BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS presented by Retropath!
Calling all nostalgia-freaks and celluloid junkies! Are you looking for the latest cinematic thrill? Retropath! has you covered. Specializing in the best flicks to stumble onto the screen, this series is guaranteed to deliver the wildest that cinema has to offer. Retropath! also features a unique lobby pop-up for each screening, featuring local artists with weird and wonderful work for sale!
Russ Meyer freaks us all with his first studio picture: a musical satirical melodrama called Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. A veritable trip from beginning to end, the film follows three young women who perform in a band called The Kelly Affair together. They're comprised of Kelly MacNamara, Casey Anderson, and Petronella "Pet" Danforth, and are managed by Kelly's boyfriend Harris Allsworth. The group quickly find themselves webbed into the mayhem of Hollywood after an impromptu gig at the mansion of a producer named Z-Man John LaZar, occasionally doing his best Phil Spector impression, and are received so well by the audience that Z-Man insists that he become their manager.
What follows is a series of luckless events for the band and anyone involved with them: from abortion to suicide to drug use to alcohol abuse, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls has it all wrapped up in a groovy melodramatic package, hilariously skewering its intended precursor, the hyper-serious and hyper-ridiculous Valley of the Dolls.
Though screenwriter Roger Ebert and director Russ Meyer originally intended Beyond to be a direct sequel to Valley, this film stands alone as a very darkly funny satire of all that is tumultuous in the world of fame and fortune. In spite of the fact that it takes its scenery and characters and deliberately pushes them into cartoonish extents, the movie is repeatedly cited as "true to life" by critics and fans, making its humour oddly timeless even though everything else about it is so profoundly of the era. Join us at The Royal Cinema for a weirdo head-trip for the ages, don't miss Beyond the Valley of the Dolls!
Our screenings would be nothing without our freaky sponsors: The Beguiling and Eyesore Cinema!
RSVP FOR ACCESSIBLE SEATING:
We have 5 accessible sections in our theatre in which you can reserve a head of time by calling! 416-466-4400 ext 0. One of our accessible seating areas has space for two mobility devices and a small section behind for the party to join. The other three are for single mobile devices with 2-3 seats beside it.
Please note that we do not have accessible washrooms. All of our washrooms are upstairs.
