Thursday Happenings

Film Festivals

-- The Bicycle Film Festival kicks off its Boston run with an opening night party. Featuring BoldSprints, a group that races bikes inside of bars, beer, food, and a live DJ. Video Underground, 383 Centre St., Jamaica Plain, 7 p.m. Free.

Previews

-- Music blog Bradley's Almanac previews the new Stereolab album, Chemical Cords. Expect rad prizes including Stereolab tickets and merch. River Gods, 125 River St, Cambridge, 9pm. (KS)

Unpleasant Experiences

-- Do you like to vomit? Baseball moralizer Dan Shaughnessy introduces a screening of Field of Dreams (1989), a movie so bad that it made Bostonist stop liking baseball temporarily. New England Aquarium, 8 p.m. $5/$3.

Movies

-- A staple of college Spanish courses the world over, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988) might be the most widely screened of Pedro Almodóvar's films. Closer to John Waters or Preston Sturges than Luis Buñuel or Douglas Sirk and lacking the explicitly sexual themes of his other work, Women on the Verge... might give audiences the wrong idea about Almodóvar. But in other respects—its female-centric plotting, its sense of hysteria as a normal state of affairs—it might be his most typical work. Watch for a young, and incredibly well-directed, Antonio Banderas. Brattle Theater, 40 Brattle St., Cambridge. Tickets and showtimes.

Kerry Skemp contributed to this post.