Horror movies may be big bucks at the box office these days, but those dollars are largely being handed to films aimed at the masses, by filmgoers who wouldn’t necessarily refer to themselves as “horror fans.” While the more unique, interesting, and genre-expanding films often languish on the sidelines, until getting unceremoniously dumped onto DVD or cable years after completion. No recent example chapped the asses of horror fans more aggravatingly than the fate of Trick r Treat. Even if you live in New York or Los Angeles, your chances of seeing original, non-Platinum Dunes horror on the big screen outside of a festival is nearly impossible.
This was a major factor behind Friday Night Frights, the horror series I created with Sebastian O’Brien and The Cinefamily theater. And why we selected Tucker & Dale Vs Evil – a great, fun film that has been struggling to find theatrical distribution despite rave responses from festivals around the globe – for our debut show this past January. Sadly, FNF is only available to the horror fans of Los Angeles (like us on Facebook LA fright fans). But I have some good news for horror fans of greater America…
AMC Theaters, an entertainment management company called The Collective, and horror website Bloody Disgusting, are teaming up to bring fringe horror films to your local muti-plex! Well, if you happen to live in one of the 32 largest markets (hey, that’s better than nothing). BD’s Brad Miska says:
“We see a lot of horror films that never make it to the consumer here in the States. We hope to change that by releasing only films we personally love and think the horror community will embrace. Horror movies are a social experience. The success of Bloody Disgusting and other horror communities proves that concept. Bloody Disgusting represents a society of hardcore fans and we plan to activate them through these screenings, bringing the conversation off of the blogs and into the theater itself, while creating a unique experience for each filmgoer that motivates them to come back every month for the experience itself, not just the films.”
There are no exact dates yet for the series, though it seems to be starting sometime late spring/early summer, with the plan for special screenings several times a week each month. The first three films to be getting the special AMC treatment will be, Cold Fish, Rammbock, and Yellowbrickroad (my review). Any way you slice it, this is pretty nice news for horror and horror fans.
7 comments
Too bad Medford, Oregon, is not large enough! At least I can feel happy that somebody gets to see cool movies in a proper theatre setting. I wish we had a place to see smaller films (of any genre) at a decent price!
This might be a slightly different topic, but I wonder how many different films most theatres show in a year? My dad’s last theatre (the one from when I was a kid) was a single screen and we rarely had anything for more than a week. So we had a huge turnover and people knew that they had to come right away or lose it their chance. So we got a lot of smaller films that now might not find a place in a theatre. Sometimes we had good crowds, sometimes there might only be a couple people. It was a small town, after all. But in 1982 a lot of people didn’t have cable, and some didn’t even have a colour TV, and I didn’t know anyone that had a VCR.
There’s no AMC theaters in Oregon, so even if Medford were bigger you’d still be out of luck.
Awesome news. MN tends to get a lot of these special AMC things in either Rosedale, Southdale or EP. I plan on checking some of these out, depending on the reviews.
Soilent Green, I know, but I can wish for a thing…
Trick r Treat is an awful movie… and this comes from someone who loves horror. That film is pure hype.
You feel Warner Bros was right not to release it theatrically?
I also live in MN! I am really glad that we have all of those AMC theaters to choose from.
I am excited to check some of these out, and even if the movies are mostly sucky, I’m hoping for a few good ones here and there. I think it would be even cooler if WB had AMC play some classic horror movies in theaters, because the few theaters that do midnight showings in MN don’t play horror often enough!
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