Next Week in Tickets: Films playing Boston 20 March 2026 - 26 March 2026

Four or five film festivals this weekend! And some (kind of) play nice with each other!

• The Boston Underground Film Festival continues at The Brattle Theatre (with Friday and Saturday midnights at the Coolidge), including local shorts package "The Dunwich Horrors", Obsession, and Cramps! A Period Piece on Friday; "Animation Disorientation", "Die Laughing", Boorman and the Devil, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre 2 (35mm), and The Devil's Rejects (35mm) on Saturday; and ending Sunday with "Death, Love, and Road Trips", "New England Esoterica", CAMP, Saccharine, and The Furious.
  
  After that, the Brattle downshifts a bit with a double feature of Paddington & Paddington 2 on Monday & Tuesday, the Ralph Bashki version of Lord of the Rings for Tolkien Reading Day on Wednesday, and Only Lovers Left Alive on Thursday.
• The Somerville Theatre hosts Irish Film Festival Boston on Friday & Saturday evenings - their first regular festival since 2019! - with Irish-language crime thriller Báite on Friday, while Saturday has Beat the Lotto with director Ross Whitaker on hand for a Q&A and Christy later on. There's a final screening of The Napa Boys on Monday, with cast member Mike Mitchell on-hand to introduce the film, by Ciclismo Classico Bike Travel Film Fest on Tuesday, Sideways on 35mm as the Wednesday Feel Good Film, and the Mellow Climbing film set on Thursday.
  
  The Capitol Theatre opens Sirât, brings back One Battle After Another, and plays Double Indemnity for Capitol Classics on Friday.
• There's a blockbuster-sized opening for Project Hail Mary, based on the Andy Weir novel, directed by Phil Lord & Christopher Miller, and starring Ryan Gosling as a scientist who has been sent light-years from Earth to somehow find a way to counter a galactic wave of dying suns before it reaches ours, encountering an alien with the same mission. It's at the Coolidge (many shows on 70mm film), the Somerville, Fresh Pond, The Museum of Science (Omnimax Friday/Saturday evenings), Jordan's Furniture (Imax Friday-Sunday), West Newton, CinemaSalem, Boston Common (including Imax Laser & Dolby Cinema & XL), Causeway Street, Kendall Square, the Seaport (including Dolby Atmos), South Bay (including Imax Xenon & Dolby Cinema), Assembly Row (including Imax Laser & Dolby Cinema), Arsenal Yards (including CWX), and Chestnut Hill.
  
  Not quite a blockbuster is Ready or Not: Here I Come, which picks up in the immediate aftermath of 2019's Ready or Not to pit Grace (Samara Weaving) and her previously-unmentioned sister (Kathryn Newton) against a new wave of super-wealthy folks who have sold their souls, featuring Elijah Wood, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Nestor Carbonell, and David Cronenberg. It plays Fresh Pond, CiinemaSalem, Boston Common (including Dolby Cinema), Causeway Street, Kendall Square, the Seaport (including Dolby Atmos), South Bay, Assembly Row (including Dolby Cinema), and Arsenal Yards.
  
  The Pout-Pout Fish is an unusually wide opening for a Viva Kids animation, with Nick Offerman and Jordin Sparks voicing a pair of mismatched sea creatures looking to save their home. It's at Fresh Pond, Boston Common, South Bay, and Assembly Row.
  
  Tow opens at Boston Common and the Dedham Community Theatre, with Rose Byrne as an unhoused woman who has to fight a predatory tow truck company when the bill for her car being removed spirals over $20,000. A lot of interesting folks in the supporting cast.
  
  Indie thriller Wardriver only gets two showtimes at Apple Fresh Pond, Saturday & Sunday at 6pm. Boston Common has 40th anniversary shows of Rad on Sunday & Tuesday. There's a mystery (horror) preview at Boston Common, Causeway Street, the Seaport, South Bay, and Assembly Row on Monday. Concert film Bring Me the Horizon: L.I.V.E. in São Paulo plays Boston Common on Wednesday.
• In addition to a 70mm print of Project Hail Mary The Coolidge Corner Theatre bring back Oscar winners Sinners and One Battle After Another, and also opens Best Documentary Feature winner Mr. Nobody Against Putin, albeit in the smallest room and not in the 7pm slot. They also open another documentary, André Is an Idiot, which follows advertising executive André Ricciardi as he attempts to find a way to die happy with colon cancer that probably could have been dealt with had he gotten a colonoscopy; there's a special "Panorama" presentation with filmmaker Tony Benna on-hand Sunday afternoon.
  
  BUFF takes over the midnight slots this weekend with the "I Hate It Here" shorts package and Exorcist II: The Heretic on both Friday and Saturday. They also have kids' shows of Finding Nemo on Saturday & Sunday mornings; Sunday also has Goethe-Institut presenting the new film by Christian Petzold, Mirrors No. 3, and a marathon of the Lord of the Rings films (they're doing this for three weeks, with the 22nd and 29th sold out but tickets still available for 5 April). Two special presentations on Tuesday appear to be sold out: A "Science on Screen" presentation of Best in Show with Harvard's Canine Brains Project leader Erin Hecht, and a preview of PBS Documentary Henry David Thoreau. Wednesday has Dee Rees's Mudbound for "Calling the Shots", and Thursday has a 35mm print of Tank Girl for the "Cult Classics" show.
• The two big Indian movies for Eid al-Fitr opened Wednesday, with Hindi-language action epic Dhurandhar The Revenge (filmed alongside last year's Dhurandhar playing Apple Fresh Pond, Boston Common, and Causeway Street and Telugu-langauge action-comedy Ustaad Bhagat Singh playing Fresh Pond and Causeway Street.
  
  Thai romantic comedy Food Truck: Stolen Love… and Moo Deng opens at Boston Common and Causeway Street, with Mario Maurer playing a TikTok star whose friends say they spotted a kid who looks just like him with his Korean ex-girlfriend, with the efforts to get to the bottom of this somehow leading to the kid stowing away in the truck and also accidentally abducting an internet-famous baby hippopotamus.
  
  Korean film The King's Warden sticks around for a few scattered showings at Causeway Street.
• The Harvard Film Archive repeats their "The Lady and the Typewriter" movies, this time with The Hudsucker Proxy at 7pm Friday, His Girl Friday at 9pm Friday, and Meet John Doe at 7pm Saturday. Sunday's "Complete Stanley Kubrick" show is a sort of what-if situation, with Marlon Brando's One-Eyed Jacks originally intended for Kubrick to direct. Monday's screening of A Clockwork Orange is sold out, but tickets may be released if there are no-shows. Everything this weekend is on 35mm film.
• The Seaport Alamo has episodes 13-15 of Twin Peaks: The Return on Saturday, a "Book Club" screening of Project Hail Mary on Saturday afternoon, wraps the weekly screenings of the Extended Editions of Lord of the Rings with The Return of the King on Sunday. They screen graphic novel adaptation Paying for It Sunday & Thursday evenings, Melancholia Monday & Tuesday, Daisies on Monday, and have both an early access show of Forbidden Fruits and an AGFADrome "Mystery Voyage" 1990s Hong Kong classic (my guess, based on the description, is Stephen Chow's The God of Cookery).
• The Regent Theatre has music documentary A Man Called Hurt on Monday, playing as part of a benefit for the Mississippi John Hurt Foundation, with a number of the musicians featured in the film playing on-stage beforehand.
• The Museum of Fine Arts has Fatih Akin's Amrum on Friday evening to open the Boston Turkish Film Festival, with more over the next two weekends. The Turner and Constable Exhibition on Screen plays Sunday afternoon.
• Landmark Kendall Square has From Up on Poppy Hill for the Studio Ghibli Retro Replay on Tuesday, and an "Directors in Focus" screening of Martin Scorsese's The Departed on Wednesday. They're also the last holdouts showing the Oscar-nominated shorts (Animation & Live Action) after the awards.
• Movies at MIT lists My Neighbor Totoro Friday & Saturday night; not sure if non-MIT folks are still welcome and if they want an email beforehand.
• Boston Jewish Film begins an Israeli Film Series at their new parent organization JCC Greater Boston in Newton, with The Property on Sundayand Nina Is an Athlete on Tuesday.
• Last weekend that The Boston Baltic Film Festival has movies available to stream (those go down after the 23rd).
• The Lexington Venue has EPiC (Friday to Sunday plus Thursday), It Was Just an Accident (Friday to Sunday plus a movie-club screening on Wednesday), Mr. Nobody Against Putin, (Friday to Sunday plus Thursday), Sirât (Friday to Sunday and Tuesday/Wednesday), Father Mother Sister Brother (Saturday/Sunday/Tuesday/Wednesday). There's a free screening of The League of Gentlemen Saturday morning, All That's Left of You on Tuesday, and The Voice of Hind Rajab on Wednesday.
  
  The West Newton Cinema hosts the Lois Weber Film Festival this weekend, celebrating over a century of women in film with Weber's 1921 film The Blot on Friday night (Jeff Rapsis on the organ), Riot in Bloom Saturday evening, and the world premiere of Punkies Sunday afternoon, with various shorts programs, panels, and formal events. They also open Project Hail Mary, reopen Sentimental Value, and hold over Reminders of Him, The President's Cake, Hoppers, Pillion, Marty Supreme, and Hamnet. Cosmic Coda plays Wednesday and Minari plays Thursday afternoon.
  
  The Dedham Community Theatre opens Tow and holds over EPiC.
  
  Cinema Salem plays Project Hail Mary, Ready or Not Here I Come, Hoppers, and The Bride! from Friday to Monday. The Spooky Picture Show hosts Tom Savini's Night of the Living Dead on Saturday, there's a Whodunit Watch Party on Sunday, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde '31 is the Wednesday Classic, with Weirdo Wednesday next door.
  
  Out at the Liberty Tree Mall in Danvers, they have late shows of Vampires of the Velvet Lounge, which stars Mena Suvari and Dichen Lachman in a movie about vampires looking for vampire hunters on dating apps, and the "with/and…" section of the cast includes the likes of Stephen Dorff, Tyrese Gibson, Rosa Salazar, and Tom Berenger.

I will mostly be living at the Brattle for BUFF this weekend, but decamping to Davis Square when Irish FIlm Festival Boston is going on (it works out well; I'll see Obsession when it releases wide, tend to skip movies-about-movies, and haven't much interest in the Bill Mosely visit). The work week will probably feature Project Hail Mary in 70, the AGFADrome show, and probably Ready or Not 2 and catching The Bride! before it leaves. Probably enough updates to my Letterboxd page to make up for all that baseball and travel!