This is certainly one of the most intriguing Augusts in recent movie-watching history. Granted, a lot of that is due to the fact almost every theater around is still closed because there’s still a pandemic going on outside, but even if you set that aside, there’s a lot of really interesting stuff to watch, be it a massive blockbuster double feature at the drive-in, a fleet-footed Netflix original and HBO Max getting a little pickled, a pair of peanuts new to streaming, and dinosaurs. Whatever you choose from below, there’s a plethora of Things to Watch this weekend!
DRIVE-INS
Cinema Unbound: John Lewis: Good Trouble and Moonlight
Northwest Film Center and Portland Art Museum are transforming Zidell Yards into a drive-in theater (building it from scratch, in fact) dedicated to showing how freeing good film can be by screening classics, new releases, and little-seen gems on as big a screen as they can. Each movie will be preceded by a regional short to help spotlight even more unique and necessary voices in cinema.
99w Drive-In Double Feature: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and The Empire Strikes Back
Drive-ins are probably the only way to get any sort of big-screen action back in your life without, you know, trapping yourself inside a dark box with other people while no vaccine exists and air conditioning is just circulating everyone’s coughs, sneezes, and spittle into as many rooms as possible. Instead, you can pull up in your car, turn up your speakers, and let 99w fill your windshield their latest throwback double-feature, which is going about as big as the ’80s ever got, starting with the most sweetly-manipulative children’s story Steven Spielberg ever made, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and following with what everyone still recognizes as “the best one” of the Star Wars saga, The Empire Strikes Back. The one thing that’s for sure: If you’ve got good speakers in your car, they’re going to be filled with some of the best film music ever composed.