Weekend Event Planner

These are the 11 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

It's a festival kind of weekend in and around Dallas, with one film festival, two music festivals, and a dance festival offering up great entertainment. You can also see new Halloween events, two legendary music acts, a fantastic comedian, a homegrown singer made big, and more.

Below are the best ways to spend your precious free time this weekend.

Thursday, September 30

Dallas VideoFest presents Docufest+
Docufest+ will serve as the final event ever for Dallas VideoFest, the longest running independent film festival in Dallas. The festival, running through Sunday at Angelika Film Center in Dallas, will feature a lineup of independent documentaries from Texas filmmakers and beyond, including On the Divide, a portrait of three key players in the abortion battle in McAllen, Texas, and Socks on Fire, poet Bo McGuire’s cinematic love letter to his grandmother.

More Halloween events
Last weekend was the start of most Halloween events in the Dallas area, but two more will join in on the fun this weekend. Starting Thursday is Frights 'n Lights at Riders Field in Frisco, an adventure trail lined with thousands of shining jack-o-lanterns, intricately carved in the shape of different fictional and real-life people. It will be open on weekends through November 6. The Parker House in Denton is another haunted attraction, featuring two different houses to scare the wits out of visitors. It will be open through October 31.

Crystal Gayle in concert
Country singer Crystal Gayle has been a big name in the country genre for over 40 years, scoring 16 No. 1 hits over the years, most notably 1977's iconic "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue." Even though her heyday ended in the late 1980s, she's maintained a presence thanks to those great songs and the occasional new release, including 2019's You Don't Know Me: Classic Country. She'll perform at Arlington Music Hall.

America in concert
The year 2020 marked the 50th anniversary of perennial classic rock band, America. Founding members Gerry Beckley and Dewey Bunnell (along with former bandmate Dan Peek) met in high school in London in the late 1960s and quickly harmonized their way to the top of the charts on the strength of their signature song, "A Horse With No Name." They'll play this special concert at Annette Strauss Square.

Friday, October 1

Denton Arts & Jazz Festival
The annual Denton Arts & Jazz Festival will return after a one-year break, featuring performers on six outdoor stages and one indoor stage, as well as roving musicians. The festival, taking place through Sunday at Quakertown Park in Denton, will also include arts, a children’s art area, various activities, and food.

Ramblin' Roads Music Festival
The Ramblin' Roads Music Festival will take over the city of Arlington, taking place just about everywhere there's a stage in the city, including Levitt Pavilion, Arlington Music Hall, Texas Live, and more than 15 other venues. Performers will include Chromeo, William Clark Green, Mike Ryan, Bobby Pulido, Jamestown Revival, Monica Saldivar, Gene Watson, Tatiana Mayfield, and more. The festival takes place through Sunday.

Brian Regan in concert
Setting a comedic standard of excellence that others continually try to follow, Brian Regan is a unique comedian who is relatable to generations of fans and revered by comedians as the best in the business. Known as a "clean" yet hilarious comedian, his comedy can be enjoyed by audiences of all ages. He'll perform at The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory.

Dallas Black Dance Theatre presents 16th Annual DanceAfrica
Dallas Black Dance Theatre celebrates the rich heritage and ancestry of Africa with the 16th Annual DanceAfrica performances at Moody Performance Hall on Friday and Saturday, featuring guest artists Bandan Koro African Drum and Dance Ensemble and the DeSoto High School A Cappella Choir. The event also includes the free Saturday daytime DanceAfrica Festival & Marketplace, which fills Klyde Warren Park with performances, food, fun, and vendors.

Saturday, October 2

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents Philharmonia Fantastique
The Dallas Symphony Orchestra will present Philharmonia Fantastique: The Making of the Orchestra, an animated film that flies through the instruments of the orchestra to explore the age-old connection of creativity and technology. Guided by a magical sprite, the audience will see violin strings vibrate, brass valves slice air, and drum heads resonate. The kid-friendly event will take place at Meyerson Symphony Center.

St. Vincent in concert
Dallas can claim musician and songwriter Annie Clark — aka St. Vincent — as its own, as she spent her formative years here and was once a member of The Polyphonic Spree. One of the most distinctive artistic voices and original guitarists of her generation, she's collaborated with such big names as David Byrne, Taylor Swift, and The Chicks. She'll play at The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving in support of her latest album, Daddy's Home.

Sunday, October 3

TLC in concert with Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
It's been almost 20 years since Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes died in a car crash, and surviving bandmates Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins and Rozonda "Chilli" Thomas have kept the TLC name going in a variety of ways, including the 2017 release of their self-titled album. At this concert, they'll celebrate their 1994 breakout album, CrazySexyCool, performing selections from that album and additional hits. They'll be joined by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony.

St. Vincent will perform at The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving on October 2.

Photo by Zackery Michael

St. Vincent will perform at The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving on October 2.

event-planner

Movie Review

The End of Oak Street can't live up to its Spielberg inspirations

Photo by Daniel McFadden

Ewan McGregor and Anne Hathaway in The End of Oak Street.

Steven Spielberg is the iconic director of the last 50 years, so it’s no surprise that many other filmmakers have borrowed from his classic films. But most of the time those come in the form of references or homages, not straight up theft, which is what it feels like watching The End of Oak Street play out in front of your eyes.

Set in the early 1980s in an idyllic suburban neighborhood of an unnamed city, Denise (Anne Hathaway) and Greg (Ewan McGregor) are parents to two teenagers, Audrey (Maisy Stella) and Brian (Christian Convery). They’re also possibly heading toward divorce, as Audrey is secretly writing a novel with a thinly-veiled plot about their life, and Brian is cagey about having to earn extra money with a pizza delivery job.

That all gets put on the backburner when a mysterious event takes their entire neighborhood back to the time of dinosaurs. Armed with little more than a shotgun and sledgehammer, Audrey and Brian do their best to keep the family safe in their house. But the longer the ordeal goes on, circumstances force them out onto the streets and into the increasing danger that’s all around them.

Written and directed by David Robert Mitchell, the film tries immensely hard to be like the Spielberg movies its filmmaker clearly adores, but fails at almost every turn. It never earns the broken family in ‘80s suburbia vibes that were prevalent in E.T., going all in right away in the opening scene with a neighborhood block party that feels forced. Other elements like a bully who has it out for Brian, the family dog that disappears, and an angry neighbor come across as the tropes they are and not as organic parts of the plot.

When it finally gets to its dinosaur sequences, they pale in comparison to those found in Jurassic Park. The strange manner in which the dinosaurs appear is a big part of that, but the action involving them forgoes ominous moments that could build tension for those that play up gore in an unexpected way for a PG-13 movie. Many of the attacks have so little emotional meaning that they come off as comical, which is entertaining but in a hollow way.

As if those weren’t enough, Mitchell - perhaps at the behest of producer J.J. Abrams (who made his own Spielbergian film, Super 8) - tries to honor Spielberg in other ways. Just like in Jaws, he employs the use of a split diopter lens, which keeps characters in both the foreground and background in focus. But instead of using it judiciously, it’s brought out in three separate scenes, including a laughable one with the four family members where it turns into overkill.

Hathaway, coming off of a role in The Odyssey that could earn her an Oscar nomination, is the best part of this film. But even her evident skills are dragged down by the ridiculousness of the story, which requires hysterics that even she can’t sell. McGregor can normally be counted on for a good performance, but he gives several line readings with strange cadences that make his already-underwritten character come off worse. Stella and Convery are okay, but their roles are unmemorable overall.

Mitchell and his team can never settle on exactly what type of film they were trying to make, and so even though The End of Oak Street has a few moments that work, they’re surrounded by many others that don’t. In trying to emulate Spielberg - there’s even a blatant Back to the Future (produced by Spielberg) rip-off towards the end - all Mitchell has done is show how difficult it is to be the master.

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The End of Oak Street opens in theaters on August 14.