The Iron Mule Short Comedy Film Festival comes to Williamsburg with a lineup of six new short comedy films from such exotic places as Mexico, Canada, and… Brooklyn!

Filmmakers will be in attendance and the screening will be followed by an after-party in Lo-Res where the audience and filmmakers can mingle.

The Iron Mule is New York’s only monthly short comedy film series, screening narrative, documentary, animated and experimental comedies from around the world. In their 14+ years they have presented more than 1,100 films, including early work from many celebrated filmmakers and comedians such as Stephen Colbert, Seth Macfarlane, Lena Dunham and Aziz Ansari.

Each screening features a guest judge from the world of film, comedy, television, or the New York art scene. Hosts Jay Stern and Victor Varnado interview attending filmmakers during the show, and each screening is followed by an after-party. In addition, Iron Mule produces the “Wanna Be a Star” contest, in which an audience member is chosen to star in a new film directed by an Iron Mule filmmaker to be shown at the following month’s screening.

EMMA INSPIRED
Emma, a recent college grad, is a little behind, but she’s gonna figure it out eventually. written by Jamie Rice and Nicole Machon, directed by Nicole Machon 

It’s only a movie…it’s only a movie. Wes Craven’s THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT.

Released in 1972, Wes Craven’s Last House on the Left was one of the first exploitation movies to scratch its way into public consciousness. For all its notoriety and acclaim (or disdain, depending on what circle you listen to), Last House on the Left is a strange concoction even to this day—a brutal rape-revenge movie with art house roots. Though not nearly as wretched as its reputation implies, this film still has some deeply unpleasant moments, and, despite its sloppiness and deaf tone, it’s told with a good deal of confidence by Craven.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.

A sociopathic preacher stalks innocent farm children in Charles Laughton’s THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER.
A 35mm presentation.

Bringing Davis Grubb’s novel to the big screen, actor Charles Laughton made his only directorial feature with The Night of the Hunter. All shadows and light, the film is a beautiful juxtaposition of love and hate, quiet moment with bursts of violence, and at its most fundamental, a representation of the struggle between good and evil. And evil enters into the world of a desperate family in the form of the religious fanatic with sociopathic tendencies Harry Powell (played to eerie perfection by Robert Mitchum). A serial murderer who marries for money and then kills his brides, he marries a gullible widow (Shelley Winters) for the $10,000 her deceased husband stole. His plan gets complicated when neither of her two children will disclose the whereabouts of the fortune, they head up river to escape the preacher…but he’s always close behind.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.

The perfect murder goes a little insane in Clouzet’s LES DIABOLIQUES.

In this classic of French suspense, the cruel and abusive headmaster of a boarding school, Michel Delassalle, becomes the target of a murder plot hatched by an unlikely duo — his meek wife and the mistress he brazenly flaunts. The women, brought together by their mutual hatred for the man, pull off the crime but become increasingly unhinged by a series of odd occurrences after Delassalle’s corpse mysteriously disappears.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.

A family is stalked by a sadistic criminal in the original CAPE FEAR.

TCM writes that “In the annals of screen psychopaths, there are few who can top Robert Mitchum’s Max Cady in the 1962 version of Cape Fear” and they’re right. After an eight-year prison sentence for rape, Cady one of the lawyers who sent him away. When Max finds Sam and his family, he begins a terrifying stalking spree, intending to ruin Sam’s life. Desperate to protect his wife and daughter, Sam makes every effort to send Max back to jail. But when his attempts fail, Sam realizes that he must take matters into his own hands if he wants to rid his life of Max for good.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.

Film’s a killer in Michael Powell’s PEEPING TOM.
A 35mm presentation.

Now revered as a British new wave classic, Michael Powell’s career-ending Peeping Tom fetishizes film, the camera, and screening room in what Martin Scorsese has called indulging in the audience’s “morbid urge to gaze.” The film shows Mark Lewis, a socially awkward young man who works in the film industry by day and takes racy films of women at night. But the camera he uses is also an instrument for murder and for recording those murders. His disturbing secret and reason behind his murderous actions are revealed, and healed, when he befriends his neighbor Helen.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.

An FBI agent and a familiar serial killer try to outwit each other in MANHUNTER.
A 35mm presentation.

Based on Thomas Harris’ novel Red Dragon is an American crime horror thriller film about an FBI criminal profiler Will Graham is called out of early retirement to assist on a serial murder case involving a killer known as the “Tooth Fairy.” Graham enlists the help of imprisoned serial killer — and cannibal — Dr. Hannibal Lecktor, who is the reason Graham took an early retirement. Soon, Graham and the FBI are entangled in a deadly cat-and-mouse game between the Tooth Fairy, Lecktor and an interfering journalist.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.

Starring: Morgan Freeman, Brad Pitt, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kevin Spacey

When retiring homicide detective William Somerset tackles a final case with the aid of newly transferred David Mills, they discover a number of elaborate and grizzly murders. They soon realize they are dealing with a serial killer who is targeting people he thinks represent one of the seven deadly sins. Starting with gluttony, this sociopath goes through them all as each detective approaches the case either by going deeper into the killer’s mind or through a more cynical perspective. It’s a smart serial killer film where director David Fincher shows the physical and psychological damage inflicted upon those in the crime-ridden city.

Starring: Al Pacino, John Cazale, Carol Kane, Penelope Allen, James Broderick, Charles Durning

Inspired by the true story of a bank robbery in Brooklyn, Dog Day Afternoon chronicles how an inexperienced criminal named Sonny Wortzik turns a bank robbery into a developing hostage situation. As Sonny and his accomplice, Sal Naturile, try desperately to remain in control, a media circus develops and the FBI arrives, creating even more tension. Gradually, Sonny’s surprising motivations behind the robbery are revealed and his standoff with law enforcement moves toward its inevitable end.

Michael Caine serves up some bloody good British revenge in GET CARTER.

Based on the Ted Lewis novel, Jack’s Return Home, Get Carter is as gritty and British as crime thrillers go. It shows the bloody trail of revenge through the seedy underbelly of Newcastle as the cold-blooded London gangster, Jack Carter, tries to get to the bottom of his brother’s death. Believing he was murdered, Carter works his way through thugs in search of the kingpin to get to the truth.

Part of Nitehawk’s fall CRIME series.