The Pioneer Theater New York City's home of horror movies The Pioneer Theater is a full-time movie theater in New York City, screening an extremely wide range of independent and international movies. However, we have established ourselves most prominently in the genre film world, particularly with horror, science fiction, and other fantastic films. We do sneak previews, events with filmmakers in person, press screenings, theatrical launch screenings, and also theatrical screenings proper. Our flagship event is "October: A Month of Horror, Terror, and General Mayhem," a month-long festival / series devoted to horror movies, now in its third edition. We also host an annual "Science Fiction Springtime." Those are our main events, but we present horror movies year-round. Our weekly "Bizarro Mondays" regularly include horror films, with Fangoria editor Tony Timpone hosting a monthly "Monster Monday" event." Special guests for these have included Malcolm McDowell, Angelo Badalamenti, Ryan Schifrin, Harry Kumel, Chris Sivertson, Bill Lustig, Jack Ketchum, and many, many more. Our horror screenings are recognized more and more, from the "mainstream" as well as "genre" worlds. In April 2006, ABC NEWS NIGHTLINE shot its story "Hollywood Blood Lust: A Look at the Newest Trend in Horror Flicks" at the Pioneer. We have also helped launch previously unheralded talent into the film world, including Douglas Buck (FAMILY PORTRAITS, SISTERS), Adrian Garcia Bogliano (ROOMS FOR TOURISTS), Ti West (THE ROOST), and Dave Gebroe (ZOMBIE HONEYMOON). In years to come, the Pioneer's horror and genre presence will undoubtedly continue to grow, in ever more terrifying ways. |
NIGHTLINE
- April 21, 2006
|
J.R.
Taylor, NEW YORK PRESS, October 4, 2005: |
Success
stories: ZOMBIE HONEYMOON |
|
writer
/ director |
"Playing ZOMBIE HONEYMOON at the Pioneer Theater was a dream-come-true for me. It was my first ever theatrical run, right in the heart of New York City, and it allowed for both my first reviews in major New York media and a one-on-one connection with my audience. In many ways, my life and career jumped to the next level the day ZOMBIE HONEYMOON premiered at the Pioneer, and I'll forever be grateful." |
Laura
Kern, NY TIMES, upon the film's opening at the Pioneer: |
"Not
quite the campfest its absurd but undeniably catchy title suggests, ZOMBIE
HONEYMOON is actually an emotionally driven blend of romance, comedy and
horror. Falling somewhere between Bob Balaban's immature yet hilarious
high-school zombie spoof MY BOYFRIEND'S BACK (1993) and David Cronenberg's
definitive gross-out transformation love story, THE FLY (1986), ZOMBIE
HONEYMOON is more interested in examining the lengths people will go to
in the name of true love than in spilling buckets of blood, though there
isn't exactly a shortage of gore." |
V.A.
Musetto, NY POST: |
"Bloody good! Whether you're looking for a love story with a little gore or a horror movie with a little romance, ZOMBIE HONEYMOON will suit your taste." |
Stu
VanAirsdale, indieWIRE / The Reeler: |
"A remarkably nuanced study of love and commitment, casual viewers inclined to skip the film based on its title alone will miss out on one of the year's most pleasant, well-made, genre-bending surprises: A blissed-out pair of honeymooners (Tracy Coogan and Graham Sibley) faces sudden crisis when a mysterious figure staggers from the Jersey Shore surf and vomits a bloody black muck onto the groom. He dies, but of course, he does not - this is a zombie movie, you know. The ensuing bloodbath tests the limits of loyalty as the newlyweds struggle to adapt to their new way of life. "Gebroe's direction allow extraordinary space for Coogan and Sibley, whose lived-in performances emphasize the genuine pathos and humor woven into Gebroe's script. 'You scared me,' the bloody, undead husband says at one point when his wife sneaks up behind him; that you cannot help but both believe him and belly-laugh is a testament to ZOMBIE HONEYMOON's ironic grace." |
|
 Special guests for ZOMBIE HONEYMOON |
Mike
Davis, writer of |
"As both a filmmaker and as a fan of independent film, I wish there were more movie theaters like the Pioneer. They've created a system that successfully cuts out all the middle men standing between a movie and its audience, functioning kind of like a one film film festival. Most of the movies selected would probably never see a theatrical release otherwise, so the Pioneer gives the audience a chance to see a film the way it was meant to be seen while at the same time fufilling the dreams of many a non-mainstream filmmaker. "Our movie PERVERT! was made as a midnight movie homage to cult director Russ Meyer. It is not multiplex material, but the audience for it is out there, and it's definately the kind of flick that's better seen with an audience. The Pioneer turned out to be a perfect fit and served as a welcoming, friendly home for our whacked out little film and the raucous perverts who came out to see it. And the next night they were showing was a serious art film, and I'm sure that audience felt equally at home. "To me the Pioneer is representative of the way film displayers need to start thinking in order to get people away from the isolation of their computers and televisions and back into the theaters. Create a real community and show great films!" |
Success
stories: ROOMS FOR TOURISTS (Habitaciones para turistas) |
|
producer
|
"ROOMS
FOR TOURISTS opened at the Two Boots Pioneer Theater in New York on October
20, 2005. This was no less than the first time ever that an independent
Argentine film, made on video, opened in North American movie theaters.
ROOMS FOR TOURISTS had just the right ingredients to land this opening,
which in a way was like a 'world premiere,' because though the film had
screened in other festivals, it had never had a commercial run anywhere
in the world - not even in Argentina. The New York opening gave the film
a chance to get extremely good reviews in media outlets like the NEW YORK
TIMES, the NEW YORK POST, and TV GUIDE. Following this opening
- which was supported by Cinema Tropical and by Condor Media, run by Peter
Marai - we received many proposals to develop projects in the United States
- even including a remake of ROOMS FOR TOURISTS. Keeping
in mind that the budget of the film was $3000, it would not be too much
to think that ROOMS FOR TOURISTS found incredible luck thanks
to the Pioneer opening, which was quite probably the lowest
budget Latin American film opening ever in the United States." |
producer
Hernan Moyano: (Spanish-language original) |
"Habitaciones
para turistas” (Rooms for tourists) fue estrenada en el Two Boots
Pioneer Theater de Nueva York el 20 de octubre de 2005. Resultó
ser, nada menos que la primera vez en la historia que una película
independiente argentina hecha en video se estrenó comercialmente
en salas norteamericanas. “Habitaciones para turistas” tuvo
el ingrediente particular además de tener en ese estreno al mismo
tiempo un carácter de “premiere mundial” porque si
bien el film ya había pasado por algunos festivales, no había
tenido estreno comercial en ningún lugar del mundo: ni siquiera
en Argentina. El estreno neoyorkino le permitió a la película
acceder a una serie de reseñas sumamente favorables en medios como
el New York Times, New York Post o TV Guide. A partir del
estreno, del que fueron piezas fundamentales Cinema Tropical y la distribuidora
Condor Media, dirigida por Peter Marai, recibimos propuestas para realizar
proyectos en Estados Unidos, entre ellos, la propia remake de “Habitaciones
para turistas”. Teniendo en cuenta que el presupuesto
del film fue de 3000 dólares, no sería excesivo pensar que
“Habitaciones para turistas” tuvo una suerte infrecuente
gracias al estreno en el Pioneer, la de ser muy probablemente
la película latina de mas bajo presupuesto de la historia en ser
estrenada en los Estados Unidos." |
Laura
Kern, NY TIMES, upon the film's opening at the Pioneer: |
"Shock and
Gore Preside at an Eerie Argentine B&B" "Rooms for Tourists," which is being called "the first Argentinian shock film," employs the popular horror-movie setup of displaced innocents cruelly tossed into the deadly lairs of homicidal maniacs. Clearly inspired by "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," as well as the works of the Italian maestros Lucio Fulci and Dario Argento (particularly "Suspiria"), the director Adrián García Bogliano's first feature is set in the desolate outskirts of Buenos Aires. Five young women, who have never met, find themselves stranded for the night after missing their connecting train. . .Like the film's effectively sinister atmosphere, its meticulous attention to sound also adds indelible texture. The expansive soundtrack is a blend of songs that vary from headbanging to dance music, an ambient, hair-raising score and everyday noises (chirping birds, crying babies, train whistles for daytime; crickets, ticking and clanging clocks, and general creaks and bumps for the night), which, in retrospect, are always more significant than they first appear." |
V.A.
Musetto, NY POST: |
REAL SPINE-ARGENTINGLING
HORROR - THREE
STARS! |
Filmmakers, producers, critics, and distributors who have introduced horror movies at the Pioneer (selected from within the last two years)
|
Ian
Allen (director, TRAPPED BY THE MORMONS) |
Success
stories: |
Upon THE ROOST's premiere at the Pioneer, Michael Gingold
wrote in Fangoria: |
Selected coverage for Horror at the Pioneer FANGORIA,
February 2007 print edition: Tony Timpone, "The Little Film Show
That Could." |
| Travis
Betz, writer / director of JOSHUA: |
Zombie
Parade: |
Mike
Atkinson, VILLAGE VOICE, October 4, 2005: "October is awash with zombieness, new and old: Romero, Raimi, Fulci, you name it. The normally marginalized but fierce indie-horror underground is uncorked as well, and amid the fresh freaks are Jeremy Newman's doc I. ZOMBI, about a real Kentucky horror-TV host who disguises his disfigurements with corpse makeup, and Ian Allen's TRAPPED BY THE MORMONS, a shot-on-cloudy-video silent film that "remakes" a 1922 British exploitation feature of the same title but adds undeadness. " |
Success
stories:
|
"Compared with
Douglas Buck, Neil LaBute, the filmmaker who gave the world "In
the Company of Men," portrays men as sweethearts. In Mr. Buck's
nightmarish "Family Portraits: A Trilogy of America," which
opens today at the Two Boots Pioneer Theater, the men don't bother with
seducing and abandoning, one theme in Mr. LaBute's work; they go straight
for the hard stuff." |
PUZZLEHEAD
|
Reviews upon PUZZLEHEAD's opening at the Pioneer:
"A witty mix of FRANKENSTEIN and David Lynch's ERASERHEAD - with
a tip of the hat to Hitchcock's SABOTEUR - PUZZLEHEAD is an indie delight." "Unnerving
ambition. . . a stunning conceit. . .fusing form and content with a sureness
that eludes all but a handful of first timers, [writer / director James]
Bai shapes the movie to illustrate and emphasize the creature's fragmented
perceptions."
"Maintains a delicious tension between narrative wildness and compositional
discipline. Mining the Frankenstein myth and finding psychosexual gold,
the movie creates a love triangle that seems to share a single disturbed
personality. . .PUZZLEHEAD reveals the selfishness of creation with style,
originality and the understanding that even a tin man can have a heart." "By
far the most independent independent-genre flick to grift screen space
in Manhattan since Douglas Buck's Family Portraits. . .a post-apocalyptic,
A.I. melodrama. . . Bai's movie deserved a real budget, and deserves eyes
now." |
Pioneer Theater
Calendar-style schedule - Pioneer Theater front page
Directions to the theater - Press materials
