Francomania
Severin Films and The Oscarbate Film Collective present Francomania, a never-ending tour celebrating writer/director Jess Franco. Hailed by The Guardian as “a dedicated exponent of weird sex, shocking sadism and surreal horror, and one of the cinema’s great individualists” – Jess Franco left an astonishing legacy of over 180 films that Sight & Sound says “occupy a liminal terrain between exploitation cinema and the avant-garde, playing with the porous structure of dream and nightmare, indeed the nature of reality itself.” Franco’s singular career remains championed by filmmakers ranging from Orson Welles, Fritz Lang, Pedro Almodovar, Sean Baker, Quentin Tarantino, Pere Portabella, and John Waters, resulting in a 2009 honorary Lifetime Achievement Award from Spain’s equivalent of the Oscars.
Francomania: The House of Lost Women
- Wednesday, Apr 10, 2024, 7:30pm
In 1982 – a year in which he reportedly shot 13 films – writer/director Jess Franco created THE HOUSE OF LOST WOMEN, a blithely twisted drama that is equal parts Buñuelian black comedy, over-the-top soap opera, and furiously perverse sex shocker. Starring the director’s muse Lina Romay as a pensive young nymphomaniac whose life on a remote island with her father, stepmother, and mentally-challenged sister seethes with violence, incest and some of the most degenerate scenarios of the entire Franco canon. In what could pass as an early film from Pedro Almodóvar (an admitted fan of this film and its director), Jess Franco makes one of the most fiercely angry and shockingly hilarious films of his career, one that extends forth to the work of filmmakers like John Waters and Todd Solondz, while simultaneously being one of the most handsomely mounted productions in his canon.
In Spanish with English subtitles. Scanned uncut from the original negative. Part of Francomania, a never-ending tour celebrating writer/director Jess Franco, presented by Severin Films and Chicago’s Oscarbate Film Collective.
Get there early! Severin Films will have a pop-up shop in the lobby before the screening, starting at 6:30pm.
Francomania: Sinfonia Erotica
- Thursday, Apr 11, 2024, 7:30pm
At the close of the ‘70s, eminent auteur Jess Franco revisited the works of the Marquis de Sade to create what EuroSleaze historians have called one of the most sexually daring and boldly creative films of his entire career, SINFONÍA ERÓTICA (EROTIC SYMPHONY). When an unstable noblewoman (a fearless performance by Lina Romay) returns to her lavish estate, she will find herself – along with her libertine husband, his male lover, and a young nun with a craving for violation – trapped in a web of unholy hungers and decadent perversions. Susan Hemingway co-stars in this sonata of artsy depravity, featuring a darkly psychedelic score by Franco & Franz Liszt. Reality and fantasy will blur within the confines of this zany haunted house, one that will at times leave the viewer, along with the characters, unsure of what they are witnessing.
In Spanish with English subtitles. Transferred in 4k from an uncut 35mm print donated by The Instituto de la Sexualidad Humana in Madrid. Part of Francomania, a never-ending tour celebrating writer/director Jess Franco, presented by Severin Films and Chicago’s Oscarbate Film Collective.
Get there early! Severin Films will have a pop-up shop in the lobby before the screening, starting at 6:30pm.