Directed by Toshio Matsumoto,
 starring Pîtâ, Osamu Ogasawara & Toyosaburo Uchiyama
, Japan 1969, 35mm, b/w, 107 min

A carnivalesque melding of documentary verité and avant-garde psychedelia, offers a shocking and ecstatic journey through the nocturnal underworld of Tokyo’s Shinjuku neighborhood, following the strange misadventures of a rebellious drag queen fending off his/her rivals. Often cited as a major inspiration for Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, Matsumoto’s breakthrough film is a visually audacious and lyrically abstract testament to the vertiginous daring of the postwar Japanese avant-garde art and film scenes. Matsumoto orchestrates a series of quite astonishing visual set pieces, including actual performances by the influential Fluxus-inspired street theater groups, the Zero Jigen and Genpei Akasegawa.

Kaleidotropes is a series of strange and unearthly delights that is brought to you by Jake Mikler of Little Red Booking and Squeaky Wheel Film & Media Arts Center.