HEIGHTS THEATER

A strange black rectangle, the monolith, appears in pre-human times and helps apes discover tools… and violence; when it reappears on the moon in the future, the monolith communicates the same messages to HAL, the artificial intelligence running the spacecraft, and human history is changed forever. Thrilling, mind-warping, and at times nearly incomprehensible, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY was the number one box office hit of the year, and in the 2022 BFI international poll of directors, was voted the Greatest Film of All-Time.

In 1910s Paris, Chico (Charles Farrell) works in the sewers and dreams of a better life. Diane (Janet Gaynor) falls head over heels for Chico after he saves her from being murdered by her tyrannical older sister. When the police arrive to arrest Diane for prostitution, Chico claims that she's his wife to keep her out of jail. The pair finds happiness in their own "7th heaven," until the outbreak of World War I tests the limits of their transcendent love. 7th HEAVEN paired Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell in the first of a dozen films they made together from 1927 to 1943, three with director Frank Borzage. Borzage, Farrell, and Gaynor (who edged out Mary Pickford and Joan Crawford for the role) were all nominated for Academy Awards. 7th HEAVEN was an exuberant commercial success upon its initial release and is still widely regarded as one of the most beautiful silent films of all time. With live accompaniment by THE POOR NOBODYS! This screening is co-presented by Archives on Screen, Twin Cities.

In Eleanor The Great, June Squibb brings to vivid life the witty and proudly troublesome 94-year-old Eleanor Morgenstein, who after a devastating loss, tells a tale that takes on a dangerous life of its own. Scarlett Johansson’s directorial debut is a comically poignant exploration of how the stories we hear become the stories we tell.

Dawn Davenport (Divine) wants it all: fame, fortune, adoration and, of course, cha-cha heels. After destroying her parents' home on Christmas morning, Dawn gets pregnant while hitchhiking, and then raises her kid while going on a lengthy crime spree in order to prove that "crime and beauty are the same." Some Xmas message, huh, kids? FEMALE TROUBLE needs to be seen to be believed, boasts a star-making turn by Divine, and is John Waters' flat-out masterpiece. With the mighty disturbing short "Santa's Enchanted Village" and 70s Ronald McDonald Mother Goose party intro on 35mm!

Live comedy with VHS tapes! BRAND NEW SHOW FOR 2025! Joe Pickett (The Onion) and Nick Prueher (Late Show With David Letterman) have over 14,000 VHS tapes in their cluttered office in Brooklyn and will take viewers on a guided tour of their latest/greatest finds in this brand new Volume 11 show for 2025. Highlights include a psychotic dollar store salesman, a video catalog of frightening porcelain dolls, two wonderfully homemade Bigfoot videos and a new age “miracle” treatment from the 80s called “Psychic Surgery.” (90 mins - contains nudity, language, clowns) “I think I speak for fans everywhere when I express gratitude for their continued hunt for hilariously bad videos. I hope the search never ends.” -Steven Hyden, Uproxx

In conjunction with the publication of local writer John Gaspard's book, HELD OVER: HAROLD AND MAUDE AT THE WESTGATE THEATER, the Heights presents a special screening of the beloved cult film, always a sell-out in our theater. Did you know that HAROLD AND MAUDE screened for TWO STRAIGHT YEARS at Edina's Westgate theater, where Heights volunteer Randy Greene managed? Gaspard will be on hand to sell copies of his book and discuss the HAROLD AND MAUDE phenomenon, and maybe Randy will even answer questions about the experience. Hal Ashby's poignant black comedy about anti-social Harold (Bud Cort) and his geriatric girlfriend Maude (Ruth Gordon) has to be one of the classic misfit love stories of all time.

We’ve been asked to screen Hocus Pocus for years, and it’s finally here! When Salem, Massachusetts teenager Max accidentally resurrects three witches from the seventeenth century, and those witches happen to be comedians Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy, the results is one of the most hilarious (and beloved) pictures from the 1990s!

HOLIDAY INN has become a Heights New Year's Day tradition, and like WHITE CHRISTMAS sells out every year! IRVING BERLIN wrote the evergreen score, which includes Easter Parade, Lets Start the New Year Right, Lazy and of course, White Christmas.

Lieutenant Aldo Raine is a battle-tested solider in the U.S. Army during World War II. His goal: recruit a commando group of Jewish-American soldiers to do “one thing, and one thing only: kill Nazis!” This is Quentin Tarantino’s World War II, full of blood, brilliant dialogue, great actors, all the while referencing spaghetti Westerns and Italian action films. Inglourious Basterds was a tremendous hit and introduced the world to the amazing Christoph Waltz, who won an Oscar for his slimy performance.

A flop in its day, and one that destroyed Capra's production company, It's a Wonderful Life began to interest audiences again in the 1980s, and has since become a standard for holiday family viewing. George Bailey considers himself a failure: his Savings and Loan has lost a tremendous amount of money, and he has never achieved any "measurable" success, and so killing himself seems to be the only remaining option. From this grim premise comes one of the most evocative pictures about small town life, friendship and humility ever to grace the screen. Jimmy Stewart put in an outstanding performance that ranges from happy-go-lucky to serious to outright fury, a tour-de-force that would portend his work with Alfred Hitchock. If you haven't seen this on the big screen, be prepared: It's A Wonderful Life will leave you a grateful, tearful mess.

On the day after Christmas, Mia (Emma Stone), a struggling actress, meets Seb (Ryan Gosling), a struggling jazz pianist, and the pair fall in and out and in and out of love, all the while navigating their perilous careers in modern day Los Angeles. La La Land charmed audiences worldwide and is a modern musical classic. Winner of the Academy Award for Best Director, Best Actress and Best Picture (for about five minutes).

Hans Wieland is a brilliant actor, a leading figure in German cinema. When the Nazis pressure him to divorce his Jewish wife, Elisabeth, he refuses. Finally, political pressure becomes too much, and, realizing that he will be arrested, his wife to be sent to a concentration camp, he faces the ultimate test of his love. Based on the real-life story of actor Joachim Gottschalk, Kurt Maetzig’s Marriage in the Shadows was the first movie (produced under Soviet auspices) to confront Germans about their treatment of Jews. A brilliant and heartbreaking film, shot like a noir but filled with the rarefied emotions of a melodrama, this rare screening should not be missed.

A single mom, a depressed child, a drunken Santa and a city full of cynical souls—this should be the stuff of one bleak motion picture. But Miracle on 34th Street is as sweet a holiday confection as Hollywood ever produced, as a group of harried but good-hearted New Yorkers run headlong into a very real Santa Claus, who offers them hope and affection. Touching on themes of divorce, faith and even capitalism, Miracle is both candy and coal in abundance. Winner of 3 Academy Awards, including Best Supporting Actor for Edmund Gwenn’s Kris Kringle.

The Heights Theater and Moon Palace Books present THE JANE ADDICTION, featuring a screening of the classic Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier adaptation from 1940, with a book club discussion of PRIDE AND PREJUDICE by Jane Austen at Arbeiter Brewery. If there's one thing we know, it's that Janeites, as Jane Austen fans refer to themselves, are an obsessed bunch, poring over Austen's brilliant prose like it was scripture and devouring every cinematic adaptation. To celebrate the 250th birthday of arguably the greatest novelist in the English language, the Heights Theater and Moon Palace Books present THE JANE ADDICTION, a screening (on her birthday!) of PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, the charming 1940 adaptation starring the greatest of all Darcys, Laurence Olivier, and, the next evening, a book club discussion sponsored by Moon Palace Books at Arbeiter (next door to the book store). Moon Palace will be on hand to sell copies of PRIDE AND PREJUDICE. Come celebrate your favorite author on her birthday!

Do we really need to explain this one? Perhaps no movie musical is as beloved as Singin' in the Rain, which has sold out the Heights Theater three times in the last four years! What a wonderful feeling!

From 20th Century Studios, “Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere” chronicles the making of Bruce Springsteen’s 1982 “Nebraska” album. Recorded on a 4-track recorder in Springsteen’s New Jersey bedroom, the album marked a pivotal time in his life and is considered one of his most enduring works—a raw, haunted acoustic record populated by lost souls searching for a reason to believe.

“Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman, who won an Oscar for this role) is obsessed: he wants to rid the dirty streets of New York of "H"—heroin, plaguing his city like never before. With his partner, "Cloudy" Russo (Roy Scheider, in a star-making turn), he’s a one-man wrecking crew, but his sights are set on nailing the top dealer, a wealthy man whose bringing in the stuff from France. Hackman was never better, and his exhausting foot chase after a dealer, while dressed as Santa!, makes this the perfect Coal or Candy confection.

You know the story: cheapskate Ebenezer Scrooge (Michael Caine) is a total drag at the holidays, until he’s visited by a bunch of ghosts who turn him into an old softie who loves to share his wealth. But Charles Dickens’ classic has never been better than this one, with the full Muppet treatment! Caine and the Muppets have a chemistry that just shines, and THE MUPPET CHRISTMAS CAROL is often regarded, by Muppet aficionados, as the finest of all their films.

Jack Torrence, a recovering alcoholic, retreats to the Overlook Hotel with his wife, Wendy, and son, Danny, in tow, in the hopes of breaking his writer's block. But the hotel is host to a variety of dark secrets, none more disturbing than those in Room 237. The Shining is one of Kubrick's more startling masterpieces, and Jack Nicholson's performance is the stuff of legend.

To commemorate the life of Robert Redford, one of our favorite actors, the Heights brings back THE STING. When small time con men Luther (Robert Earl Jones), Kelly (Robert Redford) and the Erie Kid (Jack Kehoe) rob a money drop for noted Chicago numbers-runner Doyle Lonnegan (Robert Shaw), the gangster has Luther killed. So Kelly approaches Henry Gondorff (Paul Newman) to pull the wool over the gangster's eyes and fleece him for millions. Reuniting the BUTCH CASSIDY team of director George Roy Hill and stars Redford and Newman, THE STING was the number one box office film of 1973, and won seven Oscars, including Best Picture.

A Heights Theater tradition, one of our most popular events - an event that sells out year after year! You will not want to miss the perennial TECHNICOLOR favorite, WHITE CHRISTMAS, on the big screen! Plus.....ON OUR STAGE! The big show starts with a special 20 minute concert by the wonderful MAUD HIXSON, singing a stocking full of your favorite holiday classics! Accompanied by Rick Carlson on the piano as well as A BOUNCING BALL SING ALONG at the end!! Also... A fantastic preshow concert by LOU HURVITZ and ED COPELAND on the Heights Mighty Wurlitzer!

For the 24th Annual Groveland Food Shelf benefit, longtime Heights volunteer Randy Green is bringing back the delightful (and delicious!) classic WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY. We all know the story: Charlie Bucket (Peter Ostrum) is a poor child in London, who finds a pound note in the gutter. He buys a tantalizing Wonka bar, finds a Golden Ticket, and, with Grandpa Joe (Jack Albertson) at his elbow, he and five other other kids head to Wonka's chocolate factory. There, they meet the strange, whimsical, and curious Willy Wonka (Gene Wilder), who has some very diabolical plans for the children. Gene Wilder’s outrageous performance made this movie, initially a flop, into a classic that has delighted children for generations. With Ed Copeland on the Heights' Mighty Wurlitzer, all ticket proceeds will be going to the Groveland Food Shelf