Begotten is not an easy watch, and that's precisely the point. E. Elias Merhige's 1990 film strips away dialogue, color, and conventional narrative to leave something closer to a fever dream than a movie—grainy, high-contrast black and white images that seem to writhe and decay on screen, telling a mythic story of creation and destruction through pure visual sensation. It's the kind of film that's been called one of the most disturbing ever made, not through gore or jump scares, but through its relentless, hypnotic strangeness.

Screening at The Beverly Theater, an intimate space built for this kind of cinematic experience, Begotten finds a fitting home. The venue's excellent acoustics and close quarters mean there's nowhere to hide from the film's unsettling rhythms and textures—you'll feel every flicker of grain and every unnatural movement in a way that home viewing just can't replicate. This is a film best experienced as a group, sitting in the dark with strangers who are all wondering what exactly they just witnessed.

Fans of experimental horror, underground cinema, or anyone curious about the outer edges of what film can do will find this a rare chance to see a genuinely singular piece of work on the big screen, in the kind of setting that respects its strangeness rather than trying to smooth it over.