The preeminent dramatist of China’s rapid 21st-century growth and social transformation, Jia Zhangke has taken his boldest approach to narrative yet with his marvelous Caught by the Tides.

The film mostly adheres to the perspective of Qiaoqiao (Jia’s immortal muse Zhao Tao) as she wanders an increasingly unrecognizable country in search of long-lost lover Bin (Li Zhubin), who left their home city of Datong seeking new financial prospects. The always captivating Zhao carries the film with her delicate expressiveness, while Jia constantly evokes cinema’s ability to capture the passage of time and the persistence of change: of people, landscapes, cities, politics, ideas.

Assembled from footage shot over a span of 23 years—a beguiling mix of fiction and documentary, featuring a cascade of images taken from previous movies, unused scenes, and newly shot dramatic sequences—Caught by the Tides is a free-flowing work of unspoken longing, carried along more by music than dialogue as it looms around the edges of a poignant love story.

Our A24orror series comes to a very spooky conclusion with Bring Her Back, a disturbing descent into psychological dread from directors Danny Philippou and Michael Philippou (Talk To Me).

Bring Her Back tells the story of a brother and sister that uncover a terrifying ritual at the secluded home of their new foster mother. With another great performance from Sally Hawkins and a number of horrifying sequences, it’ll have you thinking long after you’ve left the theater.

Brace yourself for a haunting you won’t forget.

For the first time in The Frida Cinema’s history, we are finally playing Juno! 

Juno MacGuff (Elliot Page), a smart, sarcastic 16-year-old in the Minneapolis suburbs, finds herself unexpectedly pregnant after a casual hookup with her shy best friend, Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera). Opting against abortion but not ready for motherhood, Juno sets out to find the perfect adoptive parents—a seemingly put-together yuppie couple played by Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman.

Written by Diablo Cody in her Oscar-winning debut, Juno pairs quippy, stylized dialogue with sincere emotional beats, carving out a space in indie film where teenage girls are allowed to be complicated, self-aware, and funny without being reduced to tropes.

Join us as we present some encore screenings of the 1999 queer cult classic But I’m A Cheerleader!

Megan is an all-American girl. A cheerleader. She has a boyfriend. But Megan doesn’t like kissing her boyfriend very much. And she’s pretty touchy with her cheerleader friends. Her conservative parents worry that she must be a lesbian and send her off to “sexual redirection” school, where she must, with other lesbians and gays learn how to be straight.

Bring your friends, wear pink if you dare, and relive (or discover) a certified Frida Cinema Favorite the way it deserves to be experienced: loudly and proudly, in a movie theater!

Join us for a double feature of Gregg Araki’s The Doom Generation (1995) and Nowhere (1997)—a hallucinatory pairing of sex, violence, nihilism, teen alienation, and everything you’d want from a singular 90s queer punk film! These films are equal parts loud, hilarious, and devastating. Buckle up. It’s gonna get weird.

The Doom Generation (1995)

Starring Rose McGowan, James Duval, and Jonathan Schaech, this blood-soaked road movie follows teenage couple Amy Blue and Jordan White as they pick up the magnetic and possibly homicidal drifter Xavier Red. What starts as a sexy, snarky joyride descends into a surreal, ultraviolent spiral of absurdist violence, nihilism, and late-night convenience store hellscapes.

Nowhere (1997)

The final and most flamboyant entry in the Teen Apocalypse trilogy, Nowhere is a tangential day-in-the-life of queer and questioning teens in Los Angeles. Centered on the sweetly dazed Dark Smith (James Duval) and his yearning for love amid sex, drugs, alien abductions, cults, and lizard people, the film explodes into pure sensory overload.

Join us for two screenings of James Wan’s 2004 horror classic Saw, playing this year as part of our Pride Month programming!

Two men wake up to find themselves shackled in a grimy, abandoned bathroom. As they struggle to comprehend their predicament, they discover a disturbing tape left behind by the sadistic mastermind known as Jigsaw. With a chilling voice and cryptic instructions, Jigsaw informs them that they must partake in a gruesome game in order to secure their freedom.

Join us for two screenings of James Wan’s 2004 horror classic Saw, playing this year as part of our Pride Month programming!

Two men wake up to find themselves shackled in a grimy, abandoned bathroom. As they struggle to comprehend their predicament, they discover a disturbing tape left behind by the sadistic mastermind known as Jigsaw. With a chilling voice and cryptic instructions, Jigsaw informs them that they must partake in a gruesome game in order to secure their freedom.

Saw may not wave a rainbow flag, but in the best tradition of horror, it’s deeply, delightfully queer. From its sadomasochistic aesthetics to its fixation on secrets, guilt, and transformation, Saw taps into queer-coded themes of repression and revelation. The entire franchise revolves around hidden lives, bodies under pressure, and moral tests imposed by a voyeuristic authority. Watch it again and make the choice for yourself!