Kenneth Anger’s Scorpio Rising (1963) is a groundbreaking 28-minute experimental film that fuses biker subculture, homoeroticism, occult symbolism, and pop music into a provocative visual collage. Shot in New York, it follows a leather-clad antihero named Scorpio as he prepares for a night of rebellion, intercut with imagery of Jesus, Adolf Hitler, and rebel icons like James Dean and Marlon Brando. Anger’s use of saturated lighting, rapid editing, and a Top 40 soundtrack created a new cinematic language that prefigured the modern music video. Controversial upon release—drawing lawsuits and censorship battles—it’s now hailed as a landmark of underground cinema and was selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry.
