LOS ANGELES—The owners of Cinefamily, who several years ago took over what used to be a Hollywood insider "guilty pleasure" when it was still called the Silent Movie Theater on North Fairfax Avenue, have certainly come a long way in terms of the fare they're willing to offer to the public—and their latest and most interesting attention-getter has got to be the three-night program coming next weekend, part of which will feature the classic XXX films Café Flesh and Nightdreams.
Café Flesh was directed by "Rinse Dream," better known to the mainstream world as Stephen Sayadian after he crossed over and became production designer for the first season of the long-running detective show Silk Stalkings. Among Sayadian's other popular XXX works were Volumes 2 and 3 of Nightdreams, two volumes of Party Doll A Go-Go! and two volumes of Untamed Cowgirls of the Wild West—all of which developed a cult following for their psychedelic/New Age stories and production design.
Café Flesh (1982), which AVN reviewer I.L. Slifkin described as "[h]aunting, frightening and sexually unsettling," takes place in a post-apocalyptic future where nearly the entire population of the planet is unable to have sex, and who depend on the 1 percent who can still get it up (including early stars Pia Snow and Marie Sharp) to entertain them with live sex shows at (where else?) Café Flesh.
In Nightdreams (1981), directed by F.X. Pope, Dorothy LeMay, one of that era's most popular stars, is the subject of an experiment conducted by scientists Jennifer West and Andy Nichols to create and monitor Dorothy's erotic dreams—and boy, does she have a bunch of them! Also in the cast were top performers Loni Sanders, Danielle Martin (better known simply as "Danielle"), Kevin James and Ken Starbuck—and the soundtrack was created and performed by top '80s band Wall of Voodoo!
Perhaps best of all, those attending the showing of Café Flesh on July 26 will have the opportunity to hear director Sayadian and his co-writer Jerry Stahl discuss the film, their other work, and take audience questions.
In addition to that XXX double bill, jaded porn watchers probably also won't want to miss what Cinefamily's offering the previous night, July 25: Sexperiments: A Collection of Turned-On Shorts.
"As constraints on representing sexuality were loosened for mainstream films starting in the late ’60s (a la Midnight Cowboy, A Clockwork Orange), so were the shackles around experimental artists, who were finally freed to fearlessly explore and blow minds with alternate views on the love act (or 'amourous congress', as they used to say in olden times)," the blurb on the Cinefamily website states. "The filmmakers selected for tonight’s shorts compilation—including luminaries like Gunvor Nelson, Constance Beeson, Paul Sherits, and animators like Vince Collins—employed a myriad of styles, from strobic overstimulation (Peace Mandala) and haunting meditations on the human form (The Operation), to freaked-out comics of morphing genitalia (Desire Pie). Tonight’s centerpiece film even comes complete with a live score! Filmmaker Barbara Rubin was a 20-year-old denzien of Warhol’s Factory, and along with being credited as discovering the Velvet Underground, she also made Christmas On Earth, in which participants in the experiment donned tribal body paint as they proceeded to explore each other every which way but loose. The film’s 'screenings' were often at friends' apartments, with musical accompaniment ranging from turning the radio dial to the Velvets playing live. We're pleased to announce Portland, OR’s prolific White Rainbow will be supplying tonight’s accompanying soundscape to this carnal free-for-all of fingerpainting and fingerbanging."
For trailers depicting each of the shows described above and/or to purchase tickets to the events, click here.
Oh... and by the way, a further look at future Cinefamily offerings includes the announcement that on August 12, the theater will be hosting "Show & Tell w/ Larry Flynt." There's no description available of that show yet, but tickets can be purchased here.
"Cinefamily at the Silent Movie Theater" is located at 611 North Fairfax Ave., Los Angeles 90036.
