road trip achieved the impossible: goodwill. And in the process, it paved the way for two classic Disney films, Saludos Amigos and The Three Caballeros. Saludos Amigos: A whimsical blend of live-action and animation, Saludos Amigos is a colorful kaleidoscope of art, adventure and music set to a toe-tapping samba beat. From high Andes peaks and Argentina's pampas to the sights and sounds of Rio de Janeiro, your international traveling companions are none other than those famous funny friends, Donald Duck and Goofy. They keep things lively as Donald encounters a stubborn llama and "El Gaucho" Goofy tries on the cowboy way of life...South American style.

The penultimate film in our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series is Joyland, Saim Sadiq’s tender, quietly radical portrait of family and the complicated ways we perform the roles society gives us. Haider lives with his wife and extended family in Lahore, where everyone seems to have a carefully prescribed role, especially the men. When Haider secretly takes a job as a backup dancer for an erotic theater troupe, he meets Biba, a magnetic transgender performer, and the two begin a relationship that forces Haider to confront desires he has spent his life suppressing. Meanwhile, the women in his family are struggling under their own impossible expectations, creating a portrait of a household where everyone is searching for some kind of freedom. With Joyland, Sadiq brings an extraordinary tenderness to a story about a family in contemporary Pakistan. Sensual without being sensationalistic and heartbreaking without ever losing its warmth, the film became the first Pakistani film selected for the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Queer Palm. At its heart, Joyland is about what happens when the life you’re expected to want collides with the life you secretly desire. We think it's one of the best films of the 2020s, and a perfect fit for this series!

Released in 1982 to near-instant cult status, Slava Tsukerman’s Liquid Sky is a surreal collision of new wave, fashion, drugs, and extraterrestrial weirdness, and easily one of the strangest movies to emerge from New York’s downtown scene. Anne Carlisle stars as both Margaret and Jimmy, a pair of androgynous club kids whose chaotic lives are upended when a tiny alien spacecraft lands on the roof of their apartment building. Leaving a trail of increasingly bizarre encounters in its wake, as well as a few dead bodies, the alien has come to Earth in search of a mysterious substance produced during human sexual activity. Shot on the streets and in the clubs of early-’80s Manhattan, and on an extremely low budget estimated at approximately $500,000, Liquid Sky nevertheless exudes a look and attitude that feel remarkably ahead of their time. Released during the height of the early-’80s New York new wave scene, Liquid Sky has become a cult touchstone for anyone interested in the intersection of underground cinema, electronic music, NY fashion, and queer nightlife. The soundtrack to Liquid Sky is as strange and distinctive as the movie itself. Composer Brenda I. Hutchinson and director Slava Tsukerman built the score around primitive synthesizers, electronic textures, and the sounds of New York’s downtown club scene, creating something that feels less like a conventional movie score than music beamed in from another planet. A slight cheat in our Unsung 80's Soundtracks series in the sense that Liquid Sky's sounds are more of a score, its entirely synthetic soundtrack, mirroring the film’s icy visual palette and alienated characters, felt like an essential for the era.

"Like Lethal Weapon only far funnier and with more chainsaw action." -Total DVD After so much emotion and violence, we are choosing to close our Hong Kong Action Essentials series by cutting loose with little bit laughter and...uhhh...more violence. Directed by Lau Kar-leung and starring Chow Yun-fat, Tiger on the Beat follows a pair of mismatched cops on the trail of a violent drug dealer, a case that escalates from street-level comedy into something far more savage and unhinged. What begins as a rambunctious action/comedy steadily sheds its humor, morphing into a full-throttle collision of gunplay, hand-to-hand combat, and sheer physical excess. By the time it reaches its infamous finale, the film has abandoned restraint entirely, delivering the perfectly brutal and messy ending to our series. Our Hong Kong Action Essentials series explores the time from the mid-’80s through the early ’90s, where Hong Kong filmmakers rewrote the grammar of action cinema forever. Directors like John Woo, Tsui Hark, Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Ringo Lam, and Lau Kar-Leung fused balletic gunplay, risky stunts, martial arts virtuosity, and raw emotional intensity into a new cinematic language that would be oft-imitated but never replicated. (sorry, The Matrix, we love you too!) Join us every month in 2026 as we explore this golden age where style and emotion collided to change movies forever.

What better way to end our Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema series than by celebrating the magic of the movie theater with Tsai Ming-Liang’s haunting, hypnotic Goodbye, Dragon Inn. On the final night before an old Taipei movie palace closes its doors, a handful of patrons gather to watch King Hu’s classic martial arts film Dragon Inn. On screen, swordsmen battle in a long-gone world of cinematic fantasy. In the theater, ghosts seem to linger in the shadows, a projectionist works almost entirely unseen, and a mysterious young man wanders through the empty corridors searching for connection. Among the sparse audience are two aging actors who once appeared together in Dragon Inn, watching themselves, and the cinema they once knew, disappear. With almost no dialogue and an extraordinary sensitivity to the act of watching, Tsai Ming-liang transforms a nearly empty movie theater into a place of queer longing. The furtive glances, anonymous encounters, and solitary figures drifting through the darkness evoke the secretive spaces where desire has so often found refuge. Goodbye, Dragon Inn is a film about so many things: a ghost story, a love letter to cinema, and a profoundly melancholic meditation on loneliness. Goodbye, Art House 101: Global Queer Cinema! 

Our Classic Movie Nights series is closes out the year with the beloved Ernst Lubitsch romantic classic The Shop Around the Corner! Alfred Kralik and Klara Novak are co-workers at a small leather goods shop in Budapest who can barely stand each other. What neither knows is that they have secretly fallen in love as anonymous pen pals, pouring their hearts out in letters to one another. As their relationship blossoms on paper, their prickly day-to-day rivalry becomes increasingly complicated by the realization that love may be hiding in the most unexpected place. Starring James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan, The Shop Around the Corner is one of Hollywood's most enduring romantic comedies, balancing Lubitsch's signature wit and sophistication with genuine warmth and tenderness. Its clever mistaken-identity premise and beautifully drawn characters have made it a lasting classic.  Please make sure to get to this showtime early, as our beloved Marketing Director, Bekah, will be doing a pre-screening presentation on the film! 

Please note: this screening will be projected on 35mm film. Frida Cinema comp passes do not apply. Cameron Winter, in December 2025, after a months-long sold-out tour with his band Geese, returned to New York to play a single show at Carnegie Hall. This is the movie. Directed and shot on 35mm and 16mm by Oscar-winning filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson (One Battle After Another, There Will Be Blood, Boogie Nights), the crew includes filmmaker and actor Benny Safdie (Uncut Gems, Good Time) and music producer Ariel Rechtshaid (Grammy winner for albums with Vampire Weekend and Adele). GQ praised Cameron Winter’s show at Carnegie Hall as “staggeringly good,” and Nick Cave said he has a "a glorious, emotive voice with brilliant, blistering words, a racked and wondrous thing.” Winter’s solo album Heavy Metal was named one of the best of the year by Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, Paste and Mojo and Geese’s last record Getting Killed was named the best album of 2025 by The New Yorker, NME, and Stereogum.

The bittersweet end to this year's Walt Disney Studies series is the beloved animated classic Lady and the Tramp! And as an early holiday present, Theodore (Theo) Gluck will be joining us to give a very informative and entertaining post-screening presentation entitled "Walt on the Wide Screen"! The film follows dog’s-eye-view adventures of Lady, a lovingly pampered cocker spaniel, and Tramp, a freewheeling mutt with a heart of gold in Walt Disney’s beloved classic—the first animated feature ever produced in the widescreen CinemaScope process. This heartwarming tale now charms a new generation of families and fans with its exquisite animation, unforgettable songs and one of the dog-gonedest love stories of all time. "Walt on the Wide Screen": Film authority Theo Gluck offers an overview of the era of the widescreen revolution as Hollywood—a response to the looming specter of television. Disney, like all the other studios, was not immune to this innovation, so they answered the call to mutually combat this threat by quickly gearing up to offer widescreen product.

Described as a "Rock & Roll Fable" by its director Walter Hill, 1984's Streets of Fire is an essential inclusion in our Unsung 80’s Soundtracks series. Michael Paré stars as Tom Cody, a tough-as-nails mercenary finds himself pulled back into a life he left behind when his former girlfriend, rock star Ellen Aim (Diane Lane), is kidnapped by motorcycle gang leader Raven Shaddock (Willem Dafoe). Enlisted by Ellen’s manager Billy Fish (Rick Moranis), Tom joins forces with his former partner McCoy (Weapons Oscar-winner Amy Madigan), and sets out into the neon-lit, rain-soaked streets of the city to rescue her. Blending rock & roll, comic-book melodrama, and 1950s street-gang mythology, Streets of Fire features original songs mixed in with 80's staples such as Dan Hartman’s “I Can Dream About You," as well as performances by the Blasters, Ry Cooder, and others, ultimately earning its cult status as something of a rock concert wrapped around a plot.

Our Heist Hallucinations series is pulling off its final score of the year with Steve McQueen’s 2018 thriller Widows! When a botched heist leaves four women widowed and drowning in debt, Veronica Rawlings (Viola Davis) discovers that her late husband left behind a plan for one final job. With nothing left to lose, she recruits Linda (Michelle Rodriguez), Alice (Elizabeth Debicki), and Belle (Cynthia Erivo) to finish the job...and settle a few scores of their own. Based on the British television series and co-written by Gillian Flynn (Gone Girl), McQueen’s film is a sleek, bruising reinvention of the heist movie, using the mechanics of a robbery to explore ghe women left behind by a criminal world built for men. And the cast is stacked: Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Elizabeth Debicki, Cynthia Erivo, Colin Farrell, Daniel Kaluuya, Brian Tyree Henry, and Robert Duvall.

A singing plant. A daring hero. A sweet girl. A demented dentist. It's the most outrageous musical comedy ever made! HorrorBuzz caps off its year of 40th anniversary screenings with the show-stopping musical Little Shop of Horrors! Meek flower-shop clerk Seymour Krelborn (Frida favorite Rick Moranis) discovers a mysterious plant after a solar eclipse and names it Audrey II, after his coworker-crush Audrey (Ellen Greene). But this plant doesn’t want sunlight or water....it wants blood. As Audrey II grows from a cute little sprout to a fast-talking menace, Seymour must choose between fame, fortune, and doing the right thing…preferably before the plant eats the whole block. Horror Movie Night takes filmgoing to another level with a full night of entertainment, including a themed HMN Video Pres-how, Trivia, Games, Prizes, and another outstanding horror short from HorrorBuzz’s The Screaming Room Film Festival at Midsummer Scream. Doors open and video pre-show video begins promptly at 7:30 pm. Games, prizes, and short film begin at 8:00PM. Feature starts at 8:30PM. This program is a venue rental engagement. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of The Frida Cinema or its staff.

Join cult filmmaker and drag icon Peaches Christ, Sleepaway Camp star Felissa Rose, and filmmaker and podcaster Michael Varrati for an unforgettable evening celebrating one of the most gloriously shocking horror films of all time! The event begins with a live pre-show featuring performances, conversation with Peaches, Felissa, and Michael, behind-the-scenes stories, audience participation, and a 1980s Camp Costume Contest, followed by a screening of Sleepaway Camp. A limited VIP Meet & Greet experience ($80) will also be available. Whether you’re a longtime fan or a first-time camper, this is a unique chance to experience Sleepaway Camp like never before! VIP ticket holders will be invited to a special meet-and-greet with Felissa Rose, Peaches Christ, and Michael Varrati at 6:30PM including a photo opportunity and autographs (up to two items per guest). 6:30 PM Doors Open for VIP ticket holders | 7 PM Doors open for general admission ticket holders | 7:30 PM Live pre-show | 8:30 PM Feature Presentation Frida Cinema member discount and comp passes do not apply!