During October, every place in town gets swept up in the spooky spirit of Halloween. Some shops offer pumpkin flavored goodies, while others redecorate their interiors to match the essence of the season. One thing’s for sure — Halloween is the culturally appropriate time of the year to enjoy a barrage of horror films.
To indulge that need, the Salt Lake Film Society (SLFS) hosts late-night screenings of classic horror movies every weekend in October. This annual event shows films at the Tower Theatre and is appropriately named The Tower of Terror. Getting together with friends at somebody’s house to watch a horror film is fun and all, but nothing compares to seeing a film on the silver screen.
Amy Beth Leber, associate director of operations and community programs for the SLFS, is proud of the cult legacy the society has built around the Halloween season.
“We’ve been doing our midnight series for a little over 10 years, then it evolved into Summer Late Nights and Tower of Terror, so we kind of pared it down into those two,” Leber says. “For Tower of Terror, we have a few big horror fans on our staff, so they program it. In the program, we try to do some classics and some core horror films.”
The first film of the series was “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2” by its predecessor’s helmer Tobe Hooper. Given the aesthetic elements of the perverse created in the first film, I was expecting a similar approach to this decade-plus follow-up. However, the film delivered a Sam Raimi-esque output. It did so by creating an entertaining yet ridiculous horror film. I won’t detail the absurdity, but know this, Dennis Hopper (in one of his most coked-up performances, which is really saying something) has a chainsaw duel with Leatherface. The entire audience was losing it with delirious laughter.
The next weekend was devoted to screenings of John Carpenter’s classic “Halloween,” which is a mandatory viewing for horror fans. It defined the slasher subgenre and put Carpenter on the map as a premiere horror auteur. Say what you will about his work after the 80s, but the man was in his prime in this time period. I had seen the film before, but its glory was enhanced on the big screen. The film really worked the crowd over, garnering plenty of jumps, screams, and nervous laughter from the audience.
Moving from weekend to weekend, the X96 radio station took over the theater for a night to host a horror movie double feature, which is something they’ve done for years. This year, they played George A. Romero’s zombie masterpiece “Dawn of the Dead” and zombie cult film “Return of the Living Dead.”
“They’re great supporters of us and great to work with,” Leber says. “The X96 marathon always has a sort of theme to it each year, this year it was films in the ‘Dead’ zombie film series.”
For the rest of the weekend, the SLFS followed suit by continuing to play “Dawn of the Dead.”
The last weekend of the month is reserved for special screenings of the cult classic “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” These screenings have become a time-honored tradition for Salt Lake City cinephiles. People dress up, watch the film and sing along.
Barb Guy, SLFS director of PR and marketing, is particularly ecstatic about these screenings.
“We do a preshow beforehand that starts 30 minutes before showtime and people get a prop bag [which has items that can be thrown at the screen],” Guy says.
Never ones to settle down, the SLFS is always looking towards the future.
“Next year will be very exciting, because we will have new restorations to play on the brand new digital projection systems,” Leber says.