Music Box Theatre 8th Annual Horror Film Festival Starts Oct. 13th

Music Box Theatre 8th Annual Horror Film Festival Starts Oct. 13th 1 The Music Box’s annual horror film festival is back and better than before with more vendors and a greater variety of food! Now in its eighth year, the ghoulish 24-hour movie marathon boasts an impressive survey of the horror genre, featuring special guests Sybil Danning (presenting her campy werewolf flick Howling II: Your Sister’s a Werewolf) and low-budget Seventies horrormeister Jeff Lieberman (showing both his debut feature Squirm and the Chicago premiere of his latest movie Satan’s Little Helper). Music Box of Horrors startsSaturday, October 13 at noon and unspools all day and night through Sunday, October 14 at noon at the Music Box Theatre, 3733 N. Southport Ave.The Music Box’s annual horror film festival is back and better than before with more vendors and a greater variety of food! Now in its eighth year, the ghoulish 24-hour movie marathon boasts an impressive survey of the horror genre, featuring special guests Sybil Danning (presenting her campy werewolf flick Howling II: Your Sister’s a Werewolf) and low-budget Seventies horrormeister Jeff Lieberman (showing both his debut feature Squirm and the Chicago premiere of his latest movie Satan’s Little Helper). Music Box of Horrors startsSaturday, October 13 at noon and unspools all day and night through Sunday, October 14 at noon at the Music Box Theatre, 3733 N. Southport Ave.

Also screening will be a new print of Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead 2and a special sneak preview of Music Box Films title Eddie the Sleepwalking Cannibal. Other not-to-be-missed titles include the home-brewed, low-budget classic The Deadly Spawn, an uncensored print of The Burning, a rare Techniscope print of British horror film Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (starring Peter Cushing, Donald Sutherland and Christopher Lee!) and the cannibal-diner-disguised-as-a-vegetarian-restaurant Blood Diner! Additionally Music Box will be premiering the new music video for Local H frontman Scott Lucas’ “There Ain’t No Grave (Gonna Hold My Body Down)” by Scott Lucas and the Married Men.

As always, the festival starts with a silent horror film. This year will be the German Expressionist classic The Golem, accompanied by the Music Box’s house organist Dennis Scott.

At this year’s marketplace, vendors will hawk costumes, comic books, T-shirts and movie memorabilia. And to fortify the die-hard inmates guests, Chicago’s best food trucks will provide curbside sustenance throughout the evening and into the wee hours.  Businesses interested in participating as vendors may contact dave@musicboxtheatre.com.

As in years past, Music Box is working with Vital Bridges as a benefit to help raise much needed donations. Vital BridgesCenter on Chronic Care has been at the forefront of helping men, women and children impacted by HIV and AIDS build healthier lives for more than 20 years.

Music Box of Horrors Movie Schedule:

  • ·   Noon:  The Golem (Carl Boese & Paul Wegener, 1920, 90m). Seminal silent classic, with live organ accompaniment by Music Box organist Dennis Scott
  • ·   1:45pm: Mark of the Vampire (Tod Browning, 1935, 60m). Stars Bela Lugosi and Lionel Barrymore
  • ·   3:00pm: The Invisible Man (James Whale, 1933, 71m). Universal Horror classic starring Claude Raines.
  • ·   4:30pm: Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (Freddie Francis, 1965, 98m). This staple of late-night British television goes wide-screen with a rare, original Techniscope print!
  • ·   6:30pm: Squirm (Jeff Lieberman, 1976, 93m). Director Jeff Lieberman presents and conducts a post-screening Q&A
  • ·   8:20pm: Satan’s Little Helper (Jeff Lieberman, 2004, 100m). Chicago premiere! Director Jeff Lieberman presents and conducts a post-screening Q&A
  • ·   10:30pm: Howling II (Philippe Mora, 1985, 91m). Star Sybil Danning appears in person for a post-screening Q&A.
  • ·   12:45am: The Beyond (Lucio Fulci, 1981, 87m). Directed by Italy’s “Godfather of Gore.” So gory, it was originally banned in the UK.
  • ·   2:30am: Eddie the Sleepwalking Cannibal(Boris Rodriguez, 2012, 90m). Sneak preview! A satirical dark comedy from Music Box Films.
  • ·   4:15am: Phantasm (Don Coscarelli, 1979, 88m). If this flying orb movie doesn’t scare you, you’re already dead.
  • ·   6:00am: Deadly Spawn (Douglas McKeown, 1983, 81m). Homemade extraterrestrial horror film with some of the most inventive latex puppetry around!
  • ·   7:30am: Blood Diner (Jackie Kong, 1987, 88m). Horror comedy loosely based on 1963’s Blood Feast.
  • ·   9:15am: The Burning (Tony Maylam, 1981, 91m). Uncut version! Written by the Weinstein brothers, with a killer Rick Wakeman synth soundtrack, and starring a young  Jason Alexander and Holly Hunter.
  • ·   11:00am: Evil Dead 2 (Sam Raimi, 1987, 84m). Brand new print.

Tickets to Music Box of Horrors, which include admission to all 14 features and related activities, are $35 in advance at the Music Box Theatre Box Office, 3733 N. Southport Ave., or online at www.musicboxtheatre.com/collections/music-box-of-horrors; or $40 day of show.

Jeff Lieberman is one of the most idiosyncratic and inventive voices of genre filmmaking to emerge in the 1970s.  His three best-known films, Squirm (1976), Blue Sunshine (1978) andJust Before Dawn (1981) have become classics of horror and sci-fi. Cited as an influence on such directors as Eli Roth and Quentin Tarantino (the latter lists Squirm as essential viewing if he’s to take you seriously), Lieberman’s filmmaking captures the low-budget resourcefulness of Roger Corman and combines it with a singular point of view – one that seems both quirky and, at times, deliriously demented.

Sybil Danning is an Austrian actress known for her many roles in European films, B movies,cult filmsscience fiction films and action films. Whether reigning as the one and only celebrity officially ranked “The World’s #1 Female Action Star” by Entertainment Tonight, or nicknamed “Queen of the Action Flicks” on her cover of Playboy, or celebrated as “Sex Symbol of the Year” by Roger Ebert, Danning stands tall as an icon for the new wave of Tough Women whose recent corps include Uma Thurman, Angela Jolie and Lucy Liu.

Dennis Scott, Music Box Theatre’s house organist, is an internationally known silent film organist dubbed the “Master of Magic Notes” by Suzanne Lloyd, granddaughter of the comic genius Harold Lloyd. Scott first began accompanying silent films in the 1970s, when he started playing theater pipe organs installed in pizza parlors in the Midwest and the West Coast. He is a co-founder of the Silent Film Society of Chicago. Ongoing at the Music Box, he plays weekend intermissions, the annual Sing-Along Sound of MusicSing-Along Grease,Valentine’s Day Sing-Along and the acclaimed Music Box Christmas Sing-Along, a Chicago holiday tradition for nearly 30 years.  For Music Box’s Second Saturday Silent Cinema Series, Scott accompanies a classic silent film, live, at noon on the second Saturday of each month on the Music Box Theatre organ. The series was named the “Best New Film Series of 2011” by Chicago magazine and “Best Matinee Film Series of 2012” by the Chicago Reader.

About the Music Box Theatre: For nearly 30 years the Music Box Theatre has been the premier venue in Chicago for independent and foreign films, festivals and some of the greatest cinematic events in Chicago. It currently has the largest cinema space operated full time in the city. The Music Box Theatre is independently owned and operated by the Southport Music Box Corporation. SMBC, through its Music Box Films division, also distributes foreign and independent films in the theatrical, DVD and television markets throughout the United States. For additional information please visitwww.musicboxtheatre.com .  Download the entire Music Box Theatre Fall Calendar here:http://www.musicboxtheatre.com/assets/calendars/MusicBox_Fall2012_Web.pdf