FERAL CINEMA #1: The Quickening

The third Thursday of each month I Luv Video, The Austin Chronicle, The Onion & The Austin Underground Film Society will present Feral Cinema Double Features — rare, freakish & often damn near impossible-to-find cult classics from the wild fringes of pop culture. Hosted & curated by Marc Savlov of the Austin Chronicle, Charles Lieurance of I Luv Video, Pop Matters & Blastitude Magazine & Andy Gately from The Austin Underground Film Festival & Psych Fest, these double features will bring to light a wide range of chronically unseen treasures. As an added bonus, screenings will have surprises like giveaways, trivia contests, drink specials, and erudite, boozy introductions from your hosts.

WHO IS KK DOWNEY?
Darren Curtis/Pat Kiely, 2008

Feral Cinema kicks off with this brutal send up of hipster culture via the real-life controversy surrounding 16-year-old transgender cult author JT LeRoy, who made headlines with her “astonishingly confident” (New York Times Book Review) semi-autobiographical debut novel Sarah. Despite dubious literary merit and questionable authenticity, the story of a boy truck stop prostitute struck a masochistic chord with younger readers through its exotic subject matter and pitch black humor, and catapulted the mysterious teenage author into celebrity status, as she soon found herself being courted (in every sense) by the likes of Asia Argento, Gus Van Sant, Carrie Fisher, and Debbie Harry. It soon came to light that, in what the San Francisco Chronicle calls “the greatest literary hoax in a generation,” the sunglass-clad guy appearing on LeRoy’s speaking dates was not, in fact, the true scribe behind the work, or even a guy…

Enter Montreal comedy troupe Kidnapper, who lampoons the scandal’s perpetrators and marks for all it’s worth, and then some. Just leave it to the Canadians to rip American scenesters a new one. View the trailer here: http://www.whoiskkdowney.com/en/trailer/trailer/

WHO IS KK DOWNEY? Will be preceded by the amazing punk rock short TORTURED BY JOY (Dir. Henry Griffin, 11 min.)

Doors @ 8 p.m. so you can get your drink on & the actual films will be shown at 8:30 p.m., with an intermission for giveaways, more drinking and bathroom breaks. Feral Cinema screenings cost $5. Feral Drink Special #1: $2 Lone Star pints