What is the ‘midnight movie’?

Defining the 'Midnight Movie'
by Daniel Robbins
Originally published 9 October2009
on Cult Media Studies
for FIST 300 - Cult Cinema - Prof. Ernest Mathijs - UBC

The ‘midnight movie’ is a phenomenon that has been around for 40 plus years. Something as vaguely defined as the ‘midnight movie’ simply cannot stay static for that length of time. It could have been the decision of the management of the Elgin theater in New York to screen Alexandro Jodorowsky’s El Topo at midnight because it was “a film too heavy to be shown any other way”(Hoberman 285) that started the ‘midnight movie’ craze. Or it could date “back to the late 1920s”(Mathijs 2). Where the true ‘midnight movie’ begins depends on which definition you choose to prescribe. To say that true ‘midnight movies’ only exist in the counter culture and underground avant garde of the 1970’s is okay, except glorifying the ‘midnight movie’ by making it a select few films in a unique time period is almost counter productive. With this definition, to make something special you have to strip it of its life and future. A more literal definition is “a screening of a film late at night in a theatre for an unpredictable crowd”(Mathijs 1). This broadens things up a bit, maybe a bit too much. I would argue that any theater-going crowd is unpredictable, especially at a midnight screening. This definition would include the droves of people driven by popular culture to their local multiplex on many a Thursday evening in the summer time to stake out a spot in line to get tickets for the special ‘midight release’ of this week’s blockbuster. Theater’s have found out that they can cash in on the success of ‘midnight movies’ that continues into the 21^st century with films like Donnie Darko (2001) and The Room (2003)(Mathijs). Being shown at 12AM does not, in my opinion, make Michael Bay’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), which brought in “$16 million from the first midnight screenings”(Kilday), a true ‘midnight movie’. No, the definition of the legitimate (no irony intended) ‘midnight movie’ lies somewhere between the two.

The way to find the true definition is to find a line of distinction. In the first definition, very few films are considered true ‘midnight movies’, so let us look at the second definition, which encompasses most big budget pictures today, and any movie that a theater decides to hold a special midnight screening of. The first definition suggests that the ‘midnight movie’ is something that came out of an underground cinema and therefore has a niche culture appeal. The films of Jodorowsky, as well as Kenneth Anger and the others associated with ‘midnight movies’ are not your average flick. These movies are offensive, disturbing, and/or terrible to the general public. The select group of people that attend these screenings repeatedly, as a ritual are not the average citizen. There seems to lie the distinction. While Transformers appeals to the masses, The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) appeals to a niche culture. The niche culture does not have to be very small, it just needs to be a specific group of devoted people, who ritualistically watch these movies. Even 34 years after its original release, a quick search on the RHPS official fan site tells me that I can see a midnight screening of Rocky Horror the first Saturday of every month, just a few hours away in Seattle, Washington. This speaks to the on-going phenomenon of the ‘midnight movie’. While definitions need to change as time progresses, the true ‘midnight movie’ still stands as the underground, niche culture cinema that it was when it first began.

Works Cited:

Hoberman, J. and Jonathan Rosenbaum. “El Topo: Through the wasteland of the

counterculture”. The Cult Film Reader. Open University Press. 2008.

Kilday, Gregg. “’Transformers’ midnight shows rake in $16 million”. 24 June 2009.

Reuters. 8 October 2009.

< http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSTRE55N5FK20090624>.

Mathijs, Ernest. “Midnight Movies.” September 2009.

Rocky Horror Picture Show official fan site. < http://www.rockyhorror.com/>. 8 October

2009.