28 Jan Philadelphia Monthly Cinema Arts Round-Up: February 2025
BY SOPHIA ABRAHAM-RAVESON
Please refer to the official websites for events to ensure that you have the most up-to-date information about ticketing, reservations, delays, rescheduling, cancellations, and other guest policies for venues, including relevant COVID-19 requirements. Inclusion in the Philadelphia Monthly Cinema Arts Round-Up does not signify cinéSPEAK’s endorsement of an event or organization’s mission or political affiliations.
February is about to be a huge month for independent and community film events in Philly! Whether you’re looking to celebrate Black History Month, go on a Valentine’s Day (friend) date, or prepare for Oscars Season, you’ll have many great film screenings and talks to choose from.
For Black History Month, check out Black Cinema Week at the Philadelphia Film Society, A Black Excellence Film Series at Walnut Street West Library, and the BIPOC Film Festival at Temple University. Other highlights this month include a Lebanese short film showcase presented by Batikh Batikh, a documentary about trans sex workers in Colombia with a conversation with the director, and a screening of the locally-made Patrice: The Movie.
There are so many events this month, so please keep reading to plan your February at the movies!
Saturday, February 1 – Thursday, February 6, 2025
Black Cinema Week
The Philadelphia Film Society presents Black Cinema Week, which includes a selection of films from their limited series Black 90s with mixers, parties, and quizzo with community partners accompanying the screenings. Make sure to catch the screening of Love Jones on February 6, which will include Mix n Mingle Quizzo before the film, presented with BeReelBlack Cinema Club!
Cost: $9-$40
Philadelphia Film Society Center — 1412 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102
Tuesdays, February 4, 11, 18, and 25, 2025, at 4:30 PM
Walnut Street West Library Presents: A Black Excellence Film Series
The Walnut Street West branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia is hosting A Black Excellence Film Series every Tuesday in February to celebrate Black History Month. The powerful lineup of films will honor the richness of Black stories, from historical struggles to visionary futures. Films screening include Recorder: The Marion Anderson Story (2019) on February 4, Pariah (2011) on February 11, Get Out (2017) on February 18, and Black Panther (2018) on February 25. Popcorn will be provided, and you’re also welcome to bring your own snacks to enjoy!
Cost: Free
Walnut Street West Library — 201 South 40th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
Thursday, February 6, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Philly Premiere: Ain’t No Back to a Merry-Go-Round
Attend the Philly premiere of Ain’t No Back to a Merry-Go-Round, a documentary about America’s first organized interracial civil rights protest. When five Black college students sat on a segregated Maryland carousel in 1960, their arrests made headlines. When the Jewish community near Glen Echo Amusement Park joined the protest, a history-making interracial demonstration was born. In this film with never-before-seen footage and immersive storytelling by Emmy-award-winning director Ilana Trachtman, four living protesters rescue this untold story. There will be a cash bar at 6:30 and the screening will begin at 7:30.
Cost: $15-$20
Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History — 101 South Independence Mall East, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Friday, February 7 and Saturday, February 8, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Batikh Batikh Presents: See You at Home No Matter What
See You at Home No Matter What, co-presented with cinéSPEAK, is a Lebanese cinema showcase and fundraiser featuring two separate short film programs. First, New Forms on February 7 features experimental cinema from Lebanese women artists, including narratives that blend dance, surrealism, and general weirdness into their storytelling as well as art video and essay films. The following evening, Queer Cinema will focus on queer narratives by Lebanese filmmakers and host the director and actor from the film To’oborni. 100% of proceeds from this event will go to mutual aid in Lebanon. Masks are required for this event, and there will be a HEPA air purifier on site. You must register for each screening separately.
Cost: Pay What You Can
Asian Arts Initiative — 1219 Vine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107
Thursday, February 13, 2025 at 5 PM
Diamond Screen Presents: BIPOC Film Festival
Attend the fourth year of Temple University’s Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) Film Festival, which will feature amazing work that tells the stories of and supports the voices of Black and Brown filmmakers and artists. In cooperation with Temple’s Film in Color student organization, a panel will curate the festival which will include screenings and discussions with filmmakers.
Cost: Free
Temple University Student Center — 1755 North 13th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19122
Wednesday, February 19, 2025 at 7 PM
Todas las flores
This 2024 documentary constructs an intimate portrait of Tabaco y Ron, a tiny brothel that serves as a workplace as well as a refuge for a community of trans sex workers in Bogotá’s red-light district. Stay after the screening for a conversation with director Carmen Oquendo-Villar, producer Alejandro Ángel Torres, and activist Charlotte Schneider Callejas, moderated by Haverford College Assistant Professor Spanish Lina Martínez Hernández. This screening is part of the Strange Truth series, presented by the Hurford Center for the Arts and Humanities at Haverford College.
Cost: $11.75-$16.25
Bryn Mawr Film Institute — 824 West Lancaster Avenue, Bryn Mawr, PA 19010
Thursday, February 20, 2025 at 6 PM
Jose Clemente Orozco: Man of Fire
This PBS documentary episode captures the life of Mexican muralist José Clemente Orozco (1883-1949), a life filled with drama, adversity and triumph. Despite poverty, childhood rheumatic fever that damaged his heart, and an explosion in his youth that cost him his left hand, Orozco persisted in his wish to become an artist. This screening is part of a series presented by WHYY and Esperanza Arts Center called Latin Rhythms & Reels Miniseries. In addition to the screening, the event will include latin food, live music, and a conversation.
Cost: Free
Esperanza Arts Center — 4261 North 5th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19140
Thursday, February 20 and Friday, February 21, 2025 at 7 PM
Body of Work: Thomas Allen Harris
Since the mid-1980s, multidisciplinary artist and filmmaker Thomas Allen Harris has examined the multiple definitions of Black and queer identity and its subjectivity, within the construction of the diaspora and the family model, through a wide range of media including video, photography, installations, film, and performance. This two-night celebration of Thomas Allen Harris’ body of work includes a series of videotapes derived from the artist’s archive from the 1990s, his first feature documentary film Vintage: Families of Value, as well as the PBS broadcast documentary series Family Pictures USA.
Cost: $5 (Suggested Donation)
Scribe Video Center — 3908 Lancaster Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19104
Saturday, February 22, 2025 at 4 PM
PhillyCAM Presents: Mettle
Mettle is a short documentary that follows the remarkable journey of Liana Mutia (who lives in Philadelphia!), a blind Filipino-American judoka—a person who practices or is a judo expert—as she trains for her second Paralympics, aiming to create history at the 2024 Paralympic Games. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with the directors, Chelsea Casabona and Surabhi Sundaram, and the lead subject, Liana Mutia. The film will be accompanied by an audio description.
Cost: Free
PhillyCAM — 699 Ranstead Street Suite 1, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Tuesday, February 25, 2025 at 7 PM
Let’s Talk Oscars
The 2025 Oscars are coming up on Sunday, March 2. This free event is a great opportunity to talk with industry experts about what to expect and get a variety of opinions on the best movies of the past year. Join the Bryn Mawr Film Institute for an evening of Oscar talk featuring Dana Stevens of Slate (and Slate’s Culture Gabfest podcast), Odie Henderson of The Boston Globe, and Keith Uhlich of Slant Magazine and (All (Parentheses)) who will discuss favorites, predictions, snubs, and more. Come ready to weigh in and offer your own takes!
Cost: Free
Bryn Mawr Film Institute — 824 West Lancaster Avenue, Bryn Mawr, PA 19010
Friday, February 28, 2025 at 7 PM
Producers Forum: Patrice: The Movie
Patrice: The Movie is a feature documentary romantic comedy from award-winning filmmaker Ted Passon about the next phase of marriage equality—disability. Patrice has finally found the love of her life, Garry, who is also disabled. They want nothing more than to get married, but if they do—or even if they just move in together—the government benefits they need to survive would be cut. Despite the scrutiny they’re under, they decide to plan a commitment ceremony that could risk their entire future. Ted Passon is an award-winning director, writer, producer, and video artist based in Philadelphia. The film will be preceded by David Block’s How Sweet the Sound, a short documentary about the blind African American street singer John Sutton.
Cost: $4-$7.50
Scribe Video Center — 3908 Lancaster Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19104
More Events:
Tuesday, February 4, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Cost: Free
Parkway Central Library — 1901 Vine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103
Friday, February 7, 2025 at 7 PM
Special Screening: Brittany Shyne
Cost: $4-$7.50
Scribe Video Center — 3908 Lancaster Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19104
Mondays, February 10 and February 24, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Four Films from Kelly Reichardt
Cost: $5-$15
Fleisher Art Memorial — 719 Catherine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Wednesday, February 12, 2025 at 7 PM
Cost: $13.24-$15.28
Bok Auditorium — 800 Mifflin Street, Philadelphia, PA 19148
Wednesday, February 12, 2025 at 7 PM
Under Your Spell: A Valentine Movie Night
Cost: $5-$10
PhilaMOCA — 531 North 12th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19123
Thursday, February 13, 2025 at 5:15 PM
The Dawn is Too Far: Stories of Iranian-American Life
Cost: Free
Fisher-Bennett Hall 401 — 3401 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
Friday, February 14, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Space Melt Cinema Presents: Codependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same
Cost: $10
Da Vinci Art Alliance — 704 Catharine Street Philadelphia, PA 19147
Friday, February 14, 2025 at 7:30 PM
Exhumed Films Presents: Girls ‘n’ Guns Valentine! A 16mm Hong Kong Double Feature
Cost: $15
PhilaMOCA — 531 North 12th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19123
Saturday, February 15, 2025 at 7 PM
Cost: $11.50-$15.50
Philadelphia Film Society Center — 1412 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102
Thursday, February 20, 2025 at 6 PM
The Abayudaya Jewish Communities of Uganda: Pop-Up Photography Exhibit and Film Screening
Cost: $18
Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History — 101 South Independence Mall East, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Sunday, February 23, 2025 at 4:30 PM and 6 PM
Philly Premiere: Art Spiegelman: Disaster Is My Muse!
Cost: $12
PhilaMOCA — 531 North 12th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19123
Tuesday, February 25, 2025 at 2 PM
Disability Pride Pennsylvania Presents: A Day at the Movies with Love Land
Cost: Free
Disability Pride Pennsylvania — 112 North 8th StreetPhiladelphia, PA, 19107
Wednesday, February 26, 2025 at 7 PM
Cost: $11.75-$16.25
Bryn Mawr Film Institute — 824 West Lancaster Avenue, Bryn Mawr, PA 19010
*Featured Image: Still from Patrice: The Movie. Courtesy of the filmmaker.
Sophia Abraham-Raveson is the Managing Editor for the cinéSPEAK Journal. She has previously worked for several Philadelphia-based film festivals, including BlackStar and Tri-Co Film Festival.
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