The Grand Illusion

45th anniversary! With this poignant second feature, David Lynch brought his atmospheric visual and sonic palette to a notorious true story set in Victorian England. When the London surgeon Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins) meets the freak-show performer John Merrick (John Hurt), who has severe skeletal and soft-tissue deformities, he assumes that he must be intellectually disabled as well. As the two men spend more time together, though, Merrick reveals the intelligence, gentle nature, and profound sense of dignity that lie beneath his shocking appearance, and he and Treves develop a friendship. Shot in gorgeous black and white and boasting a stellar supporting cast that includes Anne Bancroft, John Gielgud, and Wendy Hiller, THE ELEPHANT MAN was nominated for eight Academy Awards, cementing Lynch’s reputation as one of American cinema’s most visionary talents.

Part of To Live Is To Dream: A Northwest Tribute to David Lynch.

“I sometimes think that John Hurt’s performance in the title role of David Lynch’s sublime biography of Joseph Merrick (renamed John in the script) is the greatest piece of film acting I’ve ever seen… From the proto–Laura Palmer locket photo of Merrick’s mother that opens the film to its droning sound design and morbidly transcendent ending, [The Elephant Man] is like a template for three decades’ worth of brilliant variations.” Adam Nayman, The Ringer

“The Elephant Man is a very pleasurable surprise.” Pauline Kael

“This is a tale of redemption and transcendence, of the hunchback of London Hospital, of the noble phantom who wanted to go to the opera, of Beauty and the Beast. In Treves’ account, though, the Beast was a Beauty. In Lynch’s hands, so is this film.” Richard Corliss, TIME

“A benchmark of underground gay cinema” (The New York Times), newly restored. Co-presented by SECS Fest!

A handsome, self-involved, and brooding young sex worker (Bobby Kendall) escapes the realities of his street life through a series of fantasies of incredible beauty. Obsessed with his own perceived perfection, he lives in a dreamworld of captivating colors, magnificent music, elaborate costumes and strikingly attractive males. In a series of eye-popping sequences he imagines himself in a variety of intense roles – from matador to Roman slave to harem leader – with his room as an exquisite jewel-encrusted retreat.

But reality constantly intrudes through the depraved lives of the other street people, the harsh and ugly sounds outside, and visits from his “johns”. Ultimately, his narcissistic enchantment with his own beauty and lifestyle is marred by one great fear – aging and loss of his youth. At once phantasmagoric and kaleidoscopic, the stunning new restoration of this ‘70s underground sensation burns just as bright – if not brighter.

The feature presentation will be preceded by a Best of SECS Fest 2024 short, “Angelo” by Helias Doulis.

Please note: Here-After is a 21 and over establishment. The entrance is via the alley in back of The Crocodile building. Get there early to order tasty beverages from the bar and delicious food from Tat’s Deli!

“A kind of gay Fantasia, part underground extravaganza, part romantic p**n.” The Village Voice

“I love this film… A testament to independent filmmaking.” Gus Van Sant

“As beautiful and timeless as The Wizard of Oz.” John Waters

“One of the greatest films of the 20th century.” Guy Maddin

A beautiful restoration of the cult classic horror movie in honor of its 40th anniversary!

Welcome to the most life-enriching Italian terror-party of 1985. Produced by Dario Argento (SUSPIRIA) and directed by Lamberto Bava, DEMONS follows a panorama of punks, preppies, and ne’er-do-wells as they get trapped in a movie theater and possessed by gut-shredding Satanic demonoids. Featuring songs by Mötley Crüe and Billy Idol, gloopy effects, and the iconic Geretta Geretta in a lead role, this is the most fun you’ll ever have in a movie theater while watching a movie about beasties on the loose in a movie theater.

Please note: Here-After is a 21 and over establishment. The entrance is via the alley in back of The Crocodile building. Get there early to order tasty beverages from the bar and delicious food from Tat’s Deli!

“Demons is a monument to the horror genre’s potential for Grand Guignol beauty.” Chuck Bowen, Slant Magazine

“This is a classic party movie that you have to watch with friends and a load of beer because you will not be bored at all… Bava’s horror film is a cinematic masterpiece, pure and simple.” Felix Vasquez, Cinema Crazed

Free screening! RSVP via the “Buy Tickets” button.

MEDITATION, CREATIVITY, PEACE follows David Lynch on a 16-country tour of Europe, the Middle East, and Latin America to spread the word about the individual and global impact of meditation. With equal parts wit and passion, the documentary shows Lynch’s commitment to Transcendental Meditation as a way of changing the world, starting from within.

The film also offers rare insight into Lynch’s creative process through interviews and revealing moments from the tour.

The feature will be preceded by a special half hour compilation of clips and shorts! And be sure to arrive early to claim your seat, grab a tasty beverage from the bar, order delicious food from Tat’s Deli, and enjoy a pre-show full of David Lynch-directed music videos!

Part of To Live Is To Dream: A Northwest Tribute to David Lynch.

Please note: Here-After is a 21 and over establishment. The entrance is via the alley in back of The Crocodile building.

“[Meditation, Creativity, Peace] will surely interest Lynch’s most devoted fans, whose number is not trivial, and is an intriguing present-day look at a practice whose popularity peaked when the Beatles discovered it.” The Hollywood Reporter

A dam good time at the movies! Fifteenth encore screening!

Our friends at Central Cinema are generously helping us keep the beavers gnawing away while we search for a new home. 60% of ticket sales go to our relocation fund!

In this 19th century, supernatural winter epic, a drunken applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America’s greatest fur trapper by defeating hundreds of beavers.

Created by Mike Cheslik and Ryland Brickson Cole Tews, the duo behind the modern cult hit LAKE MICHIGAN MONSTER (2018).

Named one of the 10 best movies of 2024 by Ty Burr of The Washington Post and Amy Nicholson of The Los Angeles Times.

“Starts strange, gets stranger, and yet remains resolutely adorable… embraces the defiant glee of art cinema and distills it into something so thoroughly pure and sincere that it is surely hard not to fall in love with it.” Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Alliance of Women Film Journalists

“It’s sure to develop a significant cult following with its unique mix of silent-era slapstick, animation elements, theme-park-style critter costumes, and general air of inspired absurdity.” Dennis Harvey, Variety

“Steroidally swollen with gags and smarts.” Guy Maddin

Film critic and author Marya E. Gates will be joining us to host a special screening of Lizzie Borden's unsung feminist landmark, WORKING GIRLS.

Trailblazing director Lizzie Borden is one of 19 filmmakers profiled in Marya E. Gates’s newly published first book, Cinema Her Way: Visionary Female Directors in Their Own Words. WORKING GIRLS is Borden’s radically nonjudgmental, immersive, and richly detailed look at the rhythms and rituals of society’s most stigmatized profession. Inspired by the experiences of the sex workers Borden met while making her underground classic BORN IN FLAMES, WORKING GIRLS reveals the textures of a day in the life of Molly (Louise Smith), a photographer working part-time in a Manhattan brothel, as she juggles a steady stream of clients, balances relationships with her coworkers with the demands of an ambitious madam, and above all fights to maintain her sense of self in a business in which the line between the personal and the professional is all too easily blurred. In viewing prostitution through the lens of labor, Borden boldly desensationalizes the subject, offering an empathetic, humanizing, often humorous depiction of women for whom this work is just another day at the office.

Marya E. Gates will be signing copies of her new book, which will also be for sale at this event.

“Working Girls is fresh and perceptive… a shrewd, funny film which Borden handles with wit and imagination.” Victoria Mather, The Daily Telegraph

“…will keep you brooding about its issues for days afterward–something of a tribute to its air of unquestioned reality.” Sheila Benson, The Los Angeles Times

“Still feels so revolutionary today.” Marya E. Gates

Richard Linklater's classic romance, BEFORE SUNRISE, celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. Join us for a double feature of it and the beloved follow-up, BEFORE SUNSET, on June 16th, the date Jesse and Céline first came into each others' lives.

BEFORE SUNRISE opens with a chance encounter between two solitary young strangers. After they hit it off on a train bound for Vienna, the Paris university student Céline (Julie Delpy) and the scrappy American tourist Jesse (Ethan Hawke) impulsively decide to spend a day together before he returns to the U.S. the next morning. As the pair roam the streets of the stately city, Linklater’s tenderly observant gaze captures the uncertainty and intoxication of young love, from the first awkward stirrings of attraction to the hopeful promise that Céline and Jesse make upon their inevitable parting.

In the breathtaking follow-up, Céline tracks down Jesse, now an author, at the tail end of his book tour in Paris, with only a few hours left before he is to board a flight back home to the States. Meeting almost a decade after their short-lived romance in Vienna, the pair find their chemistry rekindled by increasingly candid exchanges about professional setbacks, marital disappointments, and the compromises of adulthood. Impelled by an urgent sense of the transience of human connection, BEFORE SUNSET remains Richard Linklater’s most seductive experiment with time’s inexorable passage and the way love can seem to stop it in its tracks.

“Taken together–which they should be–Before Sunrise and Before Sunset make up one of the supreme movie romances of the post-’80s era, an affair of the film and flesh to make the heart leap and the mind dance.” Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune

Exclusive screenings of the brand new documentary about Cro-Mags founder Harley Flanagan, with Harley and his wife and manager, Laura Flanagan, joining for in-person Q&As after each showing!

Founder of the pioneering band Cro-Mags and a legend of the NYC Hardcore scene, Harley Flanagan is a punk rock icon who has defied the odds and come out the other side. But while his career has been a no-holds-barred ride, WIRED FOR CHAOS isn’t just about the music, it’s about a man forged in fire – a survivor of neglect, sexual abuse, drugs, violence and PTSD – who’s lived to tell the tale.

Featuring interviews with Henry Rollins, Flea, Darryl Jenifer of Bad Brains, and more!

Please note: Here-After is a 21 and over establishment. The entrance is via the alley in back of The Crocodile building. Get there early to order tasty beverages from the bar and delicious food from Tat’s Deli!

“Chances are if it happened in New York and it was important and interesting, Harley Flanagan was somewhere in the room.” Anthony Bourdain

“This film floored me… It’s a glorious portrait of the human spirit and of a person’s ability to change for the better.” Steve Kopian, Unseen Films