Prison of the Psychotic Damned

“Location, location, location” are, as everyone knows, the three most important things in buying real estate. But when you want to make movies in a city as far from Hollywood (both literally and metaphorically) as Buffalo, it assumes a different meaning.

Location is what distinguishes Prison of the Psychotic Damned from a never-ending slew of low-budget horror films (and with a title like that, what else could it be but a horror movie?). It was filmed almost entirely in the Buffalo Central Terminal, the astonishing Art Deco building built in 1929 that has haunted the East Side since it was closed in 1979.

The plot of Prison moves from the Terminal’s closing to the 1950s and has it do temporary duty as a poorly supervised holding center for overflow patients from a hospital for the criminally insane. (You have to take the invented history of Buffalo with tongue in cheek, like a reference to the “State University of New York at Cheektowaga.”) Those tortured souls, it is said, still haunt the place, leading a team of ghost hunters to spend the night there in an attempt to contact them, with predictably dire results.

Prison is not without its defects, but director David Kahn (who worked for years in various background capacities on movies from Children of the Corn III to The Mask and Titanic) comes through where it counts, with an unsettling atmosphere and some truly shocking sequences. And he makes the most of his setting; the long-vacant Terminal’s decrepitude gives it an eerie magnificence that a studio budget would be hard pressed to match.

Buffalonians will get a chance to see the film as well as contribute to the building’s restoration this Friday, June 23, when Prison of the Psychotic Damned has its premiere screening at the Buffalo Central Terminal. Kann and co-stars Melantha Blackthorne and Demona Bast will be on hand, along with band the Voodoo Dollies, whose songs are featured in the film. Food and refreshments will be available, and the screenings will include trailers from other upcoming films by producers RedScream Films and Buffalo Nickel Productions. Doors open at 6pm, and Prison will be shown at 7 and 9pm. Please note that due to nudity, violence, gore fx and scenes of extreme terror, no one under 21 will be admitted.

My Wife and My Dead Wife

While it’s hard to beat seeing a film on the location where it was made, North Buffalo filmmakers Tosca and Sam Miserendino have the next best thing for their debut fright feature, My Wife and My Dead Wife: North Tonawanda’s majestic Riviera Theater. It will be the debut entry in a summer series of Buffalo-based films to be shown on Thursday nights.

Filmed in a vacant, 19th-century Queen Anne home in East Aurora, My Wife and My Dead Wife is a psychological horror story centering on a couple stuck in a loveless marriage. When they move into the old house, the husband encounters the spirit of a beautiful woman who once lived there—and who may only be a figment of his imagination.

My Wife and My Dead Wife will have its premiere screening on June 29 at 7pm. Preceding the film will be a performance by Jamie Notarthomas, whose songs are featured on the film’s soundtrack. Upcoming films in the series include Canadian Bacon, July 6; The Natural, July 20; Bruce Almighty, July 27; Buffalo 66, Aug. 3; Manna From Heaven, Aug. 10; Marilyn Monroe in Niagara, Aug. 17; and The Falls; Aug. 31. Tickets are available at the Riviera Theater box office at 67 Webster Street in North Tonawanda.

Produced by Squeaky Wheel in collaboration with WNED-TV, the Preservation Coalition and Buffalo Arts Studio, Portraits of Main Street is the culmination of a nine-month project in which 18 students from area high schools were guided to create documentary impressions centered on the culture and history of Buffalo’s Main Street. The result includes such topics and locations as transportation, graffiti, public art, race relations, architecture, Shea’s, Freddie’s Donuts, Amy’s Place, Anchor Bar and the Market Arcade. The premiere of Portraits of Main Street will be held at the Market Arcade Film and Arts Center, 639 Main Street, Tuesday, June 27 at 7pm. It is free and open to the public.