If you'd been told just last year that drive-in movies would enjoy a resurgence not seen since the 1970s, you'd probably be like "So... what, did a completely manageable pandemic go raging out of control thanks to our idiot president being completely useless, making drive-ins basically the only way to enjoy a big-screen experience?" Hey, you know what? You're pretty prescient and on-the-ball! You're also probably the kind of person who appreciates not just the wide array of drive-in options available this weekend, but would love to settle down in front of your screen of choice and check out a special screening of Return of the Living Dead, or catch the latest episode of Lovecraft Country, or take a relaxing nostalgia bath with High Score. So read on for all the best Things to Watch in Portland this weekend!

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Jump to: Drive-Ins | Supporting Local Theaters | Streaming This Weekend

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DRIVE-INS

99w Drive-In Double Feature: Grease & Dirty Dancing Past Event Like List
The hand-jive was just too strong last weekend, so the fine folks in Newberg have decided to hold last week's double feature over for this week, too. It's a second chance to cater to a very specific (and apparently lucrative) audience: People who really like grown adults playing naughty teenagers doing a lot of singing and dancing and (gasps, looks around, leans in close) the sex. First up: Grease, now deemed a family classic, but chock-full of terrible "life-lessons" for anyone watching, followed by Dirty Dancing, which was considered empty trash upon release but is actually pretty thoughtful about its storytelling. Plus, shirtless, glistening Swayze! Jerry Orbach! Jennifer Grey carrying a watermelon! Wayne Knight. So good.

Cinema Unbound: Creature from the Black Lagoon, Labyrinth, Knives & Skin Past Event Like List
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.

PDX Drive-In Movie Spectacular: Raising Arizona, Girlfight, Destroy All Monsters Past Event Like List
Now more than ever, this annual transformation of the Expo Center into a deluxe drive-in experience is absolutely needed, and the Expo Center, with the help of Hollywood Theatre, is delivering: Contactless concessions, strong safety precautions, and a lineup of films that includes an all-time bizarre comedy classic from the Coen Bros. (Raising Arizona), the hard-hitting drama that made Michelle Rodriguez a star (Girlfight), and Wrestlemania for rubber-suited monsters (Destroy All Monsters).

Cinema Under the Stars: Hidden Figures Past Event Like List
For those seeking one of the best feel-good film experiences of the last five years, consider driving out to the Hangar at Oaks Park and enjoying this screening of the "shoulda won way more Oscars" historical drama Hidden Figures, telling the story of how astronauts really got to the moon. DJ Agent Meow is once again running the sound, and proceeds from the drive-in screening help benefit the Rose City Rollers.

Drive-In Saturday: The Goonies Past Event Like List
The Bijou Theatre, Lincoln City Cultural Center, and the City of Lincoln City are bringing movies back to the big screen. Specifically, the big screen on the outside of the Lincoln City Cultural Center, where they'll be showing some of Hollywood's biggest crowd-pleasers all August long. You gotta believe an Oregon Coast screening of Astoria's best-known pop-cultural export, The Goonies, is going to be one hell of a crowd-pleaser, too.

SUPPORTING LOCAL THEATERS

Creem: America's Only Rock 'n' Roll Magazine
Past Event Like List There was once a time when magazines were healthy and thriving, and the words on their glossy pages could shift culture and make stars out of many a stringy, floppy-haired, fleet-fingered would-be guitar-god. Creem was one of the most influential of such magazines, and this documentary charts the mag's beginnings as an underground zine, basically, to becoming a publishing powerhouse and a must-read thanks to people like publisher Barry Kramer and its most famous columnist, Lester Bangs.
Hollywood Theatre

Return of the Living Dead Past Event Like List
MoPOP's online screening party continues with the zombie cult classic Return of the Living Dead, the first zombie film to give the undead the gift of speech, and a thirst for brains. This screening comes with live commentary from famous tattoo artist Nikko Hurtado, who once tattooed the Tarman, no lie! (That's an absolute lie.)
Museum of Pop Culture (Seattle)

H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival Past Event Like List
What with HBO finding some standout success via their latest series, Lovecraft Country, now is probably the perfect time to finally dive into what this Lovecraft guy was all about (when he wasn't being an irredeemably racist piece of shit, that is) via this online film festival paying tribute to 130 years of Lovecraft's influence on cosmic horror and sci-fi fiction. Featuring new short films from inventive storytellers, classic shorts from the fest's history, and live Q&A sessions with directors and historians.
Hollywood Theatre

Jazz on a Summer's Day Past Event Like List
Filmed on a balmy night in Fort Adams State Park at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, this 4K-restored classic is believed to be one the first concert films ever recorded (!). It boasts Louis Armstrong, Thelonius Monk, Gerry Mulligan, Anita O'Day, Chuck Berry, Dinah Washington, and other legends among its lineup, closing with Mahalia Jackson's rendition of "The Lord's Prayer" at midnight.
Hollywood Theatre and Clinton Street Theater

John Lewis: Good Trouble Past Event Like List
The late civil rights activist and Georgia congressman John Lewis fought for voting rights, gun control, healthcare reform, and immigration over the course of his long career. Using archival footage and interviews from his late years, Dawn Porter's documentary Good Trouble explores Lewis's childhood, his 1957 meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr., and his lasting legacy on social justice movements of the present. A portion of proceeds will be donated to Don't Shoot Portland.
Hollywood Theatre

Lucky Grandma Past Event Like List
In this crime caper set in New York's Chinatown, a recently widowed 80-year-old woman follows a fortune teller's advice and heads to the nearest casino to win some big bucks. But things don't go so great, as they often don't at casinos. When two gambling gangsters show up at her door and start demanding money, she and her newly acquired bodyguard do what must be done: kick ass for the duration of the film.
Clinton Street Theater

Son of the White Mare Past Event Like List
If you're feeling like now is a good time to really test your grip on your senses, maybe it's time to eat the strongest edibles you've got, or partake of the smokey treats in your pouch that pack the hardest punch, settle into your couch, and submit yourself to the psychedelic wonderment of Hungarian animator Marcell Jankovic's Son of the White Mare, which is, uhm... here: "Son of the White Mare is a swirling, color-mad maelstrom of mythic monsters and Scythian heroes, part-Nibelungenlied, part-Yellow Submarine, lit by jagged bolts of lightning and drenched in rivers of blue, red, gold and green." See you on the other side, fellow traveler.
Hollywood Theatre

You Never Had It: An Evening with Bukowski Past Event Like List
A special screening of this short documentary that does exactly what it says it does: Puts you in Charles Bukowski's living room for a night as the famously grumpy poet and writer smokes about five million cigarettes, drinks, and opines on whatever the hell crosses his frontal lobe at the time.
Clinton Street Theater

STREAMING THIS WEEKEND

John Was Trying to Contact Aliens Like List
Netflix is known for a lot of things: buzz-worthy series, blockbuster action, paradigm-upending business moves that laid waste to conventional Hollywood thinking, that sort of thing. But lately they're also being known for their forays into short documentary, and their latest, John Was Trying to Contact Aliens, tells the oddly-touching, poignant story of a man who spent 30 years basically DJing ambient sets for broadcast into outer space.
Netflix

Love in the Time of Corona Like List
Oh god, this is already happening, huh? Well, might as well lean into it. It's not like this is going anywhere, hahahaha fuck. This Freeform miniseries focuses on the lives of people who are still out there trying to make connections and find love (or just get laid) while a runaway pandemic throws a big wet (and lethal - thanks Trump, you corrupt fucking shitbag) blanket over the proceedings. Leslie Odom Jr. (Aaron Burr in Hamilton) stars, which is enough to check out at least one episode, at least. Sorta like how Zoe Kravitz was enough to check out the first episode of High Fidelity. Speaking of which...
Hulu

High Fidelity Like List
It's fucking ridiculous that Hulu canceled this show after one season, which wound up being the best possible version of Nick Hornby's story about an emotionally-stunted, irresponsible, and terminally immature record store owner slowly figuring out how to be a three-dimensional person. If you didn't see it when it premiered back in February (and apparently enough of you didn't, because it's canceled now) give it a shot, and be rewarded with a flawed-but-enthralling television gem.
Hulu

Lovecraft Country Like List
Meanwhile over at HBO, where they don't drown their standout series in the bathtub, you can catch the second episode of Misha Green's new show, set in the mid-century South where unspeakable horrors and cosmic terrors lurk and plot beneath the surface; but monsters aren't really that scary when the surface they lurk beneath is crawling with the sort of nihilistic white supremacy that was (and still is) everyday life in America. These folks are fighting the most monstrous aspects of humanity every day. Cthulhu can take a number and get in line.
HBO Max

Queen & Slim Like List
Queen & Slim was maybe the best—and almost certainly the Blackest—film of 2019, and is perhaps most poignant for its gorgeous, complex, and multifaceted portrayal of the Black experience, where sparks of joy and love exist alongside pain, struggle, and oppression. One of the reasons director Melina Matsoukas and screenwriter Lena Waithe's made the film with Universal Pictures was their guarantee that Matsoukas and Waithe would have say over the final cut—a choice Waithe says was to ensure the film wasn’t influenced whatsoever by the white gaze. They only did one test screening, with an all-Black audience; the result is a new American romance/drama written in the Black American language, told via a fully Black lens, and including a diverse array of characters who show that Black people are not a monolith.
HBO Max

High Score Like List
This documentary mini-series about the history of gaming is maybe not as educational as it probably could be, but the nostalgia comes fast and furious in every episode, and only the staunchest of sourpuss nerds could complain in the face of all these warm and fuzzy wood-paneled and plasticene memories getting their due, from King's Quest to Doom and all the best, most fondly remembered (and some less-remembered) steps, jumps, and bonks along the way.
Netflix

The Vow Like List
HBO viewers itching for more of that true crime goodness they OD'd on with I'll Be Gone in the Dark, looks like you won't have to wait long for your next hit. The first episode of this new documentary series from directors Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer stares hard at the sordid and thoroughly disturbing story of NXIVM, a "self-improvement" cult led by Keith Raniere, whose members ended up being charged with racketeering and sex-trafficking.
HBO Max