Get ready for a Guillermo del Toro comic book double feature featuring Blade II and Hellboy II: The Golden Army, hosted by our buddy Jordan Morris!
First up, Wesley Snipes goes full vampire-hunting badass as Blade, forced to team up with his sworn enemies to battle a terrifying new breed of vampire. Then, after a ten minute intermission, Ron Perlman’s beloved Hellboy returns alongside Liz and Abe Sapien to stop an ancient prince from unleashing an unstoppable army of supernatural creatures. Both films were directed by del Toro, showcasing the monster-loving imagination that would go on to define one of cinema’s most distinctive auteurs.
Two comic-book classics. Two armies of monsters. Two awesome movies. Don’t miss these bad boys on the big screen!
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Come celebrate the new movement of young filmmakers devouring the medium with their intense, cinematic visions with this double feature of two bold, boundary pushing, & incendiary debut feature films that compliment each-other: the hot-boiled angst of the timely ABRAXAS (Written, Directed, Edited, & Starring Charles Tyler Kinder) & the synthetic, neon-drenched, liminal nightmare fuel that schizoids out of the screen into your senses with FaceTape (Written, Directed, Edited, Shot, Sound Designed by Manny Liotta).
Made in unison with each other with a blend of cast members between the two films, this is a double feature that you won’t walk away from feeling the same as when you entered the theater!
ABRAXAS (85 min): Struggling to complete his college thesis, a frustrated environmentalist starts to receive “divine inspiration” which liberates him from writer’s block. However, as his ideas intensify, he spirals into a dangerous fixation, crafting an enraged manifesto against techno-industrial civilization. Watch the trailer for it here!
FaceTape (84 min): A junkie decides to come clean from abusing an analog VR drug called FaceTape only to find his life outside of his addiction is far from stable. Watch the trailer here!
There will be a 10 minute intermission between each film and an introduction by the filmmakers!
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Just added: before our 10PM screening on Friday, September 18th, DJ OLDBOY will be joining us to spin some vinyl inspired by the the film’s soundtrack, all while decked out in full Drive cosplay! Fans of Electronic, Synth-Pop, and Dream-Pop should not miss this pre-show!
There are no clean getaways.
Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive is back at The Frida to celebrate its 15th anniversary with some very special In Remembrance screenings for Kavinsky, whose iconic song “Nightcall” helped define the film’s unforgettable neon-noir atmosphere.
Ryan Gosling stars as The Driver, a quiet Hollywood stuntman who moonlights as a getaway driver and finds himself pulled into a dangerous world of criminals and forbidden romance.
Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn and featuring Carey Mulligan, Bryan Cranston, Albert Brooks, Oscar Isaac, Christina Hendricks, and Ron Perlman, Drive has been electrifying audiences at The Frida Cinema for over a decade since we first played it. And most of that can be attributed to the film’s brilliant soundtrack, which is a synth-soaked masterpiece featuring artists like Kavinsky, Chromatics, Desire, College & Electric Youth, and Cliff Martinez.
Enhanced Accessibility: this film has Closed Captioning capability!
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Calling all Warriors, Furies, and Rogues out to play in the city of Santa Ana for a FanMail Cinema Club screening event of The Warriors (1979) on Sunday, September 13th! Doors: 5:30pm, cosplay contest and film at 7:00pm!
The film follows members of a street gang known as The Warriors must fight their way from the Bronx to their home turf on Coney Island when they are falsely accused of assassinating a respected gang leader.
Dress up like your favorite posse from the film for our The Warriors-inspired photo-op and a chance to win the cosplay contest! Themed vendors will be set-up by 5:30pm and after the film!
Snag your $15 ticket before a rival snags your seat from under you!
Can you dig it?
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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.
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Frida Cinema Film Club members are invited to a very special 4K restoration of Jacques Deray’s La Piscine!
Jean-Paul (Alain Delon) and Marianne (Romy Schneider) indulge in their passion for each other while borrowing a friend’s luxurious villa in the south of France. When the friend (Maurice Ronet) and his daughter (Jane Birkin) arrive unexpectedly, rivalries and insecurities surface and events take a sinister turn.
“Sex, sun, and suspicion. A star-powered psychological thriller.” –Time Out
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There’s more than one way to lose your life to a killer.
August’s Staff Pick comes courtesy of our new Box Office Manager Chris Martinez, who has chosen David Fincher’s chilling 2007 masterwork Zodiac!
Over the course of a decade, editors of the San Francisco Chronicle entice themselves in the murders of the Zodiac Killer. However, as time runs its course, interest in the case dwindles in the eyes of the professionals. The Killer stops interacting with the public. However, believing he has the answers, an amateur cartoonist from the initial sightings races against time to prevent what he believes is another murder.
Featuring extraordinary performances from Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey Jr., and an incredible ensemble cast of, Zodiac is less interested in the killer himself than the devastating impact of obsession on everyone left searching for him. With Fincher’s signature knack for meticulous attention to detail and stunning cinematography, the film has become one of the defining thrillers of the 21st century.
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Yeon Sang-ho’s global phenomenon Train to Busan is coming back to The Frida Cinema to celebrate its 10th Anniversary!
What begins as a simple birthday trip for a father and daughter turns into a high-octane fight for survival when a zombie outbreak ravages South Korea. Trapped on a speeding train, they must navigate a landscape of terror to reach safety. Experience the relentless action and heart-wrenching drama on the big screen like never before.
A pure action spectacle that secretly doubles as an emotional family drama, Train to Busan succeeds because it never loses sight of the people at its center. Its breakneck pacing and inventive set pieces make it one of the great zombie films of the 21st century and one hell of a time on the big screen!
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In the basement of a university medical school, Dr. Jessup floats naked in total darkness. The most terrifying experiment in the history of science is out of control…and the subject is himself.
It’s Ken Russell Season (wink wink) around here, as we’re palying a late night one-off of Altered States, one of the wildest studio films ever made.
A research scientist (The late, great William Hurt) explores the boundaries and frontiers of human consciousness. Using sensory deprivation and hallucinogenic mixtures from Native American shamans, he explores these altered states of cognizance and finds that memory, time, and reality itself are states of mind.
Altered States is a head-on collision between prestige science fiction, body horror, psychedelia, and New Age philosophy, making it a perfect late night cinematic experience!
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“It’s just you and me now, sport…”
The Frida Cinema is proud to present the brand new 40th anniversary 4K restoration of Michael Mann’s masterful thriller Manhunter, officially titled Manhunter: The Final Cut.
Before The Silence of the Lambs, there was Manhunter. Based on author Thomas Harris’ original Hannibal Lecter novel, 1981’s Red Dragon, Manhunter stars William Petersen as retired criminal profiler (William Petersen). Traumatized by a violent encounter with serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecktor (as it’s spelled in the movie, and as played chillingly by Brian Cox), Graham reluctantly returns to the FBI to help track down a serial killer of families – and consults Dr. Lecktor for advice. The third feature written and directed by Michael Mann is a gripping adaptation of Harris’ best-selling thriller, and benefits from the filmmaker’s typically striking visuals and a top-notch supporting cast, including Tom Noonan as the hunted killer, and three-time Oscar nominee Joan Allen as his blind love interest.
The inspiration for our Unsung 80’s Soundtracks series, Manhunter’s soundtrack may be one of the best examples of Michael Mann’s use of music as an essential part of his films’ visual and emotional language. Rather than relying on a traditional orchestral score, Mann assembled a soundtrack of contemporary artists, including The Reds, Shriekback, The Prime Movers, and Iron Butterfly to establish and maintain the film’s mood and atmosphere. Standouts include The Prime Movers’ “Strong as I Am,” written specifically for the film; Iron Butterfly’s “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” which turns the psychedelic-rock classic into something genuinely menacing; and Shriekback’s “This Big Hush,” whose hypnotic rhythm gives one of the film’s quieter moments a dreamlike sense of dread.
This new 4K Final Cut, overseen by Mann, enhances the film’s depth, visual clarity, and sound, offering audiences the ultimate immersive version.
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