2025 SPRING CINEMA SERIES
Most films screen Wednesday nights at 7pm* in the Carole L. Ellis Auditorium on the SRJC Petaluma Campus (*exceptions marked below). Guests are invited to attend an optional pre-show program at 6pm. Click here for pricing, directions, and additional information.
February 12: WICKED
Jon Chu, 2024, USA, 160 min.
Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo), a young woman entering Shiz University, shows us it’s not easy being green in the untold origin story of the witches of Oz. When animals are threatened with a ban on speech and possible deportation, Elphaba finds an ally in her college roommate Glinda (Ariana Grande) and the two journey to Emerald City hoping to enlist the Wizard in a mission to restore order and equality throughout the land. Full of spectacle and charm, Wicked adapts the Broadway musical in a truly cinematic way, mixing the nostalgia of the 1939 classic with a new original vision featuring resonant themes for the 21st century. Nominated for ten Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Actress, and Best Supporting Actress. Begins at 6:30pm.
February 19: MY DEAD FRIEND ZOE
Kyle Hausmann-Stokes, 2024, USA, 98 min.
Merit (Sonequa Martin-Green), a U.S. Army Afghanistan veteran, is challenged to look after her aging father (Ed Harris) while struggling with re-entry into civilian life. Faced with a budding romance and haunted by the loss of her best friend Zoe (Natalie Morales), Merit embarks on a tumultuous journey of healing and self discovery. Featuring amazing chemistry from its extraordinary cast, including Morgan Freeman, Kyle Hausmann-Stokes’ assured first feature is an emotional powerhouse told with humor, honesty, and heart. Winner of the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature at the 2024 SXSW Film Festival. Writer/director and Army veteran Kyle Hausmann-Stokes will participate in an onstage conversation at 6pm and answer questions following the 7pm screening.
February 26: EMILIA PÉREZ
Jacques Audiard, 2024, France/Mexico, 132 min.
Jacques Audiard’s audacious genre-defying musical thriller follows four remarkable women in Mexico as they struggle to find happiness under extreme circumstances. Unfolding like a jaw-dropping song-and-dance telenovela, the story is a bizarre melange of love affairs and gangster shootouts. With gorgeous production design and a cadre of impressive female talent including Zoe Saldaña, Selena Gomez, Adriana Paz, and Karla Sofía Gascón, this unexpected Neo-noir original is a dazzling and twisty roller coaster ride not to be missed. Nominated for thirteen Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Screenplay.
March 5: A DIFFERENT MAN
Aaron Schimberg, 2024, USA, 112 min.
Edward (Sebastian Stan), a socially awkward aspiring actor with neurofibromatosis, decides to undergo an experimental treatment to reduce his disfiguring facial condition only to find that his identity is transformed in the process. Risky, surreal, and often unsettling, A Different Man is an exquisitely designed modern fable examining the prejudices that impair healthy relationships with others and hinder our ability to be our authentic self. Endlessly provocative and full of humor, wit, and exceptional performances, this deeply layered film invites multiple viewings. Winner of Best Actor for Sebastian Stan at this year’s Golden Globes.
March 12: GREEN BORDER
Agnieszka Holland, 2023, Poland, 152 min.
Master filmmaker Agnieszka Holland turns her lens to the refugee crisis at the Polish-Belarusian border in her straight-shooting and soul-shattering drama Green Border. Expertly crafted in stunning black and white, the film follows a group of African and Middle Eastern migrants traveling through the swampy forests of Belarus as they attempt to enter the European Union. A poignant and essential clarion call that opens our eyes and touches our heart, the film challenges viewers to reflect on the moral choices ordinary citizens make every day. Awarded seven of the top prizes at the 2023 Venice Film Festival, including Best Film. Begins at 6:30pm.
March 26: BLUE VELVET
David Lynch, 1986, USA, 120 min.
In honor of the recent passing of cinema icon David Lynch, we revisit his groundbreaking critique on the dark underbelly of middle America. When college student Jeffrey (Kyle MacLachlan) is summoned to return home after his father’s stroke, he discovers a severed ear in an abandoned field and quickly realizes that beneath the surface, nothing is as normal as it seems. When he elicits the help of Sandy (Laura Dern), the daughter of the town’s detective, he soon becomes entangled with a group of troubled strangers and is catapulted into an alluring, erotic murder mystery, part dream and part nightmare. Lynch’s strange, hypnotic, and frequently unsettling film, which earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Director, also stars Dean Stockwell, Isabella Rossellini, and Dennis Hopper as the terrifying Frank Booth.
April 2: THE SUBSTANCE
Coralie Fargeat, 2024, UK/France, 141 min.
Faced with increasingly limited opportunities in the entertainment business, fading celebrity Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) turns to the newest black market drug that promises a ‘younger, more beautiful, more perfect’ version of oneself. But, as one might expect, this devil’s bargain proves too good to be true as Sparkle becomes increasingly jealous and incensed by the behavior of her new doppleganger. Featuring the visual flair of Stanley Kubrick and the body horror aesthetic of David Cronenberg, Coraline Fargeat swings for the fences in this bold and daring indictment of our constant and pervasive obsession with beauty and youth. Nominated for five Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, and Best Screenplay. Begins at 6:30pm.
April 9: SPACE COWBOY
Bryce Leavitt and Marah Strauch, 2024, USA, 98 min.
Bryce Leavitt and Marah Strauch’s wildly entertaining documentary chronicles the remarkable high-flying antics of skydiving pioneer and daredevil cinematographer Joe Jennings, Hollywood’s go-to man for gasp-inducing aerial stunts. Featuring decades of iconic moments in film and television, Jennings looks back on a lifetime of triumphs and tragedies as he attempts to pull off his most ambitious stunt yet: driving an open-top automobile with four passengers out of airplane as it freefalls through space. At once intimate and epic, the film combines jaw-dropping visuals with an emotionally layered portrait of an artist, innovator, and world-class adrenaline junkie. Official Selection of the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. Directors Bryce Leavitt and Marah Strauch will participate in an onstage conversation at 6pm and answer questions following the 7pm screening.
April 16: THE PARADISE OF THORNS
Naruebet Kuno, 2024, Thailand, 131 min.
Set in a remote and mountainous Thai village, Thongkam and Sek have created an idyllic life for themselves on a soon-to-be profitable durian orchard. But when tragedy strikes, familial greed and politics threaten everything Thongkam has worked for. Intricately plotted and gorgeously shot, this riveting Thai melodrama full of betrayal and secret revelations surprises us at every turn on the way to its explosive finale. Told with humor and heart, the film is also one of the first examples of queer Thai cinema since country’s recent passage of the first same-sex marriage law in Southeast Asia. Official Selection of the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival.
April 23: A Stop/Start Deconstruction of VERTIGO
Alfred Hitchcock, 1958, USA, 128 min.
When an acrophobic detective (Jimmy Stewart) is asked to trail his friend’s wife and explain her strange behaviors, he quickly begins to fall for her…both literally and figuratively. Set in San Francisco and starring icy Hitchcock blonde Kim Novak, Vertigo is a crowning achievement from one of Hollywood’s most legendary directorial careers. Join acclaimed documentarian and film scholar Alexandre Philippe as he takes us on a deep dive into the 1958 classic with a stop/start deconstruction of the film revealing Hitch’s unique cinematic language and obsessive themes. This special program begins at 6pm and will include new unseen clips from Philippe’s forthcoming documentary feature on actress Kim Novak.
April 30: CHAIN REACTIONS
Alexandre Philippe, 2024, USA, 103 min.
In commemoration of its 50th anniversary, prolific documentarian Alexandre Philippe turns his lens to one of the most powerful, shocking, and resonant films of the 20th century: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. A masterpiece of verite horror, its images and stylings have embedded themselves in the cultural consciousness and forever changed the trajectory of global cinema. Structured as a series of visual essays by Stephen King, Patton Oswalt, Takashi Miike, Karyn Kusama, and Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Philippe explores the film’s profound and lasting influence. Chain Reactions goes to the heart of how a scruffy, no budget independent film wormed its way into our collective nightmare and permanently altered the zeitgeist of 1970s America. Winner of Best Documentary at the 2024 Venice International Film Festival. Director Alexandre Philippe will participate in an onstage conversation at 6pm and answer questions following the 7pm screening.
May 7: PIECE BY PIECE
Morgan Neville, 2024, USA, 93 min.
The series closes with Morgan Neville’s inspired biopic on cultural icon Pharrell Williams. Featuring the voices and music of Jay Z, Gwen Stefani, Busta Rhymes, Justin Timberlake, Kendrick Lamar, Snoop Dogg, and Daft Punk among others, and told through the medium of Lego animation, we follow the trials and tribulations of Williams’ career on his way to becoming a global pop sensation. The result is an endearing, pitch-perfect match of artist and format that takes us on a kaleidoscopic journey through the major cultural hits of the last 50 years.