The history of cinema is a delirious tale of wild experimentation, technological advances, improbable ballyhoo, and in-theatre gimmicks. Pungent aromas, costumed stooges, stage hypnotists, midnight screenings, immersive sound, wider screens, cheap liquor, and live music have all been deployed to keep audiences coming back for more.
SCREAM FOR YOUR LIVES! — the 13th sensational season of “London’s most fun and informative film night” (@mactingz) — celebrated the plucky pioneers who dared thrust film into the fourth dimension and was our full-throated BAR TRASH tribute to the greatest cinema showman of all, William Castle.
Across the season, TOKEN HOMO recreated some of cinema’s forgotten illusions — including 5 rarely performed William Castle gimmicks! — taking audiences on a magical mystery tour into a lost world of movie magic where the screenings are never silent. SCREAM FOR YOUR LIVES! took place every Wednesday at Genesis Cinema from 20 May to 12 August and every Sunday at Finsbury Park Picturehouse and Beer Merchants Tap from 17 May to 16 August.
Warning for the sensitive: some programmes may contain sudden noises, shocks AND screams…
#217: Prologue: LES DIABOLIQUES dir Henri-Georges Clouzot (1955/France)
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 17 MAY 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: No Late Admission!
Based on a novel by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac (who also wrote the book VERTIGO is based on), LES DIABOLIQUES is the story of the wife (Véra Clouzot) and mistress (Simone Signoret) of a sadistic headteacher of a second-rate boys boarding school (Paul Meurisse). The women plot to murder him with what seems the perfect alibi. However, things don’t go to plan…
This was the psychological horror film that inspired ‘King of the Gimmicks’ William Castle to ‘scare the pants off America’. Seeing LES DIABOLIQUES at a sold out screening with his wife Ellen, Castle noted the youthful age of the crowd and their vocal enthusiasm for the film: “I watched transfixed as the movie unfolded its grisly tale before my eyes… When that audience gave that final collective scream, I knew that’s where I wanted to take them — only I want louder screams, more horror, more excitement”. The Castles immediately hatched a plot to do just that: targeting the American youth market with their signature cocktail of thrills and chills, blended with goofiness and gimmicks, resulting in the perfect ‘date night’ experience for a new generation of American teenagers.
#218: Opening Night: 13 GHOSTS dir William Castle (1960/USA) with ‘Illusion-0!’
Genesis Cinema 20 MAY 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Illusion-O!
William Castle’s 13 GHOSTS (1960) was presented with Token Homo’s DIY and entirely unofficial recreation of the film’s original theatrical gimmick, ‘Illusion-O!’. Just as in 1960, every member of the audience received a FREE ‘Ghost Viewer’ to watch the film through, but only those brave enough will actually see the thirteen ghosts in horrifying ‘ECTOPLASMIC COLOUR’!
For 13 GHOSTS, William Castle developed a technique using different coloured filters to make “ghosts appear miraculously” on screen when audiences looked through their ‘Ghost Viewer’. Ever the cinematic showman, Castle promoted this ‘chill-n-thrill’ engagement as a must-see theatrical experience — “You can’t see the ghosts without a Ghost Viewer!’ — whilst cheekily offering those that might be too squeamish a ‘Ghost Remover’ in the same device.
#219: EL TOPO dir Alejandro Jodorowsky (1970/Mexico)
Beer Merchants Tap 25 MAY 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Midnight Movies!
SCREAM FOR YOUR LIVES! was about taking cinema into the 4th dimension and there’s no more mind-warping gimmick than the midnight movie experience. Almost as old as cinema itself, midnight presentations were first used by exploitation film exhibitors to promote adult-only engagements, and then to harness the transgressive union that only happens amongst audiences after midnight.
Written, directed, scored by and starring Chilean director Alejandro Jodorowsky, EL TOPO is the definitive midnight movie from the format’s 1970s resurgence in New York City, an outbreak of cinematic midnight mass that gave us FREAKS (rescued from obscurity as a counterculture cult hit in the 1960s), a twenty-five week run of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, and, of course, THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW.
#220: MATINEE dir Joe Dante (1993/USA) with ‘Illustrated Lecture!’
Genesis Cinema 27 MAY 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Illustrated Lecture!
Joe Dante’s keenly nostalgic tribute to William ‘King of Gimmicks’ Castle, MATINEE (1993) tells the story of an old-school cinema showman Lawrence Woolsey — played brilliantly by a cigar-chomping John Goodman — trying to promote his latest low-budget schlocker, MANT! Desperate to open MANT! to big numbers, Woolsey accidentally schedules a preview screening — complete with a marauding actor in a malfunctioning ant costume — in Key West, Florida on the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Just as Roger Corman in 1958 rushed his sci-fi film WAR OF THE SATELLITES into production to exploit America’s fears of the space race, so Woolsey must find a way of making movies matter at a time of global insecurity.
MATINEE was introduced with a sensational exposé of the TRUE shocking history of movie exhibition gimmicks by queer film fanatic, Token Homo. A must for all film fans! Absolutely not to be missed! WOULD ALL PATRONS PLEASE NOTE: if you dread loud noises in the movie theatre, YOU MUST NOT see this talk!
#221: REPO MAN dir Alex Cox (1984)
Beer Merchants Tap 31 MAY 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Midnight Movies!
The defining cult film of the Reagan era and Alex Cox’s feature debut, REPO MAN is a genre-busting mash-up of atomic age science fiction, post-punk anarchy, and conspiracy paranoia, all shot through with heavy doses of deadpan humour and offbeat philosophy. Featuring an iconic soundtrack with Iggy Pop, Black Flag, the Circle Jerks, and Suicidal Tendencies, stunning cinematography by Robby Müller (PARIS TEXAS), and iconoclastic direction, REPO MAN remains one of the rare films to find its regular midnight audience on the NY city scene.
#222: POLYESTER dir John Waters (1981) with ‘Odorama!’
Genesis Cinema 03 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Odorama!
For his first studio picture, filth maestro John Waters took advantage of his biggest budget yet to allow his muse Divine to sink his teeth into a role unlike any he had played before: a depressed suburban housewife. Blessed with a keen sense of smell, and cursed with a philandering pornographer husband, a parasitic mother, and delinquent children, the long-suffering Francine Fishpaw (Divine) turns to drink before deliverance appears in the form of a hunk named Todd Tomorrow (played by ‘The Sigh Guy’ himself, homosexual heartthrob, Tab Hunter).
Waters was a devout fan of our season’s icon, William Castle, and devised his own gimmick for POLYESTER: Odorama! Every member of the audience received a FREE ‘scratch-n-sniff’ and during the film, numbers flash up on screen that correspond to numbers on the Odorama card: your cue to encounter one of John Waters’ signature scents developed exclusively for the film (just be careful about #2…).
#223: BLACKMAIL dir Alfred Hitchcock (1929/UK) with Recorded Sound!
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 07 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: All-Talkie!
Alfred Hitchcock loved a gimmick, and here he helms what was marketed as Britain’s first ‘All-Talkie’ for only his second foray into the suspense genre. Based on a stage play by Charles Bennett, BLACKMAIL is about a grocer’s daughter Alice White (Anny Ondra) who kills a man in self-defence. Her police officer boyfriend, Detective Frank Webber (John Longden), covers up for her, but she has been spotted leaving the scene by a petty criminal who starts to blackmail her.
BLACKMAIL started as a silent film but was adapted into a separate release with sound to cash-in on that new gimmick during production. Both silent and sound versions were distributed to cinemas as sound equipment wasn’t yet ubiquitous. We’re showing the ‘All-Talkie’ version with a slightly longer run time (85mins, with the silent at 76mins). The film was the first commercially successful European talkie and in 2017, Time Out ranked BLACKMAIL as the 59th best British film.
#224: DRACULA A.D. 1972 dir Alan Gibson (1972/UK) with ‘HorroRitual!’
Genesis Cinema 10 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: HorroRitual!
How do you bring an ageing horror franchise starring two revered actors in their most iconic roles (toe-curlingly) up to date? You set it in the modern era and give the film one of the worst (best?) taglines in horror film history: “The Count is back, with an eye for London’s hot pants… and a taste for everything!”. To help sell this decidedly odd film in the USA, Warner Bros. promoted an exclusive fan club — the COUNT DRACULA SOCIETY — in a short film before the main feature. The ‘HorroRitual’ (aka ‘The Oath’) required audiences to pledge their allegiance to promoting the film “so help me Christopher Lee” and will be revived from beyond the grave by our effervescent BAR TRASH host tonight!
For this screening, Token Homo presented an absolutely diy and entirely unauthorised recreation of the ‘HorroRitual’ using a devilish glove puppet and some outrageous overacting….
#225: THE MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM dir Michael Curtiz (1933/USA) in Two-Strip Technicolor!
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 14 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Two-Strip Technicolor!
Following the success of DOCTOR X in our CELLULOID JAM season, we couldn’t wait to bring you another title in gloriously restored Two-Strip Technicolor. THE MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM is the title Warner Bros. rushed into production following the earlier film’s box office success, featuring the same director, cinematographer, lead actors, and an eerily familiar vibe.
THE MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM was among the final few films shot using ‘Two-Strip Technicolor’: the Great Depression reduced production of all colour films in the USA, and a more realistic ‘Three-Strip Full-Color’ process had debuted in 1932. THE MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM has since been remade several times including previous BAR TRASH title HOUSE OF WAX in our run of Vincent Price classics, and a 2005 version featuring Paris Hilton.
#226: 4TH BIRTHDAY: MYSTERY GIMMICK SHOW!!! revealed to be BUG! dir Jeannot Szwarc (1975/USA) with ‘Hercules the giant cockroach!’
Genesis Cinema 17 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Hercules the giant cockroach!
Another show. Another crazy gimmick revived from cinema’s forgotten histories. But this one was truly special: our birthday celebration of 4 amazing years of BAR TRASH at Genesis Cinema, a weekly chaotic cocktail of cult cinema and occasional cabaret. It was also a mystery film reveal, unleashing William Castle’s final feature as writer/producer — eco-horror BUG! (1975) about fire-farting cockroaches laying siege to a small American town — on our too trusting audience.
We’d also kept the gimmick a closely guarded secret, revealing everything in our intermission show. Back in the day, William Castle had insured a giant cockroach he’d named ‘Hercules’ for $1million and toured with to promote the film around theatres (the insurance for Hercules was ‘in case of death on tour’).
Having screened the first part of the film, and explained the gimmick that we were about to recreate at the start of our intermission show, Token Homo then freaked people out with several dire warnings about close encounters with ‘dangerous flesh-eating critters’ (doing his best dime store David Attenborough impersonation…), even recruiting volunteers to wear PPE for a close encounter with these ‘toxic’ creatures. Our actual ‘roach was then revealed (from behind a giant curtain) to be more of a final show girl than a hissing, spitting beastie, with Loose Willis in full glamour-roach garb. Hercules/Loose then performed a stand-up routine about the misunderstanding and mistreatment of cockroaches in the film industry before leading a toast “to four years, to BAR TRASH, a toast to resilience and defiance!”.
#227: HAROLD AND MAUDE dir Hal Ashby (1971/USA)
Beer Merchants Tap 21 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Midnight Movies!
When Francis Ford Coppola was late completing THE GODFATHER (1972), Paramount rushed out HAROLD AND MAUDE as a last minute replacement. The movie was both a critical and commercial failure: “has all the fun and gaiety of a burning orphanage” (Variety). A highly personal film developed by its screenwriter Colin Higgins as his master’s thesis at film school, HAROLD AND MAUDE didn’t stand a chance: “this little film of ours in those big cinemas up against all the top releases of the season… We were swamped. It was a major failure; total disaster” (Higgins).
HAROLD AND MAUDE eventually found popularity on America’s regional movie circuit, playing at venues like the Westgate in suburban Minneapolis “where it reportedly ran for three years and induced one young patron to see it 138 times” (Midnight Movies) before becoming an occasional feature in midnight movie lineups. With one of those reputations that has grown and grown over the 55 years since its original release, HAROLD AND MAUDE is now essential for any cult film fanatic.
#228: MAHAKAAL dir Shyam Ramsay & Tulsi Ramsay (1993/India) with FREE samosas & chai!
Genesis Cinema 24 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Remakesploitation!
One way to promote your film is to base it on another, already successful one, or to copy that film entirely… The global cinematic phenomenon of low-budget ripoffs and remakes is lovingly known as ‘remakesploitation’, and is often associated with the genre film industries of Turkey, Mexico, and India, which is where we return for the Ramsay brothers’ eerily familiar MAHAKAAL (1993).
We served MAHAKAAL with FREE chai and samosas in the second of two intervals, recreating the vibe of the UK’s South Asian Film Clubs of the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s when audiences would dress up, socialise, eat samosas, and talk throughout the film (and sometimes back at the screen!).
#229: THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN dir Terence Fisher (1957/UK) in Eastman Colour!
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 28 JUN 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Eastman Colour!
Directed by Terence Fisher, the film stars Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee in two of their most iconic roles, as Victor Frankenstein (Cushing) recounts his failed attempt at creating the perfect human (Lee). THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN’s massive box office success would firmly establish ‘Hammer’ as a global brand of Gothic cinema, leading to several sequels and Hammer’s versions of DRACULA and THE MUMMY.
We are showing THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN fully uncensored — including the infamous “eyeball” scene — and restored in the lurid glory of Eastman Colour. Eastman Colour was developed as a cheaper alternative to Technicolor using a ‘single strip’ process and would help revolutionise colour as the default film stock globally. Its use here adds to the film’s reputation as the “first really gory horror film, showing blood and guts in colour” (Patricia MacCormack).
#230: MR SARDONICUS dir William Castle (1961/USA) with ‘Punishment Poll!’
Genesis Cinema 01 JUL 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Punishment Poll!
Gothic chiller MR SARDONICUS was one of William Castle’s faves, a story of a man whose face becomes frozen in a horrifying grin after robbing his father’s grave to obtain a winning lottery ticket. Castle claimed in his autobiography ‘Step Right Up! I’m Gonna Scare the Pants Off America’ that the studio regarded the original ending as too grim and wanted him to reshoot it, proposing a ‘more merciful’ alternative ending. This inspired him to suggest polling the audience at each show to choose their preferred ending: MERCY or NO MERCY.
Just like in 1961, every patron received a FREE ‘thumbs up/thumbs down’ polling card, re-printed exclusively for this limited engagement at Genesis Cinema. Your card will ‘glow-in-the-dark’ to let our projectionist know which ending you want to see. Please remember to insert your polling card into the patented ‘Activator Booth’ in the foyer before taking your seat.
#231: THE ROBE dir Henry Koster (1953/USA) in CinemaScope!
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 05 JUL 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: CinemaScope!
Henry Koster’s epic film THE ROBE was the first release in the super-wide format of CinemaScope, one of a flurry of 1950s technical innovations that promised exhibiters and audiences ever-deeper degrees of cinematic realism from ever-wider screens, immersive sound, and 3D. Posters for THE ROBE marketed the film as “The Modern Miracle You See Without Glasses!”, a dig at its 3D competitors.
THE ROBE was a major box office smash — running for months after its original release and later reissued due to demand — and nominated for 5 Academy Awards (winning ‘Best Art Direction’ and ‘Best Costume Design’). Many theatres lacked suitable projection equipment to screen the film in CinemaScope, so THE ROBE was simultaneously shot and released in a standard 1:33:1 aspect ratio (the version used for TV broadcast). We were stupidly proud present this gloriously restored slice of Sunday School cinema with its original theatrical splendour of CinemaScope.
#232: ROLLERCOASTER dir James Goldstone (1977/USA) in Sensurround!
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 19 JUL 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Sensurround!
An unforgettable trip filled with sense-shattering twists and hairpin turns, ROLLERCOASTER fulfils two of the disaster sub-genre’s prerequisites, a starry cast — featuring Timothy Bottoms, George Segal, Richard Widmark, and Henry Fonda — and scenes of mass destruction. All of this is warped into a suspense thriller about a terrorist hell-bent on turning America’s amusement parks into battlefields (think DIE HARD with hot dogs, height restrictions, and long load times…).
ROLLERCOASTER was originally shown in ‘Sensurround’, a short-lived system using extended-range bass frequencies that are felt rather than heard, giving a sense of vibration during the film’s immersive rollercoaster ride sequences. Originally deployed for the film EARTHQUAKE (1974), Sensurround disrupted screenings in adjacent theatres and rattled plaster from ceilings but did have a lasting legacy in promoting the subwoofer as an integral component of cinema sound. Get ready to rumble!*
#233: DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME — 10TH ANNIVERSARY dir Bill Morrison (2016/USA) featuring True Life!
Finsbury Park Picturehouse 22 JUL 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: True Life!
One gimmick has thrilled audiences since the dawn of moving images: true life. From cautionary scenes of venereal disease and child birth in the classic exploitation films of the 1920s-40s, to the ‘mondo’ exploitation documentaries of the 1960s and ‘faces of death’ horror, audiences have flocked to true life filmmaking.
We were stupidly proud to present Bill Morrison’s astonishing study of the explosive history of cinema itself: DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME. Celebrating its 10th anniversary, Morrison’s film tells the bizarre and true story of a lost collection of over 500 nitrate film prints found fizzing in the permafrost of a remote Yukon mining town. Restoring some of the unearthed footage — complete with its eerily beautiful ice damage — Morrison creates a kaleidoscopic social history of cinema itself.
#234: THE HARDER THEY COME dir Perry Henzell (1972/Jamaica)
Beer Merchants Tap 26 JUL 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Midnight Movies!
THE HARDER THEY COME is the essential reggae-rebel story of a young, gifted and Black Kingston musician whose attempt to lift himself out of poverty leads to crisis. Reggae legend Jimmy Cliff plays the young outlaw who fights back against a corrupt system, becomes a star, but ends up on the run.
The film’s legendary soundtrack album was credited as “bringing reggae to the world” and features Cliff singing ‘The Harder They Come’, ‘You Can Get It If You Really Want’, and ‘Many Rivers To Cross’. After a lacklustre theatrical release in the USA — the film was banned in Jamaica for allegedly inciting crime — THE HARDER THEY COME found its midnight audience in NYC and is one of the more brazenly political of the late night cult classics.
#235: Queer Horror / Double Feature: HOMICIDAL dir William Castle (1960/USA) with a ‘Fright Break!’ + I SAW WHAT YOU DID dir William Castle (1965/USA) with a special ‘Shock Section!’
Genesis Cinema 29 JUL 2026 [full event info]
HOMICIDAL: William Castle’s personal PSYCHO clone, HOMICIDAL is one of the maestro’s twistiest films and deeply indebted to his other horror inspo, Henri-Georges Clouzot’s sublime LES DIABOLIQUES (1955). The story follows a mysterious young woman in a small California town whose presence unearths secrets concerning a prominent local family. For this rare presentation, Token Homo recreated the film’s original theatrical gimmick: a special ‘Fright Break’ with posters warning patrons that “All those too timid to take the climax will be welcomed to a COWARD’S CORNER!” (no refunds for missing the ending!).
I SAW WHAT YOU DID: Three young girls make ‘crank’ calls, randomly dialling numbers from the phone book and whispering “I saw what you did… I know who you are” down the line. They put themselves in danger when they pick the wrong name and number, coincidentally calling a man just after he has murdered his wife. Believing he has been found out, the man tries to track down the callers to silence them. I SAW WHAT YOU DID brings Joan Crawford back to BAR TRASH in a supporting role and was originally released with a special ‘Shock Section’ to prevent timid audience members from being scared out of their seats (a DEEPLY SILLY gimmick we will recreate tonight!).
#236: WICKED, WICKED dir Richard L. Bare (1973/USA) in Duo-Vision!
Genesis Cinema 05 AUG 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Duo-Vision!
Short-lived cinema gimmick ‘Duo-Vision’ promised audiences would “witness simultaneous action through the use of a double screen” offering “an experience that will challenge your imagination!”. Actually a simple split-screen technique, WICKED, WICKED’s true gimmick was that the entire film was shot from different perspectives, creating a boundary-pushing alternative to cinema’s slew of PSYCHO copycat killers.
On one half of the screen, WICKED, WICKED follows a psychotic electrician stalking the corridors of an elegant Californian hotel. Simultaneously, the other half of the screen follows the hotel guests who are unaware they’ll be checking out soon (as well as providing occasional flash-backs into various characters’ lives and backstories). Adding to all the deranged chaos, the carnage is accompanied on screen by an organist playing music from the 1925 silent classic, THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA.
#237: EATING RAOUL dir Paul Bartel (1982/USA)
Beer Merchants Tap 09 AUG 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Midnight Movies!
A sleeper hit of the early 1980s, EATING RAOUL is a bawdy tale of conspicuous consumption that reunites two BAR TRASH favourites, Warhol superstar Mary Woronov and cult legend Paul Bartel (last seen together in one of their many on-screen cameos in Season 9’s exploding head shocker, CHOPPING MALL).
Woronov and Bartel (who also self-funded, co-wrote and directed) play a prudish married couple who feel put upon by the swingers living in their apartment building. One night, by accident, they find a way to simultaneously rid themselves of “the perverts” down the hall and realise their dream of opening a restaurant. The result is a mix of hilarious, anything-goes slapstick and biting satire that will make you question the next ‘must-go’ supper club you attend and is Token Homo’s choice as a midnight cult film in waiting.
#238: Closing Night: THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREATURES WHO STOPPED LIVING AND BECAME MIXED UP ZOMBIES!!? dir Ray Dennis Steckler (1964/USA) with Loose Willis + Hallucinogenic Hypno-Vision!
Genesis Cinema 12 AUG 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: Hallucinogenic Hypno-Vision!
Billed as ‘the first monster musical’ and made before Ray Dennis Steckler turned 24, INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREATURES was shot in just 11 days on a micro budget of $38,000. A lurid story with musical interludes about a series of carnival murders, INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREATURES is “junk drawer cinema at its most impossible to close” with a “threadbare, developed-in-the-bathroom-sink aesthetic that explains the film’s confounding charm” (Richard Harland Smith, Turner Classic Movies).
Steckler bought-back ownership of his film after its initial failed distribution, exhibiting it to modest success under alternative titles including ‘Diabolical Dr. Voodoo’ and ‘Teenage Psycho Meets Bloody Mary’. As well as appearing in his own films under the pseudonym ‘Cash Flagg’, Steckler toured the grindhouse circuit with his titles, often playing one of the monsters that would leap out of the darkness for this film’s original gimmick, TERRORAMA. We served the film with our own cocktail of theatrical gimmicks — including some free shots! — as we brought our season to a close.
#239: Epilogue: ROSEMARY’S BABY producer William Castle (1968/USA)
Beer Merchants Tap 16 AUG 2026 [full event info]
Featured gimmick: William Castle!
Just as SCREAM FOR YOUR LIVES! opened with the film that inspired William Castle to unleash his decade-long cycle of ‘chill-n-thrill’ gimmicks — LES DIABOLIQUES (1955) — so we end the season with an epilogue: his last great roll of the cinematic dice.
Castle bought the rights to Ira Levin’s best-selling novel before it was published and pitched it to Paramount. He landed a spectacular deal to produce but not direct, claiming he received a fixed fee of $250,000 and 50 percent of the impressive profits! The maestro was superseded by rising talent in the director’s chair but would still oversee one of the most critically and commercially successful horror films of all time. ROSEMARY’S BABY also sees the swift return of Ruth Gordon (HAROLD & MAUDE) to our BAR TRASH screens, winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Minnie Castevet.
If the ‘King of Gimmicks’ stood accused of plunging horror into a juvenile cycle of pseudo-scares (his horror films are all very Scooby-Doo), ROSEMARY’S BABY re-instated the capacity of horror to truly ‘scare the pants off America’. Castle received some truly poisonous pen letters for his efforts (quoted in his not entirely trust-worthy autobiography…).
#240: Silent Horror / Double Feature: THE CABINET OF DR CALIGARI dir Robert Wiene (1920) with live score by Maxim Melton + THE HAUNTED HOUSE dirs Edward F. Cline & Buster Keaton (1921) with live foley sound FX by Ruth Sullivan
Genesis Cinema 19 AUG 2026 [full event info] date changed due to scheduling clashes
Featured gimmicks: Live Music & Sound FX!
THE CABINET OF DR CALIGARI: One of the most iconic films in cinema history, Robert Wiene’s Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari shook filmgoers worldwide and changed the direction of the art form. The film’s nightmarish sets and stark lighting influenced generations of filmmakers: you will have felt Dr. Caligari’s long shadow even if you haven’t actually seen the film. Experience this diabolical masterpiece with a new improvised live score by cabaret artist and trained knife thrower, Maxim Melton.
THE HAUNTED HOUSE: A two-reel silent short starring comic genius Buster Keaton aka “The Great Stone Face”. Written and directed by Keaton and Edward F. Cline, the film sees Keaton star as a hapless bank teller who, falsely accused of planning a robbery, takes refuge in a haunted house. Silent films were frequently presented with live music and sound effects, a theatrical gimmick we recreate with esteemed stage and screen foley artist Ruth Sullivan who has more than 260 screen credits for creating practical sound effects for TV and film including THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH, 28 DAYS LATER, and URCHIN.
