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Tickets $15. Grace and Jackson move into an old house deep in the country. With ambitions to write The Great American Novel, Grace settles into her new environment, and the couple soon welcome a child. However, with Jackson frequently—and suspiciously—absent, and the pressures of domestic life starting to weigh on her, Grace begins to unravel, leaving a path of destruction in her wake.

Tickets FREE. Join guest programmers Ariella Tai and Tracy Kernell as they present the 2023 short film Quiet As It's Kept, directed by Ja'Tovia Gary, followed by the 1996 feature film Naked Acts, directed by Bridgett M. Davis. Together, these films are two in a legacy of multi-generational and multivalent Black feminist storytelling centered on issues of self-identity, agency and healing for Black women and girls. Each of these films reflects a deeply citational practice, drawing from cinematic and literary traditions to build their own unique contributions. This double feature is a call to action — asking us to actively shift conversations around Black women’s filmmaking from a false premise that the films don’t exist yet to more pointed discussions around preservation, distribution, access and, lastly, to whom work needs to be legible in order to be valued.  Informational zines about the films researched, designed and printed by Ariella and Tracy will be made available to all attendees. 

Tickets $45. Thirty years ago, Waiting to Exhale premiered in theaters and made a cultural impact about love in multiple ways: it discusses the love that Black women give each other and the love that these women seek for themselves. To celebrate womanhood and all of its messiness, humor, heartbreak, and joy, Grand Gesture Books is so excited to offer a movie viewing with sleepover vibes. Movie goers should come in pajamas or casual wear for the ultimate vibe. Each ticket comes with a delectable goodie bag that includes a face mask, shea butter, chocolates, and other treats because everyone deserves to be pampered. Do not worry about coming alone because there is room for everyone. Tonight, you can sit back, relax, and exhale. 

Tickets $15. Celebrate five decades of groundbreaking art and storytelling with Portland legend Rupert Kinnard! In conjunction with his 50-year retrospective at the Northwest Museum of Cartoon Arts, we’re thrilled to present a screening of No Straight Lines: The Rise of Queer Comics. This illuminating documentary traces the history of queer comics and the artists who reshaped representation on the page. Following the screening, Kinnard, creator of the first Black, queer superhero, will be onstage for an audience Q&A moderated by NWMOCA Board Chair Mike Rosen. Rupert Kinnard will sign books after the Q&A. 

Tickets $15. As A Larger Reality: Ursula K. Le Guin comes to a close at Oregon Contemporary, join us for a film that honors the imagination, empathy, and wonder at the heart of Le Guin’s work.

Tickets $15. Join Nationale for a special movie night featuring Peter Hujar's Day. Nationale will be vending Peter Hujar's books and hosting a salon-style discussion after the film. 

Tickets $15. In 1981, Jessie Maple became one of the first African American women to direct an independent film with this raw, unflinching portrait of heroin addiction and recovery. Shot on location in Harlem, Will stars Obaka Adedunyo as the title character, a former All-American basketball star who has fallen from grace because of his dependence on junk. Soon after Will promises his wife, Jean (Loretta Devine, in her screen debut), that he’ll go straight, he becomes a father figure to Little Brother (Robert Dean), a street-tough teen who appears to be following in Will’s footsteps. Restored from the 16mm camera negative and magnetic sound elements by the Black Film Center & Archive (BFCA), the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Time-Based Media Archives and Conservation staff, and the Center for African American Media Arts. 

Tickets $15. Presented by local writer, filmmaker, and musician Kalimah Abioto, Twice as Nice is the second film by Jessie Maple, a pioneering independent African American filmmaker whose first film Will (1981) was the first feature-length independent film produced by an African American woman. Maple also made history as the first black woman admitted to New York’s camera operators union. Maple was also a journalist and ran her own independent theater 20 West out of her brownstone in Harlem. Tonight's film Twice as Nice (1989) is Maple's second feature film which explores the bond between twin college basketball players.

Tickets $15. A feature film in the form of a triptych. The three stories all concern the relationships between adult children, their somewhat distant parent (or parents), and each other.