Love is in the air


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​If you aren’t already planning on donating you $12 to the cynically titled Valentine’s Day or the bizarrely counterprogrammed The Wolf Man this weekend, why not take your significant other to some more proven romantic? Saturday at the Aero in Santa Monica is an Audrey Hepburn double-feature, the legendary Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and Billy Wilder’s Sabrina. Sunday features slightly more dramatic fare, Alfred Hitchcock’s Rebecca and Notorious. Notorious is a postwar espionage thriller starring Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman — pretty much the two best-looking Hollywood stars ever.
At the Egyptian on Saturday, you can catch a pair of offbeat romances with Wim Wenders’ masterpiece Wings of Desire — remade poorly as City of Angels with Nicolas Cage — and Tim Burton’s generation-defining Edward Scissorhands. V-day is more traditional: Casablanca and Billy Wilder’s archetypal noir-romance Double Indemnity. All shows start at 7:30 p.m. and run $8 at the Aero and $9 at the Egyptian with student discount.
​Valentine’s at the renovated porno house New Beverly Cinema comes with screenings of Lawrence of Arabia director David Lean’s early film Summertime with Katharine Hepburn and All that Heaven Allows, arguably Douglas Sirk’s most famous melodrama. Showings start at 3:40 and 7:30 and student-discounted tickets are $6.
​For those both unattached and unwilling to suffer the humiliation of sitting through a romantic double feature alone, feel free to join me at the Nuart’s six-hour showing of the Red Riding trilogy. A series of British films set in the late ’70s/early ’80s, the Red Riding films have been described as a British equivalent to David Fincher’s great film Zodiac. Serial killer epics might not be the most romantic fare, but I have to say that watching happy lives unravel for six hours might just suit my mood on Feb. 14. Unfortunately, the Nuart is charging separate admission so the whole day will run you a little over $30. But luckily the show starts at noon so you can probably get back home in time to watch the Trojans smack UCLA around.