From the Amazon’s forbidden depths comes…Creature from the Black Lagoon!
Cinematic Void is invading The Frida Cinema again to present one of the crown jewels of Universal’s monster canon that introduced audiences to the unforgettable Gill-man!
When scientists exploring the Amazon River stumble on a “missing link” connecting humans and fish, they plan to capture it for later study. But the Creature has plans of his own, and has set his sights on the lead scientist’s beautiful fiancée, Kay.
Combining atmospheric underwater photography and unforgettable creature effects, the film remains a marvel of 1950s genre filmmaking. More than seventy years later, the Gill-man still stands among cinema’s most iconic monsters, re-surfacing from the depths every so often to captivate new generation of moviegoers.
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July’s Hallucinations pick is the delightfully strange Musical Fantasy Tomorrow, featuring an early leading performance from the incomparable Olivia Newton-John!
In a whimsical future where science, music, and imagination collide, a brilliant young inventor and his eccentric companions set out on an adventure that spans planets, generations, and dimensions.
Released years before Grease would make her an international icon, Tomorrow offers a fascinating glimpse of Olivia Newton-John at the dawn of her screen career. Overflowing with colorful visuals and catch tunes, Tomorrow is a charming reminder that we used to make movies like this!
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”. 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 second Volunteer of the Month pick for July comes via Avalon, who has chosen chosen the hallucinatory body-horror classic Videodrome from visionary filmmaker and certified sicko David Cronenberg.
As the president of a trashy TV channel, Max Renn is desperate for new programming to attract viewers. When he happens upon “Videodrome,” a TV show dedicated to gratuitous torture and punishment, Max sees a potential hit and broadcasts the show on his channel. However, after his girlfriend auditions for the show and never returns, Max investigates the truth behind Videodrome and discovers that the graphic violence may not be as fake as he thought.
Videodrome remains one of Cronenberg’s most provocative and unsettling works. Filled with unforgettable practical effects and audacious ideas, the film predicts a world consumed by screens while asking who controls the images we consume.
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Abby, a brilliant, young neuroscientist who has recently lost her father, drowns her grief by spending her days working with a monkey named Dorey. Abby meets a programmer, Sam, who has created a technology that reconnects Abby with her beloved father. Her relationship with her digitized dad then forces her to re-examine everything from her romantic relationships to her life’s work.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Something has survived.
Our Spielberg Summer series ventures to The Lost World: Jurassic World, the oft-maligned sequel to the 1993 classic.
When mathematician Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) is pulled back into the dinosaur project after a second island is discovered, he joins a rescue expedition that quickly becomes a fight for survival as corporate greed and apex predators collide. What begins as a mission of observation spirals into full-scale chaos when dinosaurs prove, once again, who is higher on the food chain.
Darker and much more unruly than its predecessor, The Lost World: Jurassic Park explores the consequences of trying to manage wonder once it’s been unleashed. Spielberg leans into scale and spectacle, building some of the best set pieces of his career, each more intense than the last.
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An adventure 65 million years in the making.
Our Spielberg Summer series is taking a trip to Jurassic Park, the groundbreaking blockbuster that made audiences believe…and then run for their lives.
When a billionaire philanthropist unveils a revolutionary theme park filled with genetically resurrected dinosaurs, a small group of experts is invited to preview the island before opening day. But when the park’s security systems fail, paleontologists Alan Grant (Sam Neill) and Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), along with mathematician Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), are forced to survive a prehistoric nightmare unleashed by the follies of human ambition.
A landmark in visual effects and suspense filmmaking, Jurassic Park remains one of cinema’s great “how did they do that?” experiences. Spielberg blends awe and terror in perfect balance, expanding his horizons to new themes that he would explore even more more in the second half of his career.
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He is afraid. He is totally alone. He is 3,000,000 light years from home.
Our Spielberg Summer series phones home with E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, one of the most beloved family films ever made and a landmark of modern American cinema.
When a lonely young boy named Elliott discovers a stranded alien hiding near his home, the two form an unlikely friendship that changes both of their lives. As E.T. becomes part of Elliott’s family, the children must help their otherworldly companion evade government authorities and find a way back home before it’s too late.
Few films capture the wonder of childhood as beautifully as E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Spielberg transforms a simple story of friendship into something genuinely magical. Decades after audiences first watched that bicycle lift off against the moonlit sky, the film, like so many others from Spielberg, continues to inspire awe from audiences across the globe.
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