You cannot go wrong with a weekend at LACMA. The final installment of the exhibition film series The Golden Age of Mexican Cinema takes place this Friday with the double feature of Macario at 7:30 pm and Pedro Páramo at 9:10 pm. Macario’s eerie gleam and Pedro Páramo’s sweeping yet intimate panorama of rural Mexico will leave a lasting impression. Without a moment’s pause, we continue exploring the prolific and versatile nature of Gabriel Figueroa’s body of work in the film series Luis Buñuel and Gabriel Figueroa: A Surreal Alliance. Beginning on Saturday at 7:30 pm, Los Olvidados (The Young and the Damned) is the first collaboration between famed director and cinematographer and a landmark achievement in film history. Los Olvidados is a drama centered around the conflict and pains of a forgotten place and peoples.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBDgOrB76Rk

At the Altadena Art+Film Lab we close out five weeks worth of free public programs with two more sessions of Oral History Drop-ins on Friday and Sunday, an Instant Film Workshop beginning at noon on Saturday, and the screening of Daughters of the Dust—a film heavy with poetic imagery, rich language, and use of song—at 8 pm on Friday evening. While the Art+Film Lab takes a well-deserved respite (returning in the new year to Monterey Park), this Sunday, members from the Redlands community that participated in the Art+Film Lab earlier in this year are invited for a free day at the museum. Filmmaker Agustin J. Jimenez explains the importance of this outreach initiative in a short video worth seeing.

[vimeo http://vimeo.com/75467767]

At the museum, free public programming includes the premiere of Nicole Miller: Believing is Seeing and Burden of Dreams at 12:30 pm on Sunday. Commissioned by LACMA as part of the LACMA9 Art+Film Lab initiative, Nicole Miller explores the one-of-a-kind, yet oft-overlooked stories of individuals from communities that comprise the greater L.A. metro area. On Sunday from 12:30 to 3:30 pm the weekly Andell Family Sundays tinkers with concepts from art and film of Mexico. And a weekend at LACMA would not be complete without free music. Jazz at LACMA on Friday night features rhythmic stylings of Clayton Cameron Sextet and Sundays Live on Sunday evening presents virtuoso flare of Finnish pianist Teppo Koivisto.

Newsha Tavakolian, Untitled from The Day I Became a Woman series, 2009, purchased with funds provided by the Farhang Foundation, Fine Arts Council, and an anonymous donor, © Newsha Tavakolian

And, of course, check out everything happening in our galleries, from contemporary photography in John Divola: As Far as I Could Get, to exquisite art from Africa in Shaping Power: Luba Masterworks from the Royal Museum for Central Africa. Dig deeper and you’ll find work of mythical proportions in Masterworks of Expressionist Cinema: The Golem and its Avatars and stark and intriguing portraits of the modern female in Newsha Tavakolian. Yes, this might be the best decision you make all weekend.

Roberto Ayala