FREAKS is screening as part of a Friday Late Night Movie double feature alongside TETSUO: THE IRON MAN! See one or both for one sweet price!

FREAKS (1932)

“One of us, one of us.”

Real sideshow performers star in Tod Browning‘s infamous cult classic, a grotesque revenge drama set against a circus backdrop. When trapeze artist Cleopatra learns that circus midget Hans has an inheritance, she marries the lovesick, diminutive performer, all the while planning to steal his fortune and run off with her lover, strong man Hercules. When Hans’ friends and fellow performers discover what is going on, they band together and carry out a brutal revenge that leaves Hercules and Cleopatra knowing what it truly means to be a “freak.” Trapeze artist Cleopatra plans to wed and then murder midget Hans for his fortune, but when his fellow ‘freaks’ discover her scheme, she becomes the target of their horrifying vengeance. With Wallace Ford, Leila Hyams, Olga Baclanova, Harry Earles, Henry Victor.

“One of the most powerful films ever made about the need for humanity and solidarity in the face of cruelty and oppression.” (Time Out)

TETSUO: IRON MAN (1989)

After running over a man driven mad by his obsession with  metal, Japanese businessman (Tomorowo Taguchi) finds himself plagued by a curse that turns his skin into iron. A cult-classic beloved by directors like Quentin Tarantino, this 16mm experimental art house film delves into the human obsession with industrialization and technology like none other. Its perverse climax, obscene sense of humor, and “hyperkinetic” pacing, are what drew genre film audiences to it in 1989, and it’s success is credited to opening the international market to independent Japanese cinema in the 1990’s.

“As surreally weird as “Eraserhead” and as intense as a Novocainless tooth extraction, Shinya Tsukamoto’s “Tetsuo: The Iron Man” is sci-fright as only the Japanese can do it.” (The Washington Post)

Friday, October 21
Doors 10:30 pm | Movie 11:00 pm *Start time subject to change. Please arrive on time.
Advance single film tickets ($15) for FREAKS HERE 
Advance single film tickets TETSUO and Double Feature ($15) HERE

Late Night Date Night! Bring a friend, date, or fellow freak for two-for-one entry.

*Online ticket sales end an hour before any given showtime. Unless noted otherwise, tickets are also available at the door.
*Minors permitted. Must be 19+ w/ID for bar service.
*Rio Theatre Groupons and passes OK for any single film screening only. Please redeem at the box office.
*If you are looking to redeem your tickets to either a canceled Rio Theatre screening or a Rio Theatre gift certificate, please email <[email protected]> with info including your name, canceled receipt number, gift certificate info, what you are wanting to see and when, and we can make the switch for you in advance. Alternately, you can bring this information with you to the venue, and we will do our best to help you at the box office.

FREAKS (Tod Browning, 1932 / 64 mins / PG) A circus’ beautiful trapeze artist agrees to marry the leader of side-show performers, but his deformed friends discover she is only marrying him for his inheritance.

TETSUO: IRON MAN (Shin’ya Tsukamoto, 1989 / 67 mins / R) A “metal fetishist” driven mad by the maggots wriggling in the wound he’s made to embed metal into his flesh, runs out into the night and is accidentally run down by a Japanese businessman (Tomorowo Taguchi) and his girlfriend (Kei Fujiwara). The pair dispose of the corpse in hopes of quietly moving on with their lives. However, the businessman soon finds that he is now plagued by a vicious curse that transforms his flesh into iron.