You know what the weirdest thing is about sitting in a movie theater for nine hours to watch five horror films in a row?
When it’s over and your eyes feel like poached eggs and your ass is numb and your legs are stiff and you sorta zombie-walk back to your car and all of the popcorn, beer, milkshakes and pizza that you’ve taken in are starting to do weird things in your stomach… you kinda still want to sneak in one more movie. (Whether you prefer that sixth movie at home or in a theater depends, I guess, on your feelings about using public restrooms.)
It’s insane, but when the show is good and you lived through it, you become a proud weirdo.
And these Alamo Drafthouse bastards do this thing well.
This was their FIFTH annual Dismember the Alamo October horror marathon and here’s the lowdown on how it works:
The movies are always a secret and the programmers for each theater can show pretty much whatever the hell they want. Everyone walks in not knowing what they’re going to see. I’m sure it’s a fun show at Alamo Drafthouse locations across the country, but the Richardson Alamo in the Dallas area has to be the coolest one of them all for several reasons:
A) As far as I know, all of the other Dismembers across the Alamo chain show four movies, but everything’s bigger in Texas so the Richardson location does FIVE movies.
B) In Richardson, they work with a theme every year, which is a brilliant stroke because it gives the audience something to speculate about as the show goes on. Past themes at Richardson Dismembers were sequels (a whole day of Part II’s) and movies about television; this year, the theme was modern takes on classic movie monsters (werewolves, mummies, etc.)
C) In Richardson, they have a rule that they don’t show anything at Dismember that the theater has ever shown before–and this location has a vibrant repertory schedule. They’ve shown a bunch of the big horror classics already, so they can’t go for the easy crowd-pleasers here. They’ve got to dig deep. They’ve got to go VHS for at least one slot. They’ve got to give you movies starring Richard Lynch. They’ve got to get weird.
and D) these guys (Micah Prude, Damon Swindall and James Wallace) are ready to get weird.
So, let’s talk about the movies already, for fuck’s sake.
First up was Frankenhooker, the finest exploding-hooker movie ever made and one of 1990’s top severed-head-flung-up-in-the-air movies. It’s one of writer/director Frank Henenlotter’s several masterpieces and is one those rare films that constantly escalates in weirdness and delivers at every step along the way. It was fun to see it destroy a room in 2018. In 1990, this played the midnight movie circuit; in 2018, it played in the afternoon, but, hey, in a dark movie theater any time of day can be midnight.
Next was Time Walker, which is not just a mummy movie, but an alien mummy movie. An archaeology professor from the California Institute of Horror Movie Dead Meat digs it up in Egypt and has it shipped back home intending to preserve it as an important historical artifact to be studied for years to come. That wouldn’t make a very good movie though, so of course the mummy gets up and starts snuffing out frat boys and sorority sisters. This 1982 film earns bonus points for the terrific ending that sets up a sequel that we’re all still waiting for thirty-six years later.
After that, things got more low-budget and slimy and Floridian with Zaat from 1971. This one represents the humanoid underwater creature genre, a la Creature From the Black Lagoon, with the touching story of a crazy guy who figures out through B-movie science how to turn himself into a monster so he can commit a few grudge kills. It’s got a terrific discount monster suit, a sweaty atmosphere, a snappy pace and a music score that’s a weird mix of electronic blip-bleep stuff with library orchestral music and a couple of folk songs (somebody, please put it out on vinyl; I want it). According to the hosts, this was supposed to be a 35mm screening, but the only print they could find looked like it once passed through William Conrad’s digestive system, so they instead used a special DCP made exclusively for this show in collaboration with Vinegar Syndrome. I thought it looked great, but at this point in the day, I was drinking the 9.0% ABV Velvet Hammer. Bonus points for a little William Castle-style showmanship live in the theater during a big scene.
For flick number four, it’s become a tradition at the Richardson Dismember for this to be the VHS slot. You are deep in the belly at this point. You can’t turn back now. When I went up at comedy open mics, Landon Kirksey, who hosted the show at the Dallas Comedy House, used to say toward the end when the room was mostly cleared out, “this is where shit gets real”. You are no longer winning over a judgemental audience; you are now talking to the stalwarts, the crickets and the ghosts. Sounds like a good time for some 90s A-Pix Entertainment video store shelf fodder, to me (also, I should add that the room was still pretty packed at this point). Sounds like a good time for Werewolf, which is about a you-know-what. It’s also about some goofball soap opera plot that I lost track of about a half-hour in, but there were still moments worth savoring, such as watching the actors really dig into working with pool table props, the guy who transforms into a werewolf while driving a car and a leading lady who looks good in a tank top. Whatever flaws this movie has, it’s nothing that a Bourbon’s Foster (a bourbon, spiced rum, bitters and banana liquer concoction that’s my favorite Alamo drink menu cocktail; to me, that drink is the taste of the Alamo Drafthouse) couldn’t get you through.
As for the fifth and final movie, I’m afraid that I can’t talk about that one. Lives are at stake. The recently deceased writer/director probably would have enjoyed seeing this film out in the light, but the producer who owns the rights is a real bloodsucker and is known to get cross with unauthorized screenings, even if it’s on a 35mm print that’s several decades old. So, I’ll shut up now, except to say that it, a movie that might have come out in 1978, was a beautiful last hurrah. Shit got even more real, in the best way.
When it was all over, I left with all senses every bit as blown as if I’d just sat through the loudest rock concert I’ve ever seen. I drove home in a trance, selected a horror movie from my shelf in the same trance, put the disc in the player, plopped down on the couch and let Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers sing me to sleep.
Happy Halloween!
TIIIIGHT!