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Join us for a Pride Kickoff Extravaganza 🏳️‍🌈 on Thursday, May 28 at 7pm with BOTTOMS — complete with costumes and a chance to strut your stuff before the show!

Category is… High School Realness. 📚🏈📣 Dress up as your favorite high school cliché fantasy for the evening! School colors are red and blue.

Plus, stop by before the screening to learn more about how you can support Des Moines’ LGBTQ+ organizations, like @ccprideiowa @oneiowa Iowa LGBTQ Chamber of Commerce, Polk County Democrats, and @progressiowa!

#Pride #DesMoines #Bottoms #Pride2026 #DSM

Before MAID IN MANHATTAN with J-Lo, SMOKE with Harvey Keitel, or THE LAST HOLIDAY with Queen Latifah, filmmaker Wayne Wang captured the soul of San Francisco’s Chinatown in his revolutionary feature debut CHAN IS MISSING 🚕 🌉 Playing Tuesday, May 19 at 7:15pm.

Des Moines Metro Opera and Des Moines Film invite you to a special broadcast of EL ÚLTIMO SUEÑO DE FRIDA Y DIEGO at The Varsity Cinema in Des Moines 🍿🎶

On May 30, the Metropolitan Opera’s 2025–26 Live in HD season comes to a close with a live transmission of American composer Gabriela Lena Frank’s first opera, a magical-realist portrait of Mexico’s painterly power couple Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, with libretto by Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright Nilo Cruz. Fashioned as a reversal of the Orpheus and Euridice myth, the story depicts Frida, sung by leading mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard, leaving the underworld on the Day of the Dead and reuniting with Diego, portrayed by baritone Carlos Álvarez. The famously feuding pair briefly relive their tumultuous love, embracing both the passion and the pain before bidding the land of the living a final farewell.

Get your tickets today with the link in bio!

Opening Friday, May 22: I LOVE BOOSTERS 🛍️ The latest from Boots Riley (SORRY TO BOTHER YOU) follows a crew of professional shoplifters as they take aim at a cutthroat fashion maven. Starring Keke Palmer, Naomi Ackie, Poppy Liu and more.

Now playing: STEAL THIS STORY, PLEASE! 🗞️ Fiercely independent journalist Amy Goodman has spent three decades holding the powerful to account, reporting
from war zones and the Democracy Now! newsroom. With this documentary, Oscar-nominated filmmakers Carl Deal and Tia Lessin craft a riveting portrait of journalism’s power – and peril – in an era of corporate control and political attacks on truth.

For the sixth installment of #ThursdayNightThrills, @frightzonepodcast presents the 1991 slasher gem POPCORN. 🍿🔪 Join us on Thursday, May 21 at 10pm for kills and thrills — plus commemorative event koozies for the first 50 attendees and a raffle for a copy of the film on Blu-Ray!

Do you care about the Oxford comma? Then mark your pristinely kept calendar for Thursday, May 21! REBEL WITH A CLAUSE plays at 7pm followed by a Filmmaker-in-Person Q&A and book signing.

REBEL WITH A CLAUSE is a documentary about grammar guru Ellen Jovin, who takes her pop-up grammar advice stand on a road trip across all 50 states to show that comma fights can bring us closer together in a divided time.

Plus, come hang out before the show! Starting at 6pm, Ellen will be at her nationally acclaimed Grammar Table, where she will answer grammar questions, resolve family grammar disputesn, and take complaints. After the show, please stick around for a Q&A, followed by a book signing of Ellen’s national bestseller.

@ellenjovin @rebelwithclausemovie @grammartable

Drugs are good, so is our movie!
MAY 16 • 7PM
Des Moines, IA @thevarsitydsm

Check 40yearsoffuckinup.com for tix & deets

@fatmikedude 🎙️🎸
@eric_melvin 🎸🪗
@elhefenofx 🎸🎺
@picklestix_ 🥁

@40yearsoffuckinup directed by @jamesbuddyday

Made on a budget of $22,000, Wayne Wang's CHAN IS MISSING, the first widely acclaimed Asian-American feature, is a testament to independent filmmaking.

Join us on Tuesday, May 19 for this latest film in our “Declarations of Independence” series, which celebrates America’s 250th Anniversary with early films from independent filmmakers.

#ChanIsMissing #WayneWang

Made on a budget of $22,000, Wayne Wang's CHAN IS MISSING, the first widely acclaimed Asian-American feature, is a testament to independent filmmaking.

Join us on Tuesday, May 19 for this latest film in our “Declarations of Independence” series, which celebrates America’s 250th Anniversary with early films from independent filmmakers.

#ChanIsMissing #WayneWang

Celebrate ani-MAY-tion with WHISPER OF THE HEART – playing Tuesday, May 12 and Sunday, May 17. 😻

Based on a screenplay and storyboards from Hayao Miyazaki, WHISPER OF THE HEART is a precious gem in the Studio Ghibli catalog, directed by veteran animator Yoshifumi Kondo.

A chance encounter with a mysterious cat sends Shizuku, a girl with her head in the clouds, on a quest for her true talent as she embarks on a life-changing adventure that takes her beyond the boundaries of her imagination.

Our high school film club slayed the runway (aka the Varsity Cinema aisles) to share their thoughts on THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 👠

Stay in the loop for future #HighSchoolFilmClub screenings (free with student ID!) by signing up for our mailing list at the link in our bio.

Our high school film club slayed the runway (aka the Varsity Cinema aisles) to share their thoughts on THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 👠

Stay in the loop for future #HighSchoolFilmClub screenings (free with student ID!) by signing up for our mailing list at the link in our bio.

Opening Friday, May 15: STEAL THIS STORY, PLEASE! New York-based independent investigative journalist Amy Goodman takes on soldiers, politicians, and corporate media in a fearless pursuit of truth.

Undeterred by armed soldiers, smooth-talking politicians, and riot police, Goodman has reported some of the most consequential stories of our time. STEAL THIS STORY, PLEASE! is a gripping portrait of the trailblazer whose unwavering commitment to truth-telling spans three decades of turbulent history.

From the frontlines of global conflicts to the organized chaos of her daily news show Democracy Now!, Goodman broadcasts stories and voices routinely silenced by commercial media.