Collection on Screen:
Halloween Horror
October 30 to November 23, 2024
Originally, the custom of Halloween, or All Hallow's Eve, was mainly popular in Ireland. In the 19th century, Irish immigrants brought it to the United States where it developed into an important folk festival, which has come back to Europe over the past few decades. Halloween traditions do not only include pumpkins and trick or treating in costumes, but also telling spooky ghost stories – and watching horror movies together.
This also makes Halloween the ideal time to project prints of horror classics from our collection. However, our cinema usually still plays host to our traditional collaboration with the Viennale on October 31. Since this is for once not the case this year, we will take the opportunity to throw a small Halloween party in the Invisible Cinema, extending over two nights (with repeat screenings in November) and ending with films chosen by curator friends (and proven genre lovers).
On October 30 we will show two masterpieces to honor – in Mexico, Halloween is also the start of Day of the Dead festivities – two recently deceased cinema greats. Director and producer Roger Corman died this past May at the age of 98: he was not only the King of the B's, but also made many major horror films – for example, the unforgettable early 1960s cycle of freely adapted Edgar Allen Poe stories starring Vincent Price. One of the most beautiful of these works is The Masque of the Red Death (1964): We have a rare IB Technicolor print, which will soon no longer be projectable due to increasing shrinkage – a reason why we want to celebrate it one more time. The director of photography on this amazing dance of color was, moreover, the later director Nicolas Roeg. With his Don't Look Now (1973), we close the first evening in memory of Donald Sutherland: The lead role in Roeg's supernatural psycho-thriller is among the most famous achievements of the thespian who died in June at the age of 88.
October 31 focuses on the 1980s – the decade in which the horror film was finally established as a major factor in commercial production (also thanks to the medium of video, which made horror movie nights possible not only on Halloween). With Sean S. Cunningham’s Friday the Thirteenth (1980), we will show one of the most important examples from this successful horror wave before turning to our two guest picks. Julian Stockinger, whose programming includes the series Nachtblende at Gartenbaukino, has chosen a fast-paced and comic grotesque horror movie, Stuart Gordon's Re-Animator (1985), which concentrates the genre's spirit of innovation over the decade. For the finale, we will join Markus Keuschnigg, director of SLASH film festival, in the gloomy depths of the 80s horror boom: John McNaughton's Henry – Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986) caused controversy with its unadorned style. This study of the daily life of a serial killer has not lost any of its disturbing power. (Christoph Huber / Translation: Ted Fendt)
Introductions by Christoph Huber, Markus Keuschnigg, Julian Stockinger, and Elisabeth Streit
In collaboration with SLASH Filmfestival
Originally, the custom of Halloween, or All Hallow's Eve, was mainly popular in Ireland. In the 19th century, Irish immigrants brought it to the United States where it developed into an important folk festival, which has come back to Europe over the past few decades. Halloween traditions do not only include pumpkins and trick or treating in costumes, but also telling spooky ghost stories – and watching horror movies together.
This also makes Halloween the ideal time to project prints of horror classics from our collection. However, our cinema usually still plays host to our traditional collaboration with the Viennale on October 31. Since this is for once not the case this year, we will take the opportunity to throw a small Halloween party in the Invisible Cinema, extending over two nights (with repeat screenings in November) and ending with films chosen by curator friends (and proven genre lovers).
On October 30 we will show two masterpieces to honor – in Mexico, Halloween is also the start of Day of the Dead festivities – two recently deceased cinema greats. Director and producer Roger Corman died this past May at the age of 98: he was not only the King of the B's, but also made many major horror films – for example, the unforgettable early 1960s cycle of freely adapted Edgar Allen Poe stories starring Vincent Price. One of the most beautiful of these works is The Masque of the Red Death (1964): We have a rare IB Technicolor print, which will soon no longer be projectable due to increasing shrinkage – a reason why we want to celebrate it one more time. The director of photography on this amazing dance of color was, moreover, the later director Nicolas Roeg. With his Don't Look Now (1973), we close the first evening in memory of Donald Sutherland: The lead role in Roeg's supernatural psycho-thriller is among the most famous achievements of the thespian who died in June at the age of 88.
October 31 focuses on the 1980s – the decade in which the horror film was finally established as a major factor in commercial production (also thanks to the medium of video, which made horror movie nights possible not only on Halloween). With Sean S. Cunningham’s Friday the Thirteenth (1980), we will show one of the most important examples from this successful horror wave before turning to our two guest picks. Julian Stockinger, whose programming includes the series Nachtblende at Gartenbaukino, has chosen a fast-paced and comic grotesque horror movie, Stuart Gordon's Re-Animator (1985), which concentrates the genre's spirit of innovation over the decade. For the finale, we will join Markus Keuschnigg, director of SLASH film festival, in the gloomy depths of the 80s horror boom: John McNaughton's Henry – Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986) caused controversy with its unadorned style. This study of the daily life of a serial killer has not lost any of its disturbing power. (Christoph Huber / Translation: Ted Fendt)
Introductions by Christoph Huber, Markus Keuschnigg, Julian Stockinger, and Elisabeth Streit
In collaboration with SLASH Filmfestival
Related materials
For each series, films are listed in screening order.
