Explicit: A Series Of Erotic Thrillers

Brian DePalma, The Wachowski Sisters, Ang Lee, Paul Verhoeven, William Friedkin, Park Chan-wook…some of the hottest writers and directors in our series who all put a new, more hypersexual spin on classic noir tropes, with some of the most successful and controversial films of the 80’s & 90’s. In director Nina Menkes’s new documentary Brainwashed: Sex, Camera, Power (May 12th), she explores the ‘male gaze’ through 175 clips from over 100 years of cinema, though typically exemplified by the classic films noir with their femme fatales and Hitchcock’s thrillers and his icy blondes. The Erotic Thriller re-emerged as a distinct genre in the 1980’s by making explicit the sexual subtext of those earlier films in sensational detail. Join us for some steamy summer nights in Pálás, as we embark on an exploration of those heady days of the Erotic Thriller starting in 1980 with De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980), through to the zenith of the genre with Basic Instinct (1992) and ending with one of the most celebrated films of recent times to fall under the label of the Erotic Thriller, Park Chan-wook’s The Handmaiden (2016). 

See full line-up below.

  • Tangerine

    Tangerine, the gloriously queer alternative Christmas tale, is a rip-roaring odyssey, loaded with dry-wit and foul-mouthed comedy as it follows the lives and loves of a couple of transgender sex workers through the various subcultures of Los Angeles at Christmastime.…

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    Director: Sean Baker

    Genre: Comedy,Thriller,Drama

    Release Date: 06-Dec-2024

    Fri 06 Dec
  • Love Actually

    Follows the lives of eight very different couples in dealing with their love lives in various loosely interrelated tales all set during a frantic month before Christmas in London, England...

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    Director: Richard Curtis

    Genre: Comedy,Drama,Romance

    Release Date: 21-Nov-2003

    Sat 07 Dec
  • Tokyo Godfathers (20th Anniversary)

    In modern-day Tokyo, three homeless people's lives are changed forever when they discover a baby girl at a garbage dump on Christmas Eve. As the New Year fast approaches these three forgotten members of society band together to solve the…

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    Director: Satoshi Kon

    Genre: Animation,Comedy

    Release Date: 07-Oct-2003

    Wed 11 Dec
  • Elf

    Will Ferrell stars as the ultimate fish out of water, Buddy, who as a baby crawls into Santa's toy bag and is whisked off to the North Pole, where he is raised as an elf. A misfit who grows to…

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    Director: Jon Favreau

    Genre: Comedy,Fantasy

    Release Date: 28-Nov-2003

    Fri 13 Dec
  • Home Alone

    An eight-year-old troublemaker must protect his house from a pair of burglars when he is accidentally left home alone by his family during Christmas vacation...

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    Director: Chris Columbus

    Genre: Comedy

    Release Date: 07-Dec-1990

    Sat 14 Dec
  • White Christmas (70th Anniversary)

    A successful song-and-dance team become romantically involved with a sister act and team up to save the failing Vermont inn of their former commanding general...

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    Director: Michael Curtiz

    Genre: Comedy,Musical,Romance

    Release Date: 01-Nov-2024

    Sun 15 Dec
  • Die Hard

    One of the biggest films of the eighties, Die Hard was not only a box office smash, but it made a star of its leading man, Bruce Willis, and quickly became considered as one of the greatest action movies of…

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    Director: John McTiernan

    Genre: Action,Romance

    Release Date: 17-Feb-1989

    Tue 17 Dec
    Sat 21 Dec
  • It’s a Wonderful Life

    Like overcooked poultry, Brussel sprouts and indigestion, It’s a Wonderful Life is a Christmas tradition. However, unlike these things, Frank Capra’s masterpiece is both tremendous fun and good for you. Far from being a saccharine, sentimental wallow, this film, in…

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    Director: Frank Capra

    Genre: Drama,Fantasy

    Release Date: 03-Dec-2021

    Thu 19 Dec
    Sun 22 Dec
  • The Holdovers

    From acclaimed director Alexander Payne, The Holdovers follows a curmudgeonly instructor (Paul Giamatti) at a New England prep school who is forced to remain on campus during Christmas break to babysit the handful of students with nowhere to go. Eventually…

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    Director: Alexander Payne

    Genre: Comedy,Drama

    Release Date: 19-Jan-2024

    Fri 20 Dec
  • The Holiday

    A woman plagued by man trouble finds her fortune improves when she befriends an Englishwoman while on vacation...

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    Director: Nancy Meyers

    Genre: Comedy,Romance

    Release Date: 08-Dec-2006

    Sat 21 Dec

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