MINI BIKE WINTER PICKS

Got cabin fever? Lucky for you, it's Mini Bike Winter week! There's a pile of events all over town, each one of them guaranteed to get your blood pumping and your adrenaline rushing. Are you ready? Pay attention: On Friday night, bring a 16" bike—and a light—and meet at the Washington Park MAX stop's lower level for a 6:30 pm Steeplechase Race (!) full of urban obstacles. After the race, hit the Richland for a kickass party with three levels of punk bands, including Show Me the Pink, Scream Club, Pinchers of Peril, Mustaphamond—and the Sprockettes punk rock dance-bike troupe.

If you've still got energy on Sunday, head to the esplanade at SE Taylor for the Mini Bike Olympics! Spare bikes will be available, so you can compete in every event—from mini bike jousting and a slow race, to a bike toss and something ominously dubbed "whiplash."

There are more Mini Bike Winter events—some so top secret, we can't even write about 'em—over at ZooBomb's website, zoobomb.net. AJ

Steeplechase Race, Fri Feb 17, 6:30 pm, Washington Park MAX Station, SW Knights at Oregon Zoo; Punk Show at Richland, Fri Feb 17, 9 pm, 1232 SW Salmon; Mini Bike Olympics, Sun Feb 19, 2-5 pm, under I-5 at SE Taylor; zoobomb.net

WORLD CINEMA

If watching movies is your thing—which, you might as well face it, you big fucking movie nerd, of course it is—then it's well worth the effort to pick out a few promising films from the nebulous blur that is the Portland International Film Festival. This week has Iron Island, an allegorical take on Iranian government and society, as told via a veritable town living onboard an abandoned oil tanker in the Persian Gulf. Or The Hidden Blade, Yôji Yamada's latest meditative samurai film, which combines subtly drawn characters with universal themes of love, honor, and responsibility. If you're in the mood for something lighter, there's the shamelessly feel good Kinky Boots, starring the always-excellent Chiwetel Ejiofor as a drag queen who saves a small British shoe company—or, for fun of a more daring sort, Chan-Wook Park follows up his killer Oldboy with his latest promising revenge flick, Sympathy for Lady Vengeance. To wrap things up, Jonathan Demme's concert film Neil Young: Heart of Gold captures one of Young's performances in Nashville. EH

Fri-Thurs, Guild (829 SW Taylor), Whitsell Auditorium (1219 SW Park), Broadway Metro (1000 SW Broadway), $9 a film. For a look at PIFF's other films and a complete schedule, see Film Shorts on pg. 44 and Movie Times on pg. 49.