[January 30th, 2008]

[SCREEN] SUPERTRASH

72-HOUR FILM FESTIVAL Should you wander into the Bagdad Theater this weekend, expect strange company: You’ll be sharing the lobby with bloody corpses, psychotic doctors and a nun with a gun. They’re not in line for popcorn—they’re the re-imagined cult-movie posters exhibited as part of the Supertrash 72-Hour Film Fest .

The festival is screening plenty of delicious cinematic garbage, including the 1981 woman-on-a-rampage classic Ms. 45 (for more on the movies, including Road House and Big Trouble In Little China , see review). Organizer Jacques Boyreau decided the flicks needed a kicker: “Let’s not just go merch and movies and beer,” he said. “Let’s have a real exhibit.”

More than 60 cartoonists and designers submitted tributes to grindhouse classics, and judges from the show’s sponsors—Night Gallery and Floating World Comics—picked their favorite posters. The entries have such pulpy power that Boyreau, who is rarely at a loss for words, has resorted to Italian: “The word that I’m really digging is ‘rifacimento,’” he said. “That means a refashioning. It’s that total commitment of surface to content.” And mad scientists.

THURSDAY JAN. 31

[music] NADA SURF, PORT O’BRIEN

Acoustic-guitar love fest! Nada Surf plays an all-acoustic show. Show up early for the openers: M. Ward-approved Port O’Brien specializes in the same sort of acid-trip campfire sing-alongs as Akron/Family—without the drum-circle madness. Doug Fir, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $15 advance, $17 day of show. 21+.

[ACTION] FOCUS THE NATION

Local universities team up for a forum with Congressman Earl Blumenauer and Gov. Ted Kulongoski—among others—on the subject of global warming solutions. Bonus: global warming haiku contest! University of Portland Chiles Center, 5000 N Willamette Blvd., 943-7864. 5:15 pm. Free but must register online at climatechange.up.edu.

FRIDAY FEB. 1

[GEEK memorial] GOODBYE WEB 1.0

Old Town Computers throws Netscape a beer-and-dot-com-trivia-fueled nerd wake the very day AOL/Time Warner pulls the plug and stops answering life-support calls for the ’90s-era web browser. Geek cinema classic Hackers is on this historic party bill as is this commandment: “Dress up as your favorite pre-YouTube Internet celebrity and receive a free beer for compromising your dignity.” Awesome. Backspace, 115 NW 5th Ave., 248-2900. 7 pm. Free. All ages.

[music] TRIED TRIED AGAIN

A dozen locals performing the first songs they ever wrote before a live audience. Have you ever tried writing a song? Would you play it live for all in attendance to scrutinize/ridicule/cherish? Didn’t think so. See Here Comes Your Fan for more info. Red Room, 2530 NE 82nd Ave., 256-3399. 8 pm. Free. 21+.

SATURDAY FEB. 2

[theater] Vampire Lesbians of Sodom

Years before Joss Whedon had even conceived of Angel , Charles Busch’s duo of vampiric actresses were whooping it up through time. The Back Door Theater, 4319 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 970-8874. 10:30 pm Fridays-Saturdays. $12.

[music] HILLSTOMP, SASSPARILLA

Hillstomp plays bluegrass tunes the down-and-dirty way: full of reverb and distorted slide guitar with songs about being shitfaced in Northeast PDX at 3 am. Mac’s Place, 201 N Water St., 873-2441. 9 pm. $8. 21+.

[party] Night of 1000 Masks

Mardi Gras party animals in masks turn the Fez Ballroom into a Kubrickian orgy of undulating dance. Fez Ballroom, 316 SW 11th Ave. 221-7262 9 pm. $10 advance, $15 door. 21+.