Science on Screen
La Bamba
Screening and Presentation
Monday, April 13, 2026 | 7:00pm
Little Theatre 1 (240 East Ave.)
Doors open at 6:00pm
Standard ticket prices
Tickets available online in advance, at our box office during open hours, or at the door (if tickets remain).
Accessibility at this Screening
• Hearing Amplification (accessibility device or hearing loop)
The brief but incandescent life of rock-and-roll trailblazer Ritchie Valens is immortalized in this enthralling biopic from another Mexican American icon, Luis Valdez, the father of Chicano cinema. With sweetness and swagger, Lou Diamond Phillips embodies the 1950s California teenager who, forged by his fiercely supportive mother (Rosana DeSoto) and rebellious brother (Esai Morales), rises from his farm-working roots to chart-topping fame in the early days of rock—until one fateful night that haunts music history. Propelled by a hip-shaking soundtrack featuring Los Lobos and Carlos Santana, La Bamba captures the electric vitality of an artist who bridged cultures to create his own American dream.
Please join us for a presentation by Dr. Kristyn Storey following the film. (See below for details.)
Rated PG-13 | 1 hour 48 mins | Drama, Biography, Music | 1987
USA | English and Spanish
DCP | Sony Pictures Repertory
About the Presentation
“From La Bamba to ‘The Day the Music Died’: How Trauma-Driven Phobias Shape Our Lives”
Traumatic events, even if we don’t directly experience them, can have a long-lasting impact on our psychology that influences the ways we interact with the world, navigate relationships, and make decisions about the future. During this presentation we will explore how symptoms of trauma-driven phobias serve to limit our life experiences in the name of safety and control. We will also discuss the possibility to push past these limits and how Ritchie Valens was able to embrace both the opportunities and risks of flying in the context of aviophobia, allowing his music to reach across generations.
Presentation by
Kristyn Storey, MD, Assistant Professor in Psychiatry and Pediatrics, URMC
Dr. Kristyn Storey is an assistant within the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Division of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center. She received her M.D. from the State University of New York Upstate Medical University in 2014 and completed residency in General Psychiatry at Brown, where she was the lead author on an article in the Rhode Island Medical Journal, “Health Care Needs of Incarcerated Adolescents.” While in residency, Dr. Storey was active in developing strategies to improve the wellbeing of Psychiatry trainees, founding the Psychiatry Film Club, and continued these initiatives during her fellowship in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Brown as Chief Fellow. She served as an attending child psychiatrist in the Pediatric Partial Hospital Program at Bradley Hospital in Rhode Island from 2020 – 2025, working in a multidisciplinary team who treated children ages 7 years old and younger struggling with serious emotional and behavioral challenges. Dr. Storey joined UR Medicine Faculty in 2025 and works in the Brighter Days Pediatric Mental Health Urgent Care Center as well as the outpatient setting. She is also a lifelong fan of music from the 1950s and 1960s and the dawn of rock and roll.
About the series
Science on Screen
Science on Screen® creatively pairs screenings of classic, cult, and documentary films with lively introductions by notable local figures from the world of science, technology, and medicine. Each film is used as a jumping off point for the speaker to reveal current scientific research or technological advances, providing the perfect combination of entertainment and enlightenment – even for the most science-phobic culture vulture! Browse all films in this series
An initiative of the COOLIDGE CORNER THEATRE, with major support from the ALFRED P. SLOAN FOUNDATION.
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