THIS WEEKEND: All-Night Horror Show at the New Beverly

Because nothing says "Halloween's Coming" quite like severe eye trauma gags, the New Beverly Cinema is having a twelve-hour all-night horror-thon this weekend, screening a half-dozen disturbing, disgusting, but otherwise distinguished films over Saturday night/early Sunday morning. Tickets are but a scant $20, all films play in "glorious" 35mm (as opposed to the lackluster kind), and all proceeds go to benefit retrofits at the New Beverly (which could frankly use a couple of them oh-so-lovely leather couches that grace the Silent Movie Theater just down the way).

Set to play: Creepers (featuring a teenaged Jennifer Connelly who can talk to bugs); The House on Sorority Row (about the recondite perils of college hazing ritual-interuptus via slashing); In the Wall (a short film so hip and now that we've never even heard of it before!); Zombie (Lucio Fulci's loving undead tribute to amateur enucleation); a "top-secret surprise movie" (which will hopefully literally be Top Secret); The Power (in which Aztec dolls do the kind of damage that only Aztec dolls can); Teenage Mother (chronicling the life of a... wait for it... teenage mother); and wrapping things up with a double-plus-good early-morning screening of Raw Force (which eatmybrains.com describes as "a bikini kung-fu zombie action car crash of a movie," and then goes on to mumble something about a place called "Warrior Island" and how a lot of the footage has actually been pirated from Roger Corman. And are you really going to question the taste of a site called EatMyBrains.com?).

WHERE: The New Beverly Cinema
WHEN: This Saturday, October 18, 2008, at 7:30pm
COST: $20 + $1 service fee (if tickets are ordered online)
MORE INFO: New Beverly Midnights (MySpace page)

The New Beverly and Seth Green Unleash a CAVALCADE OF HORRORS Tonight

The New Beverly Cinema's latest guest-programmer festival starts tonight with a double-feature of Robocop and Die Hard, introduced by Seth Green. If you've somehow managed to live a full and complete life without ever having seen the latter film -- and really, what are the chances? -- we'll point you to an early review by the Outlaw Vern, the internet's resident expert on Badass Cinema:

[In Die Hard] Bruce Willis is a conflicted type hero very much of the '80s movie heritage of which he is most definitely a part. Coming to LA to spend christmas with his wife and kid, it is revealed he lives in a different city than his wife and right away gets in an argument with her, knowing all along that he is fucking things up. Before he can even say I'M SORRY three times fast the gal is held hostage by a group of germans who take over the building and plan to steal all the money. Bruce sneaks off with his little cop pistol and the rest of the film tells the story of how one man can kill all of the terrorists by himself using makeshift weapons and detective work -- all so he can make up with his wife.

Now especially at christmas time a motherfucker that watches this movie may very well believe it is meant as a jesus type story. The part of Jesus is played of course by Bruce, who sacrifices himself to save the other people in the building. The disciples include the cop Bruce talks to over the walky talky, who follows his teachings even while the commanding officers and fbi don't believe in Bruce and even hope to get him out of the way. I don't know maybe the other 11 are the guys he mentions from his squad who are taking bets on Bruce. Also judas is played by the smarmy fucking yuppy cokehead who pretends to be bruce's friend but turns him in to the evil king Hans Grueber.

Festival programmer Seth Green is best known, depending on your circle of geekery, either for his role as Oz on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for playing the part of "the wacky geek kid" in any number of second-rate action-comedies, or as the co-creator of the amazing series Robot Chicken:


"Seth Green's Cavalcade of Horrors" as it has been dubbed will continue for the next two weeks and feature, amongst others, Albert Brook's hilarious Defending Your Life and a Phil Joanou double bill of Three O'Clock High and State of Grace.


WHERE: The New Beverly Cinema
WHEN: September 3 through 15, at 7pm
COST: $7 gets you in to both films.
MORE INFO: The New Beverly's MySpace Blog