Starring: Cornel Wilde, Ken Gampu, Gert van den Bergh, Bella Randles, Morrison Gampu, Sandy Nkomo, Fusi Zazayokwe

The dog-days of August are upon us… Time to shed those warming layers – tear the sweat-soaked raiment of societal structuralism away – freed to take chase with The Deuce in hot hunt of… THE NAKED PREY!.. “Audience” and “film” finally fused –  stripped bare… surrendered… together sentient in a Sun-flooded fever of image! Sound! Movement! Emotion!.. STEAMY!!

With a minimum of “set-up”: obnoxious privilegeds on a paid-for South African safari stupidly disregard their guide’s guidance and get met with more than a mouthful of malice from those whose land they’re looting… leaving said guide the last man standing – or rather running – for his life… as The Naked Prey!!

Mid-latish career for the handsomely hunkish one-time swash-buckling “Matinee Idol” Wilde – here doing double-duty before and behind the camera… One of a handful of highly idiosyncratic, generally down-beat directorial efforts.. this for which he somewhat re-invents not only himself – here bearded haggard scraggly gaunt and sinewy – but also as well the idea of what a “mainstream” “Hollywood” “Action-Adventure” movie could be made up of: also haggard scraggly gaunt and sinewy (and bearded?? why not!)… Independent from explanations, contextualizations, judgmentals… base and basic… A crucible of brutal sensualism nearing the “experimental” in its lean meanness… Confident in its nearly dialogless universality and fervent digging toward a humanity-wide cry for compassion… with THE NAKED PREY, Wilde forges the basics of movie-making’s beginnings into a gut-stab mold-breaking modernism… A wonder to behold! Behold on tight with The Deuce!!

PREY‘s Paramount Pictures promoted the pic’s New Embassy Theatre premiere with a “nationwide beauty contest” –  the “winner” of which to be tiaraed that opening night: “Miss Naked Prey“!??! Preposterous?!!? Perfect!??! Prey-tell – which of you Deucies be brave enough to dare vie for such a title?? Because – believe or not… ’tis indeed… by night’s end – one of YOU (in actual theatrical attendance) will be crowned!!

Starring: Joan Blondell, Ann Dvorak, Bette Davis, Warren William, Lyle Talbot, Humphrey Bogart

Called “distasteful” by New York Times critic Mourdant Hall, pre-Code workhorse Mervyn LeRoy’s Three on a Match ranks among the era’s most lascivious and uncompromising women’s pictures.

Grade school pals Mary, Vivian and Ruth’s personalities seemed to have already calcified on the playground, hinting at the shades of womanhood in their respective futures. Shameless flirt Mary (Joan Blondell) ripens into a happy-go-lucky showgirl. Brainy bookworm Ruth (Bette Davis) parlays her studiousness into a secure office job. But it is Vivian (Ann Dvorak), a snobbish beauty with a rich husband, whose life takes the most drastic turn. Reunited during a chance meeting, Vivian can only marvel at her companions’ independence and self-sufficiency. Bored with marriage and motherhood, she soon falls under the sway of a no-good gangster, sending her tumbling into a void of addiction and child neglect.

Confronting a bankrupt, decaying city and the dashed hopes of the civil rights generation, African-American and Latino teenagers took over the streets of 1970s New York. The South Bronx became a war zone ruled by gangs like the Savage Skulls and the Ghetto Brothers. Hypnotic archival footage and present-day interviews with former gang members reveal how peace was brokered at the peak of the bloodshed in a most unlikely manner, laying the foundation for what ultimately became hip-hop culture.

Starring: Mark Polonia, Maria Davis, Todd Carpenter, Dustin Davis, Todd Michael Smith

“Feels like it was made by a stoned sixth-grader.” – Bleeding Skull 

When a routine construction blast shakes their sleepy town, a group of locals discover that the explosion has awakened two dinosaurs from a centuries-long slumber, who soon run amok in the local woods on a rampage of terror.

Mark Polonia’s grassroots Super 8 mini-epic serves as the ultimate blue-collar counterpoint to Steven Spielberg’s $63 million dinosaur blockbuster from the previous year. Brimming with wobbly effects, puppetry, and endearing stop-motion, it distills dinosaur fantasy cinema down to its most unpolished and heartfelt essence. Assembled with the help of family, friends, Saurians is a true homespun indie gem— ultimately radiating more guts and grit than any CGI-laden spectacle.

Starring: Nicole Arianna Fox, Sam Brittan, Clifford Morts

The lives of three residents of Redlands, California, intersect and ultimately collide in this claustrophobic exploration of radical creativity, sexuality and violence in America.

Vienna (Nicole Arianna Fox, America’s Next Top Model) is a young “alternative” nude model who lives with her musician boyfriend Zack (Sam Brittan) in Redlands, California – a bleak Inland Empire city sixty miles east of Los Angeles. Controlling and hypocritical, Zack uses Vienna’s earnings to further his own musical career as Vienna attempts to build a creative life of her own. Their lives are forever changed when Vienna meets Allan (Clifford Morts), a balding middle-aged amateur glamour photographer; unemployed and recently divorced, Allan’s unassuming behavior camouflages his feelings of inadequacy and his building resentment toward others.

An arthouse take on a film noir storyline with elements of black humor, Redlands breaks all the rules of traditional American indie filmmaking — a dark voyeuristic film that slowly builds to a savage denouement.

Starring: Isabel Sandoval, Publio Briones III, Dominic Milano Palomo, Gary Lim, Richard Manabat, Stella Palomo Monteño

To make an additional $10 donation to Advocates for Trans Equality, select the “Event + Donation” ticket on the checkout screen.

Wishing to start a new life, Donna, a transgender sex worker in Manila, relocates to the small town where her son (who believes she is his aunt) lives. There she is drawn into a grassroots campaign to oust a crooked mayor that becomes personal.

Starring: Holly Woodlawn, Tally Brown, Suzanne Skillen, David Margulies

To make an additional $10 donation to Advocates for Trans Equality, select the “Event + Donation” ticket on the checkout screen.

Eternal trans icon (and Warhol superstar) Holly Woodlawn is a riot in Scarecrow in a Garden of Cucumbers—a long-lost comedy musical that has been lovingly restored by the Academy Film Archive. Holly stars as a small-town Kansas girl who tries to make it big—or at least find a roommate—in New York City. One of the first features with a trans lead, this joyous valentine to individuality features a supporting role from Warhol scenester Tally Brown and cameos from Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin.

With bonus extended pre-show material!

To make an additional $10 donation to Advocates for Trans Equality, select the “Event + Donation” ticket on the checkout screen.

A moving and timely documentary following the unsolved murder of Venus Xtravaganza, star of the legendary Paris Is Burning as Venus’ two families — biological and ballroom — come together to seek answers and celebrate her legacy.

Starring: Steve Zahn, Jillian Bell, Sasha Knight, Ann Dowd

To make an additional $10 donation to Advocates for Trans Equality, select the “Event + Donation” ticket on the checkout screen.

Steve Zahn stars as Troy, a troubled but well-intentioned father who has recently separated from his wife Sally (Jillian Bell). Aghast at Sally’s refusal to let their trans son Joe (Sasha Knight) live as his authentic self, Troy runs off with Joe into the Montana wilderness. Meanwhile, police detective (Ann Dowd) pursues them, but her resolve about the case is tested the more she learns about Joe’s family. Cowboys, a modern day western from director Anna Kerrigan, is a tale of rescue, family betrayal and a father and son on the run.