FILM: Beyond the Black Rainbow

“Beyond Science, Beyond Sanity, Beyond Control”

In Panos Cosmatos’ 2010 experimental cult sci-fi-horror film, we witness Dr. Barry Nile, anno 1983, employed by the Arboria Institute, where the link between science and the spiritual is being researched, with the aim of achieving eternal happiness. Elena, a young girl with psychic abilities, is being held captive here, and is being “treated” by Dr. Nile. Throughout the film, Dr. Nile’s psyche and past is slowly unravelled, and we see how horrible things can go when a person’s trust is abused, and the perils of trying to find absolute answers to questions that have none.

Cosmatos made the film as a reaction to the death of his parents, after having wallowed for a while, not doing anything. His father was a Hollywood Action-Movie director, his mother an experimental sculpteur, and Beyond the Black Rainbow draws inspiration from both of these sources. The resulting product is a film drenched in 70s & 80s Hard Sci-Fi nostalgia, that could’ve easily played as a midnight movie in 1979’s USA.

Panos Cosmatos
Canada
2010
DVD
110 min