TODAY · 7:00pm
The Incomer
Boedecker Theater · $7–$14
TODAY · 4:30pm
Black Zombie
Thursday, October 29 at Boedecker Theater, Boulder
About this event
TICKETS Oct 28-Nov 1 Black Zombie digs beneath the blood-soaked spectacle of modern horror to uncover the zombie’s buried and unsettling origins. Long before it became associated with flesh-eating ghouls, the zombie was a living metaphor for slavery: not a monster, but the ultimate victim of colonial power. A symbol of stolen agency was recast as an object of fear, while Black spiritual traditions were distorted, sensationalized, and erased. Director Maya Annik Bedward traces the evolution of the zombie from colonial Haiti to contemporary Hollywood, reconsidering iconic films like White Zombie, Night of the Living Dead, and The Serpent and the Rainbow alongside archival footage, vérité scenes, and interviews with cultural historians, artists, and genre legends including Yves-Grégory Francois, Mambo Labelle Déesse, Slash, Tom Savini, and Zandashé Brown. Part cultural reckoning, part horror remix, Black Zombie exposes how a figure born from enslavement, spiritual belief, and resistance was transformed into one of pop culture’s most profitable monsters. (Maya Annik Bedward, 2026, Canada, 1:30, NR)
Who's playing
Maya Annik Bedward is a Toronto-based filmmaker. The film premiered at SXSW and went on to Hot Docs in Toronto. She talks with cultural historians, artists and genre figures, including Yves-Grégory Francois, Mambo Labelle Déesse, Slash, Tom Savini and Zandashé Brown. Kino Lorber handles U.S. distribution.
What to expect
A documentary of about 90 minutes that mixes archival footage, vérité scenes and interviews. It revisits White Zombie, Night of the Living Dead and The Serpent and the Rainbow. The film treats the zombie as a figure of enslavement and resistance, and asks how it became a profitable movie monster. The tone is part cultural history, part horror remix.
Why go
The film suits horror fans who want the history behind the genre's best-known monster. The Boedecker is Boulder's only year-round arthouse cinema, with plush rocking chairs and a concession counter that serves beer, wine and popcorn. The small room suits a film that invites conversation afterward.
Where
Boedecker Theater · Walnut Street · Boulder CODirections
