Our Technicolor Summer series slows down for a sun-drenched romantic escape with Summertime—a bittersweet story set against the breathtaking backdrop of Venice.
Katharine Hepburn stars as Jane Hudson, a middle-aged American schoolteacher fulfilling a lifelong dream of visiting Italy. Independent, curious, and slightly adrift, Jane arrives in Venice with her camera and sensible shoes, eager to soak in the beauty but wholly unprepared for what she finds: a chance at unexpected romance with Renato (Rossano Brazzi), a charming Italian antiques dealer.
Directed with warmth and restraint by David Lean, Summertime achingly romantic a perfect midsummer reverie in vivid, glowing color.
In the early 1930s, the 3-strip Technicolor process was introduced to audiences, inviting them to experience a world dripping with vibrant saturation for the very first time. The Technicolor Summer series ranges from familiar classics to rarely-screened gems all Summer long!
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Our Technicolor Summer takes a darker turn with the lush and haunting Leave Her to Heaven—a psychological thriller cloaked in sun-drenched, beautiful colors.
When novelist Richard Harland (Cornel Wilde) meets the striking and enigmatic Ellen Berent (Gene Tierney), it seems like a whirlwind romance straight out of a dream. But their fairy-tale love story quickly curdles into obsession as Ellen’s possessiveness spirals into something far more dangerous. She doesn’t want to share Richard’s affection with anyone—not his family, not his work, not even his past.
A noir dressed in Technicolor’s finest, Leave Her to Heaven is a masterclass in contrasts: light and shadow. It’s a chilling reminder that darkness can lurk even in the brightest places—and a true gem of Hollywood’s golden era.
In the early 1930s, the 3-strip Technicolor process was introduced to audiences, inviting them to experience a world dripping with vibrant saturation for the very first time. The Technicolor Summer series ranges from familiar classics to rarely-screened gems all Summer long!
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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.
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Pink Narcissus closes out our Pride Month programming with a special one night only presentation. A landmark of queer underground cinema—it’s an erotic, dreamlike fantasia shot entirely within the confines of a New York apartment over the course of seven years.
Originally released anonymously, the film became a cult object of fascination, long believed to have been made by Andy Warhol or one of his Factory acolytes. It wasn’t until decades later that James Bidgood—a former fashion photographer and drag performer—was revealed as the true auteur behind the film.
Today, Pink Narcissus is rightly celebrated as a foundational work of queer cinema and a forerunner to later visual artists and filmmakers—from Pierre et Gilles to Derek Jarman to Todd Haynes. It is a reminder that even in the most constrained circumstances, beauty and radical vision can flourish.
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Ridley Scott’s girl trip Thelma & Louise winds down our Pride Month programming with a brand new 4K restoration!
The story follows Thelma (Geena Davis), a timid housewife, and Louise (Susan Sarandon), a no-nonsense waitress, as they embark on what starts as a weekend getaway and turns into a flight from the law. After Louise kills a man who attempts to rape Thelma, the two hit the road, realizing that the justice system is unlikely to see their side. Their journey becomes one of personal awakening, radical defiance, and ultimately, tragic liberation.
Thelma & Louise is more than a road movie—it’s a feminist landmark, a genre-defying tale of friendship, freedom, and fury that still resonates over three decades later.
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Has it really been thirty years since To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything! Julie Newmar came out? Yes. Are we screening it two times for absolutely no charge on the weekend of Santa Ana’s Pride celebrations? Also yes!
Manhattan drag queens Vida Boheme and Noxeema Jackson impress regional judges in competition, securing berths in the Nationals in Los Angeles. When the two meet pathetic drag novice Chi-Chi Rodriguez — one of the losers that evening — the charmed Vida and Noxeema agree to take the hopeless youngster under their joined wing. Soon the three set off on a madcap road trip across America and struggle to make it to Los Angeles in time.
Join us for this bold, campy, and surprisingly tender film that helped bring drag culture—and a message of acceptance—to the mainstream in the mid-1990s.
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It’s not Santa Ana Pride weekend at The Frida without a screening or two of Hedwig And The Angry Inch! And this year, the showings are completely free!
Raised a boy in East Berlin, Hedwig undergoes a personal transformation in order to emigrate to the U.S., where she reinvents herself as an ‘internationally ignored’ but divinely talented rock diva, inhabiting a ‘beautiful gender of one’.
At a time when few films dared to center queer and trans experiences with this much raw honesty and visual style, Hedwig and the Angry Inch carved out a space that felt radical and necessary.
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Join us for some free screenings of The Adventures Of Priscilla, Queen Of The Desert as we celebrate Santa Ana’s official Pride weekend!
Two drag queens and a transgender woman contract to perform a drag show at a resort in Alice Springs, a town in the remote Australian desert. As they head west from Sydney aboard their lavender bus, Priscilla, the three friends come to the forefront of a comedy of errors, encountering a number of strange characters, as well as incidents of homophobia, whilst widening comfort zones and exploring new horizons.
Released at a time when positive queer representation in film was still rare, Priscilla broke ground simply by putting LGBTQ+ characters front and center—and letting them shine.
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Our Page To Screen series for June is Denis Villeneuve’s 2016 masterwork Arrival! Adapted from Ted Chiang’s celebrated 1998 novella Story of Your Life, the film retains the cerebral complexity of its source while transforming it into a moving cinematic experience.
The story follows Dr. Louise Banks (played by Amy Adams), a linguist enlisted to communicate with mysterious alien visitors whose ships have appeared around the globe. As she works to decode the heptapods’ intricate written language, she begins to experience time in a radically new way—past, present, and future folding into one.
Emotional and visually stunning the way only a filmmaker like Villeneuve can deliver, Arrival has quickly become a Science Fiction classic.
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Frida Cinema Film Club members are invited to a treat for the senses as we present Krzysztof Kieślowski’s radical exploration of fate, Blind Chance!
The story revolves around Witek, a young medical student disillusioned after the death of his father. At a train station, he runs to catch a train—and in a sudden narrative split, the film shows three divergent versions of Witek’s life, each depending on whether he catches the train, misses it, or is stopped by a guard.
Shot in 1981 but shelved by censors until 1987, the film resonates as both a deeply personal reflection and a subtle political critique.
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