Back to School Clothing Swap
Monday 28, Windsor Park Branch Library
The only good part about going back to school is getting a fresh new wardrobe, but fresh doesn’t have to mean new. Before you (or the kids) drop dollars on SHEIN, take part in a good old-fashioned swap meet to score some items that are new to you, saving money and the environment at the same time. Clean, gently used items for all ages – clothes, backpacks, and accessories – are welcome. The meetup runs from 5-7pm. – Carys Anderson
Trans & Intersex Community Sing
Monday 28, Ground Floor Theatre
Sing out with friends, family, and maybe even your foes (we’re calling a truce). Choir director AV Avillarreal leads trans arts org Gender Unbound’s second annual community sing, where everyone under the transgender umbrella is welcome to join. Whether you’re a pro belter or have only ever warbled out Kim Petras in your car, GU promises a no-judgment zone with no commitments beyond trying your best. – James Scott
Hard Ticket to Hawaii
Monday 28, Hyperreal Film Club
From the illustrious Andy Sidaris, creator of the Triple-B series – bullets, bombs, and babes – comes a wild story of a beachy drug bust that borrows an aesthetic from Miami Vice and its handsome action star from soap opera The Bold and the Beautiful. Ronn Moss played Ridge Forrester on the soap for 25 years starting in 1987, the same year this low-budget beaut came out. But did fashion magnate Ridge ever take out a himbo with a razor Frisbee like Rowdy Abilene? That scene alone might be the pinnacle of his entire career; see it for yourself here. – Kat McNevins
TPA Trivia Night
Monday 28, Barrel O’ Fun
Texas Performing Arts swaps the big stage for Drafthouse Mueller’s bar boards at this live trivia night. Theatre geeks and normies alike can team up in groups of up to six members for this multi-round quiz that’s alllll about arts & entertainment. Get into the top three trivia teams and you’ll win fabo prizes, including tickets to upcoming TPA shows as well as Alamo artifacts and etc. – James Scott
Just for Teens: Aura Photography
Tuesday 29, Terrazas Branch Library
I won’t pretend to understand how an aura is photographed – and since I’m over 17, I’ll never know. That’s okay, because someday I’ll be amazed by the future aura photographers initiated at the library. Teens, take it from me, learning to capture and interpret an aura could lead to lucrative career opportunities at hippie markets and L.A. weddings and practically guarantees an impressive Instagram feed, which, hey, is lucrative in and of itself these days. Maybe you’ll even find some interesting insights into your personality and your place in the world in those hazy colors glowing around you. – Caroline Drew
Fantasia 2000
Tuesday 29, KMFA
There are anthology films, and then there is Fantasia, Walt Disney’s animated night at the concert hall. Disney’s dream – one of many – was to change it, let it evolve, add new segments and remove old ones, to make it a repertory piece that lived and swirled. That dream never came to life until 1999, when his nephew, Roy Disney Jr., and studio head Michael Eisner added a whole new array of shorts set to classical music, from the sacred to the hilarious. And don’t worry: Mickey Mouse is still there, as the new film retained the immortal sequence of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” just like Walt would have wanted. – Richard Whittaker
The Swimmer
Tuesday 29, Hyperreal Film Club
Based on a John Cheever short story, this 1968 Burt Lancaster vehicle is a shockingly ahead-of-its-time dream sequence exposing the disaffection of suburbia. Wealthy ad-man Ned pilots a proto-Swimply app odyssey, deciding to swim across backyard pools as a means of getting back home from a friend’s house. Along the way, visions of his faded youth as a WASPy athletic womanizer appear as the inhabitants of each house confront Ned with evidence of his own emptiness and malaise. It might look like a sunny, chlorinated summer break, but it feels like getting out of the pool to find the weather’s gone chilly. – Lina Fisher
A Woman Under the Influence
Tuesday 29 & Saturday 2, AFS Cinema
John Cassavetes cast his wife Gena Rowlands in 10 of his films, but this harrowing 1974 drama remains a high point of both artists’ storied careers. Alongside Cassavetes’ friend Peter Falk, the late, great actor portrays a Los Angeles housewife struggling – with her brain, with her husband, with motherhood – with full-bodied commitment. She is fragile, terrifying, and sympathetic in her interactions with Falk, who loves, abuses, understands, and misunderstands her all at once. AFS screens the picture as part of its Essential Cinema: Women of the Seventies series, and rightfully so: A Woman Under the Influence leaves you with a pit in your stomach over 50 years later. – Carys Anderson
Jennifer’s Body
Tuesday 29, Package Austin
In 2009, audiences weren’t ready for Megan Fox horking down raw beef and killing boys, but 2025 Austin queers sure as heck are. Score a backyard seat at this South First bastion of gay gear, and you’ll be slingshotted back to the Aughts by the outfits, soundtrack, and 9/11 references detailed in the Karyn Kusama classic. Be aware that Package’s Sinema series is BYOB, but they do offer popcorn and pickles in the way of snacks. – James Scott
Mars Attacks
Tuesday 29, Paramount Theatre
As a child, I was frightened by this film so badly that when my dad imitated the villainous Martians’ gurgle, my blood would freeze. What can I say? Director Tim Burton’s ill-fated first dance with CGI was convincingly creepy, unlike his later attempts. Adapted from the iconic Topps trading card series, this cynical sci-fi horror comedy pits spineless neo-liberalism against alien aggression – all with the kitchy Fifties style Burton oozed throughout his Nineties era. Come for Sarah Jessica Parker’s head on a Chihuahua’s body; stay for Danny DeVito as the indelible Rude Gambler. – James Scott
Austin Bat Cave Journaling Workshop for Teens
Wednesday 30, Windsor Park Branch Library
Journaling is one of the easiest things you can do to improve mental health, as it helps clarify your thoughts and feelings, work through problems, and reduce stress. But journaling can also be a really fun and creative exercise, especially when you make yourself a really cute book to write in! Teens can join nonprofit Austin Bat Cave for a workshop to decorate their own journals and work through some creative writing prompts and art activities, with sharing of their work optional but encouraged. – Kat McNevins
Dinner Film Series: A Good Year
Wednesday 30 – Thursday 31, Loren Hotel
“Dinner and a movie” becomes quite literally elevated as chef Christian Grindrod of the Loren’s on-site restaurant Nido creates the perfect pairing menu for Ridley Scott’s delightful 2006 romance. As a suitably gruff Russell Crowe falling for the guarded Fanny (Marion Cotillard) among the vineyards of Provence, indulge your taste buds for a prix fixe delight where the courses will match the love story. – Richard Whittaker
Life After
Wednesday 30, AFS Cinema
Documentarian Reid Davenport uses a disabled woman’s 1983 legal battle to end her life as the jumping-off point to explore assisted dying and the disabled community. Bringing his own first-person experiences as a disabled man to the film, Davenport presents a nuanced, thoughtful exploration of an issue that’s far thornier than you might think, in the process exposing shocking gaps in health care coverage, the social safety net, and basic human empathy. The film, which won a Special Documentary Jury award at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival, will be followed by a Q&A with Davenport and special guests, presented by local nonprofit AustinINConnection. – Kimberley Jones
Memory Static: Live Podcast Taping
Wednesday 30, Tiny Minotaur Tavern
Recalling childhood movie memories can be like trying to find details in the playback of a corroded VHS. Time’s fuzzed out the details into some new beast – a copy of a copy of what you experienced once. Bailey Moore’s podcast, Memory Static, attempts to rewind those recollections and find the truth within “the musty, sun-bleached video rental store of the millennial subconscious.” Moore invites new and old listeners to this mystery film screening, where a post-watch discussion makes for a fun new entry into the “Slow Moving Time Machine.” – James Scott
Psycho (1960)
Wednesday 30, Paramount Theatre
Unlike a certain friend of mine who claimed this landmark Hitchcock thriller was just “fine” after they watched on a tiny airplane screen, those who catch Anthony Perkins’ career-defining performance as Norman Bates for the first time at the Paramount are sure to understand what captured cinemagoers so much when the film made its 1960 debut. The twists, the turns, and the taxidermy never cease to haunt American film culture and play beautifully on the big screen. And once you’ve properly enjoyed the 65-year-old feature, you’ll be ready to move on to its equally good sequel Psycho II. – James Scott
Pan African Film Festival
Thursday 31 – Sunday 3, AFS Cinema
For the third year running, AFS Cinema plays host to curated highlights from the Los Angeles-based Pan African Film and Arts Festival’s February festival. That includes opening night film Move Ya Body: The Birth of House on Thursday, which documents the infamous Disco Demolition Night at Comiskey Park in 1979 and the unintended hand it had in inspiring the birth of house music at Chicago’s underground club scene. A Q&A follows the screening with director Elegance Bratton (The Inspection) and producer Chester Algernal Gordon, moderated by KUTX’s DJ Shani of The Groove Temple. Individual tickets are available, but you could just treat yourself to a PAFF pass to catch all the films, including closing night doc Sun Ra: Do the Impossible. – Kimberley Jones
Circus Chickendog
Thursday 31, University Hills Branch Library
Back in the day, Darren Peterson dropped out of college to join the Royal Lichtenstein Circus, and years later, he would combine those skills with his gift for dog training. He soon discovered the combo to be a hit with Austin families. This is your chance to see that unique pairing, at the library no less. Kids will spend the hour enthralled by Peterson and his five highly trained dogs (not to mention his juggling balls and unicycle) performing tricks. When the excitement is over, why not grab a book and unwind? – Sammie Seamon
Babies Who Brunch
Thursday 31, Goldfish Swim School
Being a new parent is tough, but Goldfish Swim School gets it. They’re putting together a lovely little morning for babies and parents just to say “you got this,” with an open swim in their 90-foot pool, brunch bites for the whole family, and a craft activity you can take home. It’s a great opportunity to meet other parents, chat with the swim school about water safety for your little goldfish, and get kids familiar with the swimming pool early so they can enjoy a lifetime of water activities. – Kat McNevins
Challengers
Thursday 31, Hyperreal Film Club
Pickleball came into our culture at a weak point, when tech freaks and normies desired a sport that required a fraction of the skill that traditional tennis needed. Little square paddles dominated Target’s dollar spot; millions of standard-sized courts were split by tiny nets; and the parking lot of Austin’s best microcinema continues to be overrun by pickleballers to the detriment of innocent and terminally late cinema sickos, who then have to do street parking on Fourth and Chicon. Thank god for Luca Guadagnino’s eighth directorial effort, which – through the power of Zendaya, Mike Faist, and Josh O’Connor’s sexually antagonistic & tennis-centric threesome – smashed a round-ass racket through the flaccid heart of pickleball. Relive the thrumming triumph this Thursday, but arrive early because otherwise, brother, you’re parkin’ on Fourth. – James Scott
Want to see all of our listings broken down by day? Go to austinchronicle.com/calendar and see what’s happening now or in the coming week.
This article appears in July 25 • 2025.
