When one thinks of B-movie icon Roger Corman's disciples, big names spring to mind: Coppola and Scorsese come first, followed by genre directors like Jack Hill. One name that's not so immediate is Monte Hellman, but for cinéastes, it's nearly as important. Hellman's films are often concerned with obsession, ambiguity, and genre in a manner that manages to be simultaneously intriguing, fairly abstract and avant-garde.

Tonight, the Alamo Ritz welcomes the 76-year-old Hellman for a triple feature celebration of his work in three very different genres. The first film, 1967's The Shooting, features a young Jack Nicholson alongside cult favorite Warren Oates in a film that never gives the viewer much exposition but slowly draws one into an intense manhunt that's clouded by mystery and morality.

The middle feature, Two Lane Blacktop, is often called Hellman's best work. A car movie starring a young James Taylor and Beach Boy Dennis Wilson, the film follows two racers as they idly move from town to town challenging others to races for cash. The pair find their match in a character again played by Warren Oates, and the film transforms into an atmosphere the Time Out Film Guide deems "self-enclosed, self-absorbed, and self-destructive...it's absolutely riveting." Those who only know Wilson from this film (or who discover him here) would be well served to pick up the recent remaster of his classic Pacific Ocean Blue, another reminder that he was much more than a friend to Charles Manson and the token "hard-partying" Beach Boy.

After two gems, the triple feature gets a little wonky to fit with the Alamo's long-running "Weird Wednesdays" series. Hellman's last 70's work was the slasher flick Silent Night, Deadly Night 3: Better Watch Out!, and the direct-to-video sequel will get a midnight movie airing here to round out the night. Having never seen this film, we can't tell you what to expect, but the Alamo promises a "particularly pathological foray into Santanic savagery starring terror icon Bill Moseley." So let that sentence be your guide.

As always, we remain awed by Tim League's ability to grab everyone from Hellman to Tarantino to Seth Rogen to Chuck Norris for these special one-off screenings, and can't encourage you enough to support and attend these unique events. So go and tune up your GTO for tonight.