By Ray Pride Pride@moviecitynews.com

HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER Gets 4K Restoration and 30th Anniversary Release

Posted Friday, August 26th, 2016 - Comments Off on HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER Gets 4K Restoration and 30th Anniversary Release
Be Sociable, Share!
THE FILM THAT REWROTE THE RULES ON CINEMATIC VIOLENCE RETURNS IN THEATERS ACROSS THE COUNTRY FOR A 30th- ANNIVERSARY
THEATRICAL RERELEASE IN A 4K RESTORATION
HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER
 
The Acclaimed Thriller, Starring Michael Rooker of ‘The Walking Dead,’ Will Receive a Red-Carpet Premiere Followed by Release in 20 Cities Beginning October 21, 2016
THE FILM THAT REWROTE THE RULES ON CINEMATIC VIOLENCE RETURNS IN THEATERS ACROSS THE COUNTRY FOR A 30TH– ANNIVERSARY
THEATRICAL RERELEASE IN A 4K RESTORATION
HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER
The Acclaimed Thriller, Starring Michael Rooker of ‘The Walking Dead,’ Will Receive a Red-Carpet Premiere Followed by Release in 20 Cities Beginning October 21, 2016
“As fine a film as it is a brutally disturbing one.” – Sheila Benson, Los Angeles Times
It was a true game-changer, a film so upsetting in its blunt depiction of an amoral murderer that it made the slasher films of its time look like cartoons by comparison.  HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER became a lightning rod in heated debates about cinema and censorship but has only grown in stature since its first showing in 1986. Now, on the 30th anniversary of its momentous debut, it returns in a 4K restoration rerelease nationwide via Dark Sky Films, with major theatrical engagements to begin on October 21, 2016.
The film will come “home” on October 14, 2016, as Dark Sky partners with the Chicago International Film Festival for a large-scale event including a festival red-carpet premiere and a Q&A with star Michael Rooker and director John McNaughton in attendance.
HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER is a chilling profile of a cold-blooded killer that, 30 years after its historic festival premiere, has lost none of its power to shock. The film, loosely based on a true story, has been hailed as one of the most disturbing and terrifying examinations of mass murderers ever filmed. Henry (Michael Rooker, The Walking Dead) is a psychopathic drifter who has coldly murdered a number of people for no particular reason and without any remorse. Leaving bodies in his wake, Henry makes his way to Chicago, where his he settles into the run-down apartment of his drug-dealing former prison friend and occasional roommate Otis (Tom Towles).
Also moving into the space is Otis’s younger sister Becky (Tracy Arnold), who is fleeing her abusive husband. As she fends off her brother’s incestuous advances, Becky finds herself attracted to Henry – unaware that he, along with Otis, are continuing their murderous rampage.
Director John McNaughton completed the film in 1986, and it was shown at that year’s Chicago International Film Festival. But it wasn’t until 1990 that a U.S. distributor was brave enough to give it a wide release. Henry predates the NC-17 rating and received its predecessor, the X rating, on three separate occasions. As a result of it and related issues with Almodovar’s “Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down,” Phillip Kaufman’s “Henry & June” and Peter Greenaway’s “the Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover,” the MPAA created the NC-17 as its replacement on 9/26/1990. Henry’s current rating is “X (Surrendered)” though a renewed rating is pending.  The film’s violence, and the clinical, detached portrayal of Henry by the unforgettable Michael Rooker, originally earned it the MPAA’s highly restrictive NC-17 rating.
The response from both critics and the public was as visceral as the film itself, and it went on to gain praise as one of the most compelling and disturbing films of modern cinema.
In celebration of its 30th anniversary, HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER returns with a thrilling, cinematic presentation that cements its reputation as one of the most harrowing and original American films of all time. Dark Sky Films, a division of MPI Media Group, proudly presents it in a brand-new 4K scan and restoration from the 16mm original camera negatives, and featuring a new 5.1 audio mix from the stereo 35mm mag reels, all approved by director John McNaughton.
HENRY opens in New York on October 21, McNaughton will attend the film’s New York premiere, at the Landmark Sunshine Cinema and on October 28, McNaughton will present it at the Laemmle NoHo in Los Angeles. 
A whole new generation of filmgoers will be introduced to HENRY with an amazing new transfer that puts the film firmly back into the vanguard of contemporary cinematic horror. Daniel M. Kimmel of Variety wrote, “[T]his is a movie that will anger and frighten audiences … Many will also find this one of the most impressive film debuts of the ’80s.”
About Dark Sky Films
Dark Sky Films is an independent film production and distribution label founded in 2008, working with emerging talent as well as established veterans to develop, package, produce and finance feature film and episodic television projects. Representing films from some of the most talented directors working today, such as Ti West‘s The House of the Devil and The Innkeepers, and Jim Mickle‘s Stake Land, Dark Sky continues to identify original talent and projects to bring a vibrant slate of films to the world market, with such recent releases and productions such as We Are Still Here, Deathgasm, Applesauce and Emelie.
# # #

 

Be Sociable, Share!

Posted in Movie City News, Press Releases | Comments Off on HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER Gets 4K Restoration and 30th Anniversary Release

Comments are closed.

Quote Unquotesee all »

It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon