Exhibitor, distributor, producer and director — one of the seminal figures of the modern American independent film movement, Ben Barenholtz, died last Wednesday in Prague. He was 83. In the late ’60s, Barenholtz programmed New York rep house the Elgin Cinema, where his scheduled mixed experimental films with mainstream movies. It was also where he popularized the concept of the “midnight movie,” playing Alejandro Jodoworsky’s El Topo for months on end. Another midnight movie — Eraserhead — was an early marquee title of Barenholtz’s first distribution company, Libra Films, and later, at Circle Films, he bought and distributed the classic […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 3, 2019