Julia Ducournau’s controversial Palme d’Or body horror extravaganza is coming back for our Father’s Day weekend programming as present Titane from 2021!
A woman with a metal plate in her head from a childhood car accident embarks on a bizarre journey, bringing her into contact with a firefighter who’s reunited with his missing son after 10 years.
Unflinching and unforgettable, Titane fuses the visceral with the vulnerable. Ducournau (Raw and the upcoming Alpha) directs with feral intensity, crafting a film that shifts from slasher to surrealist family drama to near-mythic transformation tale all in one.
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Our Pride Month programming takes a dark turn as we venture into the nu-Giallo genre with Yann Gonzalez’s brilliantly bizarre Knife + Heart!
Set in Paris during the summer of 1979, Knife + Heart follows Anne (Vanessa Paradis), a producer and director of gay pornography, who is grappling with the recent departure of her editor and lover, Loïs (Kate Moran). In an attempt to win her back, Anne embarks on creating her most ambitious film yet. However, the production takes a dark turn when one of her actors is brutally murdered, leading Anne into a perilous investigation that intertwines with her professional and personal life.
Exploring themes of love, obsession, and the blurred lines between reality and fiction, Knife + Heart delves deep into the world of 1970s gay pornography, offering a narrative that is both a tribute to and a critique of the Giallo genre.
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Halloween night takes a deadly turn in Blue Murder when a rogue lightning bolt transforms free-spirited nurse Blue (Jewel Bressler) into something far more sinister. Possessed by the soul of the infamous Lone Pine Killer (Bonnie Jean Tyer), Blue is suddenly overcome with an unrelenting urge to punish the deserving.
Stick around after the screening for a Q&A with Jewel Bressler, Bonnie Jean Tyer, Hunter Shigley, Colin Seifert, and Preston Gant!
Now, fueled by a killer’s instincts and a taste for vengeance, she stalks the streets, slashing through sorority queens, loudmouth punks, insufferable Karens, frat boys, and even a twisted clown. But amidst the bloodbath, she might just find some unlikely allies.
Buckets of gore, foul-mouthed kids, unstoppable badassery, and one seriously cool black dude—get ready for the most insane Halloween of all time. From the creators of Bloodsucka Jones and Xanadu Hellfire.
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.
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Our A24orror series has earned itself another encore, and this time it’s Halina Reijn’s neon-soaked nightmare party Bodies Bodies Bodies!
In an isolated family mansion, a group of rich 20-somethings decides to play Bodies Bodies Bodies, a game where one of them is secretly a “killer” while the rest tries to “escape”. Things take a turn for the worse when real bodies start turning up, setting off a paranoid and dangerous chain of events.
Starring Rachel Sennott, Chase Sui WOnders, Maria Bakalova, Lee Pace, and Pete Davidson, Bodies Bodies Bodies is an updated take on the spooky haunted house murder mystery genre with plenty of twists and turns thrown in along the way!
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Enter the world of Joel Potrykus’ Vulcanizadora, a twisted exploration of two friends, Marty (Potrykus) and Derek (Joshua Burge), who embark on a disturbing mission in the Michigan woods. What begins as a seemingly straightforward pact unravels into a tense and surreal confrontation with the consequences of their actions.
Premiering at the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival, Vulcanizadora has garnered critical acclaim for its unique blend of horror and drama, earning a 96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes . The film’s striking cinematography and potent storytelling have been highlighted as standout elements, making it a must-see for fans of genre-defying and absurdist cinema.
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Vinegar Syndrome Pictures presents a Sunrunner Films production from director Austin Snell–They Call Her Death! And stick around after the screening for an in-person Q&A with director Austin Snell!
On the wild frontier of the American prairie, Molly Pray is on a bloody crusade against the criminal forces that have wronged her. She shows no mercy, leaving a trail of bodies in her wake on a mission that ultimately strikes at the heart of the American identity and the notion of manifest destiny. But for Molly Pray – who has the embodied specter of death on her side – this isn’t political. This is personal.
They Call Her Death is inspired by Euro acid-westerns, 70s exploitation films, shot on 16mm, has great practical effects, and is bloody as hell. Not to mention the cherry on top–a very cool Morricone-esque score!
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Encores added! Step into a world where folklore nightmare and innocence walk hand in hand as we present the long-awated Soviet classic Viy! This hallucinatory delight of Eastern European cinematic magic is sure to satisfy fans of gothic and folk horror! Get ready to be haunted.
Viy is Soviet cinema’s first officially sanctioned horror film—and it doesn’t hold back. Adapted from Nikolai Gogol’s macabre tale, this supernatural fever dream follows a hapless seminarian forced to spend three nights praying over the body of a witch. What begins as eerie restraint explodes into phantasmagoric spectacle, complete with flying coffins, demonic hordes, and otherworldly visions rendered with wild, hand-crafted ingenuity.
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Our second Volunteer Of The Month pick goes to Hillary, who has chosen Frida Cinema favorite Ana Lily Amirpour’s A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night, also doubling as an entry into our 21st Century Cult series!
Set in the fictional Iranian ghost town of Bad City, the film follows a chador-cloaked vampire (Sheila Vand) who stalks the night on a skateboard, preying on men who underestimate her. Shot in sumptuous black-and-white, it’s a hauntingly stylish tale of loneliness, justice, and bloodlust—where underground rock, spaghetti western swagger, and quiet longing swirl into something fierce and unforgettable.
Part vampire noir, part feminist revenge fantasy, and entirely its own hypnotic beast, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is a genre-smashing cult sensation—equal parts Sergio Leone, Jim Jarmusch, and graphic novel fever dream. A bold debut that announced a major new voice in genre cinema, this is arthouse horror with some serious bite!
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Can’t decide between a classic Godzilla film and a cup of Earl Grey tea? Well, you’re in luck! Gorgo, the UK’s legendary contribution to mid-century monstermania, is the latest entry in our Hallucinations series!
Irish fishermen net an enormous lizard off the coast and sell it to a London circus. It’s the biggest thing to hit the city . . . until the little buddy’s mama arrives to take custody! The movie that inspired Spider Man co-creator Steve Ditko’s comic book adaptation, Gorgo is a furious firestorm of reptilian wrath, amplified by the shrieks of the innocent! Oh boy!
Hosted by Polygon’s editor-in-chief Chris Plante, Hallucinations is a monthly event that spotlights movies that challenge our expectations of story, style, and “good taste”. Plante will introduce each film with some behind-the-scenes history and critical context. With Hallucinations, The Frida Cinema wants to build a communal space for lovers of Weird Cinema. We invite guests to bond over films that change what we expect from the medium, the world, and themselves. So come early, stay late, make friends, and watch something strange, surprising, or just shamelessly sick.
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Our 21st Century Cult series dives headfirst into psychological horror and comes out with one of the most claustrophobic, nerve-shredding films of the 2000s—Bug. Adapted from Tracy Letts’ stage play (he also wrote the screenplay), this fevered two-hander finds director William Friedkin (The French Connection, The Exorcist, Sorcerer, To Live and Die in L.A.) stripping things down to the bone: one motel room, two broken people, and a mounting delusion that morphs into full-blown apocalypse.
Ashley Judd gives a career-best performance as Agnes, a lonely, traumatized waitress holed up in a cheap Oklahoma motel. When she meets Peter (an always-electrifying Michael Shannon), a drifter with a haunted past and a theory about government-implanted bugs living under his skin, the two fall into a spiral of shared madness. What begins as a strange romance rapidly mutates into something terrifying, intimate, and hallucinatory—culminating in an operatic crescendo of love, paranoia, and self-immolation.
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