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Arts & Entertainment

What’s Playing? From 'Boogie Nights' to 'The Neverending Story,' Our Weekend Movie Picks Around LA

A colorful dark red, yellow and beige exterior above entrance doors and a marquee showing several movie titles.
The New Beverly Cinema on Monday, Feb. 12, 2024.
(
Julie Leopo
/
LAist
)

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Happy weekend, Angelenos! If you're looking for something to do, why not catch a movie? Check out our weekly recommendations for what's showing around town.

For the goofy romantics

His Girl Friday

The Vista

Saturday, June 1 and Sunday, June 2 @ 10 a.m.

Tickets are $10, more info here.

Synopsis: A screwball comedy from 1940 about reporters, murder and falling back in love, directed by Howard Hawks and starring Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell — what’s not to like here? When newspaper editor Walter Burns (Cary Grant) finds out his ex-wife, star reporter Hildy Johnson (Rosalind Russell) is engaged to another man, he pulls her in for one last story. Fun fact: the whole screwball approach is a subgenre of romantic comedy and started as a way to get risque material past the censorship of the Hays Code. So, with this film, you know you’re in for shenanigans and incredible romantic tension.

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You’ll like this if … You’re a fan of romantic and screwball comedies through the ages like Bringing Up Baby, What’s Up Doc?, or almost anything in Nora Ephron’s filmography.

For L.A.'s seedier side

Boogie Nights

The Academy Museum

Saturday, June 1 @ 7:30 p.m.

Tickets are $10, more info here.

Synopsis: Does anyone make better movies about the Valley than Paul Thomas Anderson? Boogie Nights boasts an incredibly stacked cast (Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds, Julianne Moore, Don Cheadle, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, the list truly goes on) in the disco-era world of the Hollywood-adjacent porn industry. It’s a nuanced, hilarious and sometimes heart-breaking story about trying to make it in L.A.

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You’ll like this if … You loved Licorice Pizza’s complex relationships and L.A. scenery, or if Babylon got you looking for more episodic and wild movies about making movies.

For those celebrating Marilyn Monroe’s birthday

The Seven Year Itch

The Orpheum Theatre

Saturday, June 1 @ 8 p.m.

Tickets are $25, more info here.

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Synopsis: Richard Sherman (Tom Ewell) stays in his New York apartment for the summer while his wife and kids go on vacation. During the sweltering season, a blonde bombshell (Marilyn Monroe, in an iconic performance that cemented her star status) moves in upstairs, and Richard gets the “seven year itch.” This screening is part of the L.A. Conservancy’s Last Remaining Seats screening series, playing films in historic movie theaters in DTLA.

You’ll like this if … You loved Marilyn Monroe in films Gentlemen Prefer Blondes or Some Like it Hot.

For the daydreamers

The Neverending Story

The New Beverly Cinema

Sunday, June 2 @ 2 p.m.

Tickets are $10, more info here.

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Synopsis: When lonely 10-year-old Bastian Bux is told he must stop daydreaming and grow up, he finds a book called The Neverending Story. Hiding away to read it, Bastian discovers a fantasy world on the brink of destruction. Reality and fiction start blending together — will the power of imagination (and a fantastic dragon puppet) win out in the end?

You’ll like this if … Classic '80s and '90s movies about imagination and fantasy like Labyrinth and The Pagemaster shaped your childhood.

For those living life a quarter mile at a time

The Fast and the Furious

Vidiots

Sunday, June 2 @ 8 p.m.

Tickets are $12, more info here.

Synopsis: Don’t worry, no one goes to space in the first installment of one of the biggest franchises of all time. In this relatively grounded L.A.-based film, Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) is a street racer suspected of organizing a series of big-rig hijackings. Brian O’Connor (Paul Walker) is an undercover cop, who gets in too deep with the crew when he falls for Toretto’s sister (Jordanna Brewster). As the start to the decades-spanning series, it’s a bit of a curio — and as a movie about crime and street racing in L.A., it's absolutely worth seeing.

You’ll like this if …You wish Point Break (1991) was about street racing, or you want to see where the other Fast & Furious films all started.

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