Where to Celebrate Dia de los Muertos

17 festive Day of the Dead celebrations taking place across Houston

Discovery Green Dia de lo Muertos Day of the Day

Discovery Green will recognize the holiday with an ofrenda, art activities, and more.

Courtesy of Discovery Green

Call us wacky, but whenever this time of year rolls around, we get more psyched about the Dia de los Muertos (aka Day of the Dead) events going down than anything Halloween-related.

Maybe it’s because, after dealing with all the trick-or-treating and drunk people in Spirit Halloween outfits, Dia de los Muertos is a two-day holiday where people can learn about and/or engage in Hispanic culture, as well as honor friends and family who have passed away.

For those interested in observing the holiday, here is a rundown of some events taking place across the Houston area:

Friday

City Place will kick off its fourth annual, two-day Dia de los Muertos celebration with a free Pix on the Plaza screening of Coco. On Saturday, a ceremonial altar will be unveiled for the community to recognize their dearly departed loved ones. 6:45 pm (4 pm Saturday).

Discovery Green’s Day of the Dead celebration features a community ofrenda (built by Houston artist Angel Quesada) to help visitors remember their loved ones. Families can enjoy hands-on art activities, artist demos, vendors, and more. 7 pm.

Downtown Houston+ will have a two-day weekend celebration at Trebly Park. It will feature a family movie night, the unveiling of a community ofrenda, and a festive Día de los Muertos Mercado with handcrafted items available for purchase. 6 pm (2 pm Saturday).

Locopotions in Magnolia will host its first Dia de los Muertos Celebration. The John Barraza Project will kick things off on Friday night, while Mike Casey and Amado J. Garcia will be there for Saturday performances. 7 pm (3 pm Saturday).

Metropolis & Extravaganza will have a Dia de los Muertos: Catrina Edition. There will be a Catrina costume contest, where the winner will receive $600. Girls get in free all night and guys get in free until 11 pm. 9 pm.

Miller Outdoor Theatre will have help for its celebration. FLAS and Índigo (Indigo Theater Group) return to celebrate “Calavera con Calavera” (Skulls), an original piece written by Indigo president Eddie Gonzalez, on its 11th anniversary. 7:30 pm.

The National Museum of Funeral History will have a Day of the Dead Market, filled with music, shopping, and costumes/makeup. Over 40 small business vendors, with a mix of Hispanic heritage, oddity, and artisan cottage vendors, will be there. 6 pm.

Old Town Harrisburg will have a three-day party called Ay de mi llorona “Dia de muertos.” An exciting raffle (or loteria) and market will kick things off on Friday, while Saturday and Sunday will have an art exhibition, live music, and ballet folklorico. 1 pm.

Urbe, Hugo Ortega's street food-inspired restaurant in Uptown Park , will commemorate the day with a lavish party featuring food stations, drink specials, a DJ and mariachis, face painting, a photobooth, festive decorations, and prizes for the best dressed attendees. Tickets, $85 per person plus tax and gratuity, are available online.

Saturday

East End Houston is welcoming folks to remember their friends and family who have passed on at its Day of the Dead celebration. The celebration includes an exciting local market featuring local businesses selling food and other items. 11 am.

Gloria’s Nightlife wants Houstonians to dance the night away this Dia de los Muertos. They’ll have live music from Orquesta Mi Rumba and the hottest beats from DJ Boris. Customers are encouraged to show up in your best catrina or sugar skull (or calavera) attire. 11 pm.

Historic Houston Cemetery will have a Dia de los Muertos gathering for those who want to honor and celebrate the memories of departed loved ones. They will have face painting, costumes, dancers, food, drinks, and more. 10 am.

Hope Farms will have a Day of the Dead event where children and their families can explore the rich culture behind this holiday. Kids will engage in activities including learning about the ofrenda, creating mementos for the altar, and more. 2 pm.

MECA will have its two-day, 24th Annual Día de los Muertos Festival. This free community event invites Houstonians to experience the rich traditions of Mexico's Day of the Dead through art, music, and cultural expression. 11 am.

Scout Bar has a Dia de los Muertos Music Spectacular, for people who’d like to spend their Day of the Dead rocking out. Los Skarnales is scheduled to be the headliner, along with opening acts InDaSkies and Marshall Falcon & the Texas Muthatruckas. 7:30 pm.

Tejas Brewery & Taproom will have a vibrant and festive celebration, complete with a DJ, photo booth, costume contest, and more. Plus, enjoy a limited-time menu featuring tamales, warm champurrado, mini conchas, and traditional pan de muerto. 8 pm.

Verde Garden will have a two-day fest with face painting, folklorico dancers, live mariachi performances, live DJs, food and drink specials, and more. Houstonians can also contribute to Verde Garden’s special ofrenda. 11 am.

day of the dead holidays dia de los muertos

Movie Review

Jennifer Lawrence plays mom on the edge in artsy drama Die My Love

Photo by Kimberley French/courtesy of MUBI

Jennifer Lawrence in Die My Love.

Writer/director Lynne Ramsay does not make feel-good movies. Her previous two films —You Were Never Really Here and We Need to Talk About Kevin — were about a traumatized veteran who tracks down missing girls for a living and parents reckoning with a child who might be a sociopath, respectively. Her latest, Die My Love, has a story as dark as its title.

Grace (Jennifer Lawrence) and Jackson (Robert Pattinson) are a married couple who move into a run-down house that used to belong to Jackson’s uncle, who shot and killed himself on the property. That doesn’t exactly scream “great vibes,” but the somewhat manic duo quickly introduce a child into the equation, an event that forms a schism between two people who previously seemed to be on the same off-kilter wavelength.

While Jackson works to provide for the family, Grace is left to take care of the baby and herself at the somewhat remote house. She doesn’t appear to be a big fan of the arrangement, engaging in all manner of odd behavior, like crawling around the floor, talking to herself, and taking the baby on miles-long walks to visit her mother-in-law, Pam (Sissy Spacek), who’s not doing well herself after recently losing her husband, Harry (Nick Nolte).

Ramsay, who co-wrote the film with Enda Walsh and Alice Birch, foregrounds Grace’s experience above all others, but the film is far from straightforward. The idea of post-partum depression is raised as a reason for Grace’s weird behavior, but as both she and Jackson are introduced as two people who skew to the “ab” side of normal, it’s difficult to say that everything she does is due to feelings that arise after giving birth.

Plus, Grace has plenty to be upset about in general, including living in a death house, being left alone with their child the majority of the time, and Jackson bringing home a yapping dog without even so much as a conversation. But the manifestation of her anger/depression is hard to parse, as Ramsay includes scenes of her carrying around a butcher knife, meeting up with a mysterious figure on a motorcycle, and other strange things that may or may not actually be happening.

There is clearly a lot of metaphorical work being done by seemingly random things like the reappearance of a black horse on multiple occasions, blaring rock music that accompanies several scenes, and the use of the 1x1 aspect ratio by Ramsay. It’s easy to feel the intensity of the film’s central relationship and their conflicts even if you can’t make heads or tails of the allusions that the filmmaker seems to love.

Lawrence is put through the wringer almost as much as she was in Darren Aronofsky’s Mother!, and her performance is one that can be felt strongly. Still, because the narrative is unclear, she often appears to be overwrought in certain scenes. Pattinson never fits well with his uncaring and/or oblivious character. Spacek makes a nice impression in a limited amount of screen time, but why Ramsay chose to use the ultra-talented LaKeith Stanfield in the nothing part of the motorcycle rider is baffling.

Those who love to dig into symbolism and non-linear storytelling will have a field day with the arty Die My Love. But for everyone else, anything Ramsay might have been trying to say about the difficulties of being a mother gets buried under many scenes that don’t make any logical sense and over-the-top acting that’s only fit to match the bizarreness of the film itself.

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Die My Love is now playing in theaters.

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Movie Review

Jennifer Lawrence plays mom on the edge in artsy drama Die My Love