Spectacle

Spectacle Spectacle (est. 2010) is a volunteer-run microcinema in Brooklyn, NY, currently streaming our usual array of programming online.

BUMMING IN BEIJING( 流浪北京)dir. Wu Wenguang, 1990.China, 70 mins.In Mandarin with English subtitles.THURSDAY, JUNE 4 – 7:3...
05/31/2026

BUMMING IN BEIJING
( 流浪北京)
dir. Wu Wenguang, 1990.
China, 70 mins.
In Mandarin with English subtitles.

THURSDAY, JUNE 4 – 7:30 PM
SATURDAY, JUNE 14 – 10 PM
MONDAY, JUNE 15 – 7:30 PM
MONDAY, JUNE 22 – 7:30 PM

“In 1990, Chinese documentaries were almost exclusively stodgy, didactic talking head affairs broadcast on state-run media. Then Wu Wenguang’s BUMMING IN BEIJING came out, kicking off an entire independent documentary scene in the country. Shot directly before and after the Tiananmen Square Massacre on cameras taken from a government TV station, BUMMING IN BEIJING follows five broke bohemians (including future art stars like Zhang Dali, long before they found fame) in grimy late 80s Beijing. Shot in a vérité style that would soon be adopted by a new generation of filmmakers, the movie includes an onscreen mental breakdown, a time-capsule view of the emergence of the country’s avant-garde, and proof that the hippest place in China used to be KFC.” – Aaron-Fox Lerner, Time Out Beijing Film Editor

“The prolonged moments of near silence in BUMMING IN BEIJING produce the aesthetic effect of outlasting the remembered roar of government tanks.” – Ernest Larsen, Art In America

BUMMING IN BEIJING plays in the BEST OF BEST OF SPECTACLE series. Since the dawn of the theater, there have been films that have defined Spectacle’s identity and its ethos—films that transcend the walls of our humble ex-bodega and tap into the sense of radical rediscovery that our collective is always chasing. The weird, the pertinent, the beautiful, and the ineffable—these films have been cataloged in our long-running annual series “Best of Spectacle.” At the end of every calendar year, in a tradition that began in 2013, the collective votes on what films should get a second showing in January. Our January calendars have thus become a repository for some of our fondest memories spent with both packed houses and loyal, solitary midnight Spectacleheads.

September of 2025 marks our 15th anniversary at 124 South 3rd Street, and as such it seems a ripe occasion to play the entire catalog of hits, unfolding in chronological order until we catch up with the present.

📣 JUNE SERIES ANNOUNCEMENT: This Pride Month, your local SOV film freaks at Spectacle are delighted to present this glee...
05/31/2026

📣 JUNE SERIES ANNOUNCEMENT: This Pride Month, your local SOV film freaks at Spectacle are delighted to present this gleefully kitchy follow-up retrospective from one of the local q***r community’s most offbeat DIY auteurs, Joe Zaso. Following the valuable experience of working with community theater folks on SCREAMBOOK II, Joe Zaso would continue his wild, camcorder-driven experiments across the dimly lit spaces of late-80s Long Island while showcasing his earnest love for musical theater and the works of Dario Argento.

Join us as we wig out for the alleged “First Possession Musical” in the 1990 IT’S ONLY A MOVIE and the 40th anniversary of giallo-inspired, bridge-and-tunnel soaked MALIGNO– featuring in-person Q&As from the horror himbo himself!

MALIGNO
Dir. Joe Zaso, 1986
United States, 93 min.

FRIDAY, JUNE 5 – 7:30PM
SATURDAY, JUNE 13 – 7:30PM
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 24 – 7:30PM (IN PERSON Q&A)

While far from the first made-for-video send off to the style of Argento, MALIGNO brings the giallo aesthetic to the loud, thick accents of Lawn Guyland. We follow Susan Gilligan as she arrives at a new school and begins to notice her classmates start disappearing one by one. Shot on location at the St. Agnes Cathedral in Rockville Center, MALIGNO is just as much a document of turn of the century east coast suburbia as it is a teen directed horror movie.

IT’S ONLY A MOVIE
Dir. Joe Zaso, 1990
United States, 105 min.

FRIDAY, JUNE 5 – 10PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 9 – 7:30PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 25 – 7:30PM IN PERSON Q&A

A ragtag movie crew attempts a cynical cash-grab adaptation of the latest Harlequin romance styled best-seller. Little do they know, the lavish mansion chosen as their set location has demonic plans for them. With explicit nods to The Producers, Little Shop of Horrors and a Rocky Horror like banger dedicated entirely to the state of Pennsylvania, IT’S ONLY A MOVIE could very well be the strangest movie musical from Long Island that doesn’t star Rem Lezar… the picture even got a review from Variety’s Home Video section where they’d dub it “a well meaning amateur video. Would-be-spoof musical in the Rocky Horror vein is strictly for consumers of low camp."

2 BY SUKI HAWLEY & MIKE GALINSKYThe husband-and-wife team of Mike Galinsky and Suki Hawley have been making films togeth...
05/30/2026

2 BY SUKI HAWLEY & MIKE GALINSKY

The husband-and-wife team of Mike Galinsky and Suki Hawley have been making films together since the early ‘90s, when they both agreed to drop out of film school and make their own work together. This June, Spectacle is proud to present a double bill of Hawley and Galinsky’s two fictional features, Half-Cocked (1994) and Radiation (1999).

Drawing on Galinsky’s experience as a photographer and Hawley’s as an assistant to the likes of Roger Corman and Todd Haynes, these films remain vital dispatches from the guts of the ‘90s indie rock scene. Despite being shot with a documentarian’s eye for detail and local color, both apply a loose crime-film framework to their episodic narratives, suggesting the risks and compromises inherent in living as an artist on the margins.

HALF-COCKED
Dir. Suki Hawley, 1994.
US. 81 min.
In English.
TUESDAY, JUNE 2ND – 7:30PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 9TH – 10PM 
FRIDAY, JUNE 19th – 7:30PM (Q&A with director Suki Hawley)
SATURDAY, JUNE 27th – 10PM (Q&A with director Suki Hawley)

Hawley and Galinsky’s first feature follows bored Louisville teenager and aspiring rocker Tara (Tara Jane O’Neil), who spends her hours toiling away with her local indie rock band Truckstop and arguing with her pompous brother Otis (Nation of Ulysses frontman Ian Svenonious), leader of the slightly-more-popular Guilloteens.
When Tara and Truckstop decide to push their chips by stealing the Guilloteens’ van and equipment to go on tour, they find themselves struggling nightly to book shows and make ends meet, all while staying one step ahead of the law.

RADIATION
Dir. Suki Hawley & Michael Galinsky, 1999.
US. 90 min.
In Spanish and English with English subtitles.

TUESDAY, JUNE 2ND – 10PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 11TH – 10PM 
SATURDAY, JUNE 20th – 5PM (Q&A with director Suki Hawley)
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 24th – 10PM

Radiation follows Unai, a Spanish music promoter who supplements his income by selling speed while on the road. After he’s stiffed by a club owner, Unai finds himself unable to pay either his drug supplier or the band (real-life indie rockers Come) he’s supposed to be taking on tour.

ANALIFE(アナライフ)
Dir. Kenji Goda. 2005.
Japan. 83 min.
In English and Japanese with English subtitles.WEDNESDAY, JUNE 3 — ...
05/30/2026

ANALIFE
(アナライフ)
Dir. Kenji Goda. 2005.
Japan. 83 min.
In English and Japanese with English subtitles.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 3 — 10 PM
FRIDAY, JUNE 12 — 10 PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 16 — 7:30 PM
FRIDAY, JUNE 26 — 10 PM

A ra**st, a murderer, and a dumpster diver all find themselves in the waiting room at the same proctologist…

What may sound like the setup for a cruel joke is in fact the premise of Kenji Goda’s groundbreaking and predictive hyperlink cinema masterpiece, ANALIFE, in which our three weaving heroes discover that a hole is never just a hole.

Developed between 1995 and 2005, filmmaker and game director Kenji Goda sought to express what he witnessed at the arrival of the Information Age: our global consciousness was starting to fracture and the guts of human emotion and identity had flipped inside out. Soon enough, our webs would become our cages, and our thirst for human connection would push us towards increasingly psychotic tactics. To Goda, it was clear: the fruit from our digital garden had already begun to rot.

Deploying a disembodied, corporate voiceover à la Chris Morris’ late-nite cult radio program BLUE JAMand infectiously scored by the late Rei Harakami (part of duo yanokami, alongside the legendary Akiko Yano), ANALIFE is an abjectly transcendent, WAX-like assault from a once-future world where “all morals are engulfed in the flood of images” and a hole in the heart is worth filling with something more sublime. Give your regards to the bear this June at Spectacle.

Join us after the feature to see where it all began with:

PERSPECTIVE OF POWER
Dir. Kenji Goda. 1995.
Japan. 21 min.
No spoken language.

Provided by the director, this extremely rare low-fidelity viewing opportunity provides essential context, examining many of the themes later explored in ANALIFE. Something best viewed on your Nokia at 4 AM, but Spectacle will do in a pinch.

WARNING: STROBE, SEXUAL VIOLENCE

COMING THIS JUNE…HISTORY LESSONSdir. Barbara Hammer, 2000.USA, 70 min.In EnglishThe final installment in Barbara Hammer’...
05/29/2026

COMING THIS JUNE…

HISTORY LESSONS
dir. Barbara Hammer, 2000.
USA, 70 min.
In English

The final installment in Barbara Hammer’s groundbreaking “lost q***r trilogy,” HISTORY LESSONS imagines a world in which le****ns are as omnipresent as white heterosexual cis men. Manipulating everything from Eleanor Roosevelt studded newsreels to analog skin flicks, Hammer rewrites history with this reclamation of an almost always marginalized demographic.

“Radical sexual politics in a jester’s surprise package of impudent humor and Situationist-style found-footage monkeyshines” – Variety

MONDAY, JUNE 1ST - 7:30PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 18TH - 10PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 25TH - 10PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 30TH - 10PM

Part of: Best of Best of Spectacle
Tickets coming soon…

LAST CALL FOR ..SEVEN WOMEN SEVEN SINSdirs. various, 1987.Various, 101 min.SATURDAY, MAY 30 – MIDNIGHTpart of BEST OF BE...
05/28/2026

LAST CALL FOR ..

SEVEN WOMEN SEVEN SINS
dirs. various, 1987.
Various, 101 min.

SATURDAY, MAY 30 – MIDNIGHT

part of BEST OF BEST OF SPECTACLE

TICKETS AND FULL PROGRAM DETAILS AVAILABLE ON OUR WEBSITE

As wide-ranging an omnibus film as there has ever been, a group of some of the most important international filmmakers of the last few decades – all of them female – take on each of the biblical vices. Bette Gordon, Chantal Akerman, VALIE EXPORT, Maxi Cohen, Laurence Gavron and more contribute a contemporary celluloid sin. The result is a thoroughly unpredictable introduction to each filmmaker’s work; encapsulating devious narratives and experimental collages, film and video.

Special thanks to Women Make Movies.

poster by .err

🚂🚃🚃🚃🚃.... ALL ABOARD THE LAST TRAIN TO...DADETOWNDir. Russ Hexter, 1995.US. 93 min.In English.SATURDAY, MAY 30 – 10PMTIC...
05/28/2026

🚂🚃🚃🚃🚃.... ALL ABOARD THE LAST TRAIN TO...

DADETOWN
Dir. Russ Hexter, 1995.
US. 93 min.
In English.

SATURDAY, MAY 30 – 10PM

TICKETS AND FULL PROGRAM DETAILS AVAILABLE ON OUR WEBSITE

“We arrived in late March, 1994 to film a simple 15-minute segment for a public television special about small towns in America. Although we were only hired to stay for two weeks, our plans would change.”

So begins the story of Dadetown, which follows its titular upstate New York town through a fraught moment of post-industrial transformation. As the paper clip factory that has long served as the town’s chief employer begins closing, a hi-tech computer company called American Peripheral Imaging sets its sights on Dadetown as the location for its newest expansion. The arrival of API (and the legions of yuppie arrivistes they bring with them) exposes deep fault lines in the community, largely between those who stand to gain from the infusion of big business and those who may be left by the wayside.

Director Russ Hexter (who tragically died at age 27 shortly after the film’s Sundance premiere) captures the nuances and absurdities of this escalating conflict through candid interviews with the townsfolk and the API interlopers, invoking both the power and the challenges of working-class solidarity in its tight-knit community. Long before our current firestorms around tariffs and data centers, Dadetown asks urgent questions about labor, tech and capital that we’re still wrestling with to this day.

Special thanks to John Housley, Jim Carden and Maren Hexter.

CRY OF THE WILD⁣Dir. Bill Mason, 1972⁣Canada, 88 min.⁣In English⁣⁣WEDNESDAY, MAY 27 – 10PM⁣FRIDAY, MAY 29 – 7:30PM⁣⁣Bill...
05/27/2026

CRY OF THE WILD⁣
Dir. Bill Mason, 1972⁣
Canada, 88 min.⁣
In English⁣
⁣
WEDNESDAY, MAY 27 – 10PM⁣
FRIDAY, MAY 29 – 7:30PM⁣
⁣
Bill Mason’s first foray into feature length documentary filmmaking, he sought to destigmatize wolves and their vicious public perception with this project. Observing them both in their natural habitat and on his own property in the Gatineau Hills, the film also chronicles Mason and his family’s attempt to raise wolf cubs on their own.⁣
⁣
Note: this film contains brief scenes of animal death⁣

STORMY MONDAY⁣Dir. Mike Figgis, 1988.⁣United Kingdom. 93 min.⁣In English.⁣⁣FRIDAY, MAY 29TH – 10PM⁣⁣A corrupt American b...
05/27/2026

STORMY MONDAY⁣
Dir. Mike Figgis, 1988.⁣
United Kingdom. 93 min.⁣
In English.⁣
⁣
FRIDAY, MAY 29TH – 10PM⁣
⁣
A corrupt American businessman tries to strongarm his way into buying a nightclub in Newcastle. However, Brendan, an employee of the nightclub, discovers a darker motive behind the acquisition. ⁣
⁣
STORMY MONDAY (1988) marks the debut feature of director Mike Figgis, who spent many of his formative years in Newcastle. The film unfolds as a slow-burning neo-noir set against the decaying streets of late-1980s Newcastle, where smoky jazz clubs and rain-slicked streets become the stage for a web of corruption and uneasy alliances. Figgis brings the classic noir language of outsiders, seduction, and moral ambiguity to a distinctly British landscape, capturing a city caught between its industrial past and an uncertain future.⁣
Roger Deakins’ beautiful cinematography pairs seamlessly with Figgis’s haunting, jazz score, transforming Newcastle’s misty Quayside into a neon dreamscape. Despite a star-studded cast, including Melanie Griffith, Sean Bean, Tommy Lee Jones, and Newcastle local Sting. STORMY MONDAY has fallen into relative obscurity since its initial release.⁣

LAST CALL 🗣️👾👩‍💻👹FRIDAY, MAY 29 – MIDNIGHTCYBERPUNKdir. Marianne Trench, 1990USA, 60 min.Itself an artifact of the time ...
05/26/2026

LAST CALL 🗣️👾👩‍💻👹

FRIDAY, MAY 29 – MIDNIGHT

CYBERPUNK
dir. Marianne Trench, 1990
USA, 60 min.

Itself an artifact of the time and aesthetic being documented, CYBERPUNK is a fun, highly stylized sampler capturing its eponymous subculture still coalescing. Featuring interviews with William Gibson, Timothy Leary, founder of VPL Research/inventor of the Data Glove Jason Lanier, and encompassing musicians, animators, plastic surgeons, crafters, and self-proclaimed hackers, the movie shows and tells simultaneously with talking-head interviews overlaid and interspersed with then-cutting-edge CG animation and graphic effects. Reflecting the range of its subjects’ motivations, sometimes this is practical, masking coders casually chatting about illegal data access, and sometimes it’s purely for visual flair.

The documentary’s timing places it at a unique juncture – there’s talk of phone phreaking, VR potential and research, body modification, warez trading, database hacking, but no concrete mention of the internet as we know and use it today. AOL for DOS was released February 1991, Windows in 1992; CYBERPUNK just missed the radical breakthrough that was readily accessible dial-up, existing in a world where text-based intranets with node points were the closest equivalent. Of all people it’s a computer theorist outlining the blind spot most clearly; speaking to the (assumed) main fear of technology being how small and powerless it makes the average person feel and citing the military-industrial complex as example, the idea of complete personal connectivity and power doesn’t even occur. And yet the possibility is present in the film – one hacker tells how a 14-year-old poking around an AT&T database for kicks had the FBI knocking on his door after he’d inadvertently nudged a satellite out of orbit. In a present with unlimited texting on readily available handheld computers, it’s tempting to giggle at one hacker bragging “I make free phone calls…everywhere. You name it…Europe, Asia…..The United States…”, but hindsight’s 20/20 – CYBERPUNK is a snapshot of those excited for a future they nearly saw coming.

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124 S 3rd Street
Brooklyn, NY
11249

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Monday 7pm - 12am
Tuesday 7pm - 12am
Wednesday 7pm - 12am
Thursday 7pm - 12am
Friday 7pm - 12am
Saturday 7pm - 2am

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