LISZTOMANIA

Sponsored by Austin's greatest music store, End of an Ear Records, and Austin's most essential vintage furniture and decor store, Room Service.

Co-presented by the Warner Archive

The most fantastical, bawdy, synth-adelic, opulent and outré film ever from the '70s most audacious cinematic enfant terrible!

Following the huge success of TOMMY, Ken Russell next tackled one of his trademark composer biographies -- and the result was the life of Franz Liszt as channeled through Superman comics, 10-foot phalluses, glittery hoedowns, Frankenstein, METROPOLIS, Ringo Starr as “The Pope”(!), and a stupendous list of other impossible stuff.

Portrayed by Roger Daltrey, Liszt is at first shown as a 19th-century equivalent to Daltrey’s real-life brand of rock ‘n roll animal -- but, of course, Russell gleefully ramps every piece of sensory input to 11, pitting Liszt as a superhero priest sent to annihilate the scourge of vampiric Nazi mad scientist Richard Wagner.

Woefully misunderstood and critically savaged upon its original release, LISZTOMANIA is one hell of a good time, and exemplifies a kind of radical chance-taking Hollywood can’t even conceive of today -- the kind that Russell couldn’t conceive of not bringing to the screen. (Cinefamily)