A seminal cult classic and a musical far ahead of its time, The Rocky Horror Picture Show celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Jim Sharman's legendary film transformed the movie theater into a participatory ritual space, inspiring generations of artists with its sharp social satire and boundary-pushing spirit.
To honor its half-century legacy, the 21st Jecheon International Music & Film Festival presents a special tribute through the Music Horror Picture Show section, featuring six films. Five of these are musicals infused with horror, fantasy, and cult sensibilities. The lineup includes: Sono Sion’s Tokyo Tribe, a surreal and electrifying urban rap battle musical; Jeon Kyesoo's Midnight Ballad for Ghost Theater, a rare example of a Korean musical imbued with eerie aesthetics; Tim Burton's Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, his signature take on a Victorian urban legend; Chainsaws Were Singing, by Estonian director Sander Maran, a gleefully bloody B-movie romp featuring a chainsaw killer; and Bertrand Dezoteux's animated feature Harmony, an even more extreme expansion of his bizarre short about Jesus's strange planetary adventure. These works continue The Rocky Horror Picture Show’s legacy by unleashing grotesque imagination and subverting traditional norms. The sixth film, Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror, is Linus O'Brien's heartfelt ode to his father Richard O'Brien—writer, composer, and actor of the original—and to the film itself as a timeless icon of freedom, rebellion, and liberation.