Monthly Archives: May 2014

Travel

Dining Is Slightly Off the Mark in Walla Walla Wine Country

4 Comments
PeoPeoMoxMox (Yellow Bird), who was head chief of the Walla Wallas.

My Facebook feed is constantly full of Seattle friends visiting Walla Walla. The plan is primarily about the wine. When I’ve asked for feedback about the food, most have said it’s fair at best, and a few have remarked that they don’t remember—because of the wine!

I recently took a quick trip to Walla Walla, limiting my drinking to small sips of wine at just one meal. Food was my focus. As my stay was brief, I was selective about where I dined, revisiting a couple of places I’d tried previously, and dining at a few other restaurants that were most recommended to me, including one that wanted to host me.

I was most eager to return to Colville Street Patisserie, which I’d enjoyed in my first visit to Walla Walla in 2010. Either the quality of the pastries has gone down, or my knowledge about them has gone up. I suspect it’s the latter, as I made a trip to Paris to sample lots of viennoiseries in the intervening years, and have also come to appreciate the high quality of such products in Tokyo during my annual visits there.

Colville Street is a pleasant place to enjoy some sweets, and I hear positive reports about some of their other treats, but I was disappointed with both my croissant and kouign amman. They weren’t awful, but both were dry and lacking in buttery flavor. (Side note: I just tried Trader Joe’s kouign amman, which you can find in the frozen food section. Overnight proofing proved inconsistent, but for $1 apiece and the ability to eat them warm, they’re well worth a try.)

Better for breakfast, I’d bet, would be Bacon & Eggs. I went for lunch and was impressed with the shrimp and grits, cooked to be deliciously runny. The flavor of the smoked mozzarella and sharp cheddar cheese shined through, and the over-easy eggs were prepared perfectly, adding to the runniness of the dish. The wall of hot sauces enabled me to play with lots of peppery heat. I get a sense of good quality ingredients going into dishes cooked with care at this breakfast and lunch restaurant.

My other revisit was to Andrae’s Kitchen, though this time to the restaurant inside a gas station as compared to the food truck parked at a gas station. Before, I chose and enjoyed a burger from the truck’s limited menu. Now, Andrae’s offers an interesting array of food, from schnitzel sandwiches to Halal-style chicken to gyros—all in a unique location.

Andrae wanted my opinion on his ramen, so he hosted me for a bowl and was gracious in asking me to hit him hard with feedback. His ramen is a work-in-progress and an ambitious undertaking, as he’s been making both the noodles and the double soup (he showed me the dried sardines for the dashi broth) recipe from scratch. I share here what I shared with him: I admire the effort but don’t see the need to make noodles from scratch, especially for the small volume of ramen that he sells. It’s hard to make consistent noodles, and the ones I tried were too soft. Better to focus on the broth(s); Andrae’s had good flavor, and I can see it getting better over time. (Note that there were out of menma, which would normally be in the bowl.)

Brasserie Four is an inviting place for lunch or dinner, serving some classic French food like steak frites, bouillabaisse, and charcuterie plates. For my springtime lunch, I went seasonal and started with cream of asparagus soup with ramp pistou. Nice presentation with gorgeous color, but with muted flavor until the addition of a generous amount of salt.

The same would be true for the kale, ramp, and chive quiche. Both the crust and the filling would have benefited by a hit of salt. That said, good flavors, and the side salad offered a nice variety of greens, delicately dressed. With such attention to fresh ingredients and pretty presentation, I was surprised by the lack of seasoning.

For a “late”-night bite, I made a stop at Public House 124, featuring live music and a very lively mid-week scene. (Stay in Walla Walla for some time, and you’ll see that everyone seems to know each other, especially those in or connected to the wine industry. It’s a small town, and drinking is a big part of life there for many.) One of my dining companions ordered steelhead salmon with house-made ramen noodles, pickled Japanese mushrooms, ginger scallion sauce, and a sunny side up duck egg. Ramen always tempts me, but this was a generous use of the word “ramen,” as it was really just a dry noodle dish. I went with the “Public Burger,” which contains bacon, cheddar cheese, pickled onions, and aioli, all on ciabatta bread. Not my favorite type of bun, as it’s unwieldy, with ingredients sliding everywhere. Meat quality was fine, but far more cooked than the medium rare I requested, and the cheddar cheese was a gelatinized, chewy mess. Sadly, while I finished the salad, I simply carved away at the meat after giving up on the burger as a whole.

Marcus Whitman Hotel (Photo courtesy of Marcus Whitman Hotel)

My biggest meal was at The Marc Restaurant, located at the Marcus Whitman Hotel, which hosted my stay in Walla Walla. The rooms in the tower feature “rich Renaissance styling,” which means a classic feel, as I found in my comfortable suite. The location makes it easy to explore the downtown area, and the hotel is just steps from a transit center, which is where I caught a bus (only 50 cents, complete with country music!) to teach a class at the Wine Country Culinary Institute at Walla Walla Community College.

The lobby at the Marcus Whitman Hotel (Photo courtesy of Marcus Whitman Hotel)

Pre-dinner at The Marc, I took a quick tour of the kitchen and the vast network of spaces where I saw prosciutto aging, herbs and microgreens growing in indoor hydroponic gardens, and other interesting in-house operations. (Another example: The Marc is working on making its own balsamic vinegar.) The restaurant touts Antonio Campolio as being a James Beard recognized chef (which means he’s cooked at the James Beard house in New York City) who “creates progressive modern American menus that blend traditional Northwest influenced cuisine with molecular gastronomic twists.” He was absent the day of my visit, but my tasting reflected the regular menu offerings.

Consistent with the hotel, the dining room has a classic look with booths offering a relative degree of privacy. I appreciated the space between tables, keeping the noise level low, though groups traipsing through the dining room en route to the Vineyard Lounge disrupt the experience to some degree. The bread basket photo gives a glimpse of the dining room, and a first look at the bounty of balsamic vinegar in my meal.

Amuse bouche: blue cheese crumble with balsamic caviar and herb oil. A flavorful start!

On the left side: Humboldt Fog goat cheese with crisped prosciutto and microgreens. On the right side: grilled asparagus with poached egg. Pulling the two sides together: a streak of balsamic reduction. The cheese was good, but I would have preferred to enjoy the house prosciutto fresh instead of cooked hard. And while I was glad to sample some early asparagus and generally adore a soft-poached egg, the texture of this egg was off, and I found some shell pieces on the plate.

Left: roasted beet agnolotti with pork belly, Monteillet causse noire, heirloom spinach, and pear. Right: pork belly with beet chip and beet caviar. Also beet puree, and the requisite balsamic reduction. A lot of beet action on this plate, but some textural issues, as the agnolotti was rather rustic and “gooey” (for lack of a better word), while the pork belly was slightly overcooked, and therefore too firm.

After an intermezzo of raspberry mango sorbet, the next plate arrived. Left: lamb sweetbread with orange marmalade, maltese sauce, and blood orange. Right: Italian spring truffle crepinette with miner’s lettuce, soft-poached quail egg, and pickled asparagus. I love sweetbreads, particularly for their sponginess, but that texture was lost in this preparation. With a hard shell batter, the sweetbread had a hushpuppy feel to it. The marmalade was delicious, though quite strong. Meanwhile, I enjoyed the pickled asparagus, with acidic brightness necessary to counter the earthiness of the crepinette.

Next: Upper Dry Creek Ranch lamb loin and braised lamb ravioli with midnight kale, toasted sunflower, hazelnut and parsnip puree, and balsamic-infused lamb jus. I liked the loin (with coffee and cocoa notes in the crust) more than the ravioli (with similar textural issues as the agnolotti), with the puree a refreshing counterpoint to the meatiness of the dish. But with lemon crème fraiche to the side and a salad of oil-cured olives and tomatoes on top, I believe one problem at The Marc is that there are too many elements to each dish, causing flavors to clash. With entrees pushing the $40 price point, I expect better flavors and textures. Maybe diners coming from the east will find this food “exotic,” but coming from west, I feel I can enjoy far better fine dining at a better price in Seattle. (To be fair, prices tend to run a little high throughout Walla Walla.)

Dessert would be my favorite course at The Marc, as the numerous elements actually worked well together. I enjoyed the chocolate custard with foie gras gelato, espresso gelato, and caramelized bananas. The “tower” actually has a chocolate sponge base along with banana cremeux and dark chocolate custard that’s sprayed with white chocolate that’s been colored yellow. The action included butterscotch, caramel, and espresso extract. Or something like that!

With some exception, my experience was that food is slightly off the mark in Walla Walla. I’m hopeful for future change, but for now, maybe drinking is the secret to fully enjoying the dining scene in Washington’s wine country.

Arts & Entertainment, Music

Violinist Hilary Hahn Shines at UW World Series

Violinist Hilary Hahn (Photo: Karsten Moran)

A few pieces into violinist Hilary Hahn‘s recital at the University of Washington, my companion leaned over and whispered in amazement, “Her tone is like clarified butter!” Indeed, Hahn’s sound is gloriously full and smooth — anything but gritty. When combined with her exacting technique and musical poise, it all adds up to the very picture of a master violinist at the top of her game.

A touring soloist since her teenage years, the 34-year old Hahn first gained attention for her interpretations of the classics, especially Bach. Recently, she’s expanded her musical horizons, pushing beyond the traditional classical canon. In 2012, she recorded an album of improvisations with German composer Hauschka, who’s known for his pared-down soundscapes featuring prepared piano.

Hahn’s latest recording project is In 27 Pieces: The Hilary Hahn Encores. The album features twenty-six short pieces commissioned from an illustrious list of composers including Nico Muhly, Jennifer Higdon, and Mason Bates. Hahn’s open contest to find the 27th encore drew a pool of more than 400 submissions from around the world.

Last week, Hahn visited Seattle for a UW World Series recital with pianist Cory Smythe. The April 29 concert at the UW’s Meany Hall for the Performing Arts paired repertoire by Mozart, Schubert, and Telemann with new pieces by living composers Antón García Abril and Richard Barrett, commissioned as part of Hahn’s encores project.

Speaking from the stage, Hahn introduced the pieces on the program, providing background and explaining her connection to each work. She’s an affable speaker, never talking down to the audience. Instead, Hahn’s intelligent commentary felt like an invitation to join her in her musical world.

Like her speaking, Hahn’s playing is a reflection of her personality. Calm and collected, Hahn brings a sense of understated warmth to her music. Her playing always feels firmly planted on the ground, radiating emotion instead of gushing passion.

Standing alone on Meany Hall’s immense stage, Hahn began Telemann’s Fantasia No. 6 in E Minor by creating an atmosphere of calculated melancholy. Though she took small liberties in tempo throughout the solo work’s four movements, these moments all made sense and felt completely natural. After listening to Hahn perform Telemann, it’s easy to understand why she first made her name as a Bach player. Her understated brand of musical expression brings a graceful emotionality to the Baroque style.

Spanish composer Anton Garcia Abril’s Third Sigh blends a variety of musical styles. Some harmonies recall Bartok’s beloved Hungarian folk tunes, while others evoke jazzy Gershwin tunes. Commissioned by Hahn for In 27 Pieces, Third Sigh begins with a flurry of extended violin trills that evolve into soaring melodies. At times giddy, at times grave, the work strings together beautiful phrases that flow one after another. It’s all very nice-sounding, but in the end doesn’t seem to add up to any greater statement.

“Sweet” and “tender” aren’t adjectives typically associated with Arnold Schoenberg’s work. Yet Hahn and Smythe’s performance of the Phantasy for Violin and Piano was full of unexpected sweetness and fleeting tender moments. “It’s not about each note,” said Hahn in her introduction to the piece. “It’s about the gesture. It can be spiky, but it can also be lyrical and ethereal.” There were certainly plenty of spiky moments as Hahn and Smythe exchanged volleys of notes. The musical conversation between the duo could have been enhanced by a sharper tone in the piano.

Violin and piano found an ideal balance during Mozart’s Sonata for Violin and Piano in A Major. The two-movement work began cheerfully, with Smythe’s bubbling piano lines providing a foundation for Hahn’s buoyant tone. Here Hahn’s playing was the picture of Mozartean elegance, combining the composer’s refined musical style with a dash of wit. In the theme and variations of the second movement, the duo highlighted dramatic changes from major to minor key.

Hahn and Smythe concluded with Schubert’s Fantasia in C Major for Violin and Piano, the most emotionally vulnerable performance of the evening. Here Hahn was at her most dramatic, effectively managing the ebb and flow between storm and sunshine. One impeccably-timed pause cut perfectly into a particularly angst minor key passage like a gasp of breath, seeming to bring time to a halt before dissolving into a sunny major key. Though Smythe’s sensitive accompaniment worked well in lyrical sections, he could have stepped up to better match Hahn’s energy in stormier passages.

Following on the emotional high point of the Schubert, Hahn and Smythe concluded with an encore by British composer Max Richter. The final track on In 27 Pieces, Mercy is a sweetly sentimental work that brought out yet another side of Hahn’s musical personality. Her rich violin tone took on just a hint of longing and raw emotionality, a parting gesture that left me intrigued and wanting to hear more.

Announcements

Win a prize pack, including vinyl and tickets, from KAIROS and Fin Records

We have a contest! This is very exciting!

Our friends from Fin Records have offered to give a lucky reader of The SunBreak two tickets to see the big CD release party for KAIROS at the Crocodile on Monday, May 19, plus a copy of the KAIROS EP on vinyl, and a Fin Records t-shirt.

KAIROS is the solo project from Lena Simon, who is one of the most talented musicians in Seattle. She’s in the bands Pollens (probably my favorite Seattle band at the moment), Tomten, and La Luz, plus she was even on “The Tonight Show” in January, performing with Mary Lambert. I plan on writing more about Lena Simon and KAIROS in the coming weeks, but wanted to post this contest prior.

To enter, please just send an e-mail to thesunbreak@gmail.com before 9am on Thursday, May 15 with “KAIROSTIME” in the subject line. The show’s all ages, so anyone can feel free to enter. A lucky winner will be drawn at random sometime after Thursday morning and notified shortly after that. Tickets can be obtained here for $8, and other merch can be found on Fin Records’ website, should you not want to leave things up to chance.

Below is the new single “Dirt & Grit,” that was just released yesterday:

Theatre

Love, Boats, Dystopia: Satori Brings a World to Life in Returning to Albert Joseph

It’s time, once again, to take a little trip to a dystopian world that is distressingly familiar and comfortingly strange. You know the literature: Brave New World, 1984, The Hunger Games, The Giver… Sleeper: places dominated by shadowy leaders whose image engenders fear, obedience, and rebellion. Add to the list Returning to Joseph, Satori Group’s world premiere production of a script by Spike Friedman (through May 25).

This touching meditation on love, education, and family through boat analogies and civil strife features strong performances from a pair of actors (a pair and a half, counting the prerecorded eponymous dictator). Despite a lull in the second half, the show is moving and more engaging that most one sees in a Seattle theatre season, but its greatest strength is in the details. Friedman writes with such finesse that, despite vast differences, the world of this play feels closer to our own than most plays set here and now.

The characters we discover in that world include Andrea (LoraBeth Barr) and Leo (Quinn Franzen) who meet at a rebel gathering that gets routed by loyalist forces. Andrea and Leo barely escape and Leo, who is more of a loyalist, saves their lives but suffers serious brain damage. This provides Andrea with an opportunity to rebuild his brain with rebel sympathies, much as the government brainwashes their prisoners (more effective than killing). In the process Andrea and Leo form a deep personal bond that is strained when she leads her new-made rebel home to share her achievement with her comrades.

The tale is shown in flashbacks as Andrea and Leo speak their story, or a version of their story, into a microphone in hopes of gaining access to a rebel-held shelter. They cannot see the people to whom they speak but they look up, as if at a camera, or toward a two-way mirror. We are keenly aware that we are observing, that we have power we won’t use, and that these actors/characters are vulnerable.

As they beg to be let in, to be given shelter, we in our steeply raked gallery of seats, begin to feel that the play wants something from us. We begin to look for a way to let them in, and then suddenly the tables are turned.

At intermission we are all asked to exit and instructed to leave nothing in the theatre. When we return it is to the area that had been the stage. The actors perform on the gallery that had been the house.

There is an idea at work here but the staging is awkward. The gallery is useful in terms of the script’s interest in audiences and performance, but feels wrong as the setting. It serves as a projection surface where we see video of Albert Joseph broken up on those railings, steps, and risers. This does make the leader more shadowy but seems an odd choice for a projection surface in the world of the play.

In the first half the play we watch Andrea and Leo’s relationship take shape. Barr and Quinn have great chemistry and instantly snap back and forth from their shared intimacy in the testimony scenes to the various points of growing trust in the flashbacks. The second half is less compelling, in part, because we are denied that chemistry. Instead we find Andrea alone with that projection for much of her time on stage.

The interrogation that makes up most of the second half is wickedly clever. It proceeds like a therapy session with the subject doing most of the work. The prerecorded therapist/interrogator simply provides prompts. In the world of Albert Joseph that prompting is so powerful that punishment comes in removal of the interrogator: The subject desires the torture.

The hitch is that most of the play’s dramatic action takes place in this second half and the changes don’t seem organically justified. There is little for us to discover, no need we might fulfill. All we can do is wait for Andrea to escape her engrained responses. Though she has enough perspective to see the evil in Albert Joseph’s control she remains swayed by it. When she finally and suddenly breaks she justifies the self-conscious staging of projection on gallery, calling out the performance of power and coming to question most of what she knows.

This revelation, though long in coming, leaves us with questions about our own power and place in society and the world. There’s no brow beating; they are subtle and incisive questions. Finally, Friedman is kind and hopeful enough to leave us not just unsettled but also reassured.

The world of this performance wouldn’t hold together without strong support from the technical team. Marnie Cumings builds on her growing reputation for subtle work in challenging settings. Evan Mosher’s sound design is understated and effective; even if the projector sounds feel symbolic they still do the job.

Costumes, by Doreen Sayegh and Greta Wilson, are a highlight. Both rustic and futuristic, they look like clothes one would want to wear here and now. This does nothing to diminish their efficacy as costumes. We immediately know how these two characters differ from one another by their shoes alone. It is this level of attention to detail that characterizes the entire production making it equally transporting and transforming for its audience.

{The Satori Group’s Returning to Albert Joseph plays at theLAB@Inscape through May 25, tickets can be found here.}

Arts & Entertainment, Film & TV

SIFF Turns 40, Lineup Available, Box Office Open

Late last week, SIFF unveiled the complete lineup for the 2014 festival (the 40th) on their website and in stacks of glossy printed guides all over town, complete with a full festival calendar, compact film descriptions, trailers, and all sorts of other bells and whistles. Pour one out for the much-beloved iPhone app: it’s still dead (“iSIFF, never forgotten in the hearts of SunBreakers”). Instead you’ll have to make due with bookmarks to your home screen or by summoning your best origami skills and turn the 24-day, 9-theater schedule at the guide’s centerfold into something pocketable.

Setting aside our mourning for apps of SIFFs past, let’s get ready to festival! The country’s biggest festival is knocking at our doors, wired and ready to celebrate its fortieth birthday in style. If you’re not yet ready for 435 films from 83 countries (198 features, 60 documentaries, 163 short films), it’s time to set up your war rooms because starting on on Thursday May 15th, 44 world premieres, 29 North American premieres, and 13 U.S. premieres are rolling into town. Can you ever be truly prepared for this film onslaught? Of course not! Don’t be ridiculous.

That’s why in the coming weeks we’ll be hivemindmelding to help you figure out what…tenth, let’s say, of this festival is worth your precious time. And really, if you see a quarter of those, you’ll feel it your stiff legs, bleary eyes, and sun-deprived skin by the end. As this year’s ad campaign goes, so say we all: “You will be returned home safely but forever changed”.

If you can’t wait for our crystal ball readings, but know that you like your fims, for instance, to get romantic, induce nightmares, take you on a rocket ship to adventure, or cause you to feel horribly melancholic upon having the dire state of human rights/environmental collapse/economic atrocities/etc., SIFF continues to organizing the festival into user-friendly tourist destinations (“Coast of Passion”, “Bay of Merriment”, “Plans of Truth”, “Adrenaline Forest”, “Thought Trails”, “Uncharted Territory”, “Sea of Knowledge”, “Cape of Outer Limits”, “Originality Oasis”, and “the Melodic Sea”), each with their own respective  Moods (some of which overlap).

Let’s hash through the details (and DEFINITELY reacquaint yourself with last year’s tips & tricks): Early-bird prices have come and gone, but you can still sign up for an all-you-can-eat buffet by getting a series passes or set more achievable goals with a bulk order of six or twenty slightly-discounted tickets. Aside from shopping online, the festival maintains two box offices — on at SIFF Cinema in Lower Queen Anne and another at Pacific Place. In terms of in-city programming, this year’s map remains fairly compact with most regular screenings taking place downtown at Pacific Place, in Capitol Hill at the temporarily-revived Egyptian and Harvard Exit, and on SIFF’s home turf in lower Queen Anne with three screens at the Uptown and one at the Film Center. Once again, the festival will take the show on the road to Bellevue (Lincoln Square), Renton, and Kirkland, but we have enough trouble catching everything in Seattle and don’t expect to venture too far beyond city limits.

 

ALL OF THE GALAS:

The Opening Night film features Andre “3000” Benjamin as onetime local, legendary guitarist, and permanent bronze Broadway fixture, Jimi Hendrix.  Directed by John Ridley, Jimi: All Is By My Side kicks off the festival on May 15 @ McCaw Hall and is followed with all sorts of gala festivities and various price points to meet your needs for fanciness.

In addition to the opening night soiree, the festival is packed with parties. There are also a series of “Saturday Parties” to reward you for making it through the week: Saturday #1 is fashion-centered with Dior and I + Il Fornaio, #2 gets science-metaphysical with I Origins + Kaspar’s,  and #3 is the Centerpiece Gala, featuring  the film I’m probably most excited about at the whole festival: Richard Linklater’s long-film experiment, Boyhood, followed by a party at the DAR Rainier Chapter House on Capitol Hill, and #4 finds Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler (swoon) lampooning rom-coms in They Came Together and getting boozy at the W hotel. Is that enough parties? It is most certainly not. You’ll also find the festival celebrating the African Pictures Program (Friday, June 6th with Alex Gibney’s Finding Fela), “the gays” with Helicopter Mom anchoring a mid-week “Gay-La” party at Q (June 4th), as well as opening nights in Renton (Megan Griffith’s Lucky Them, May 22nd) and Kirkland (the Grand Seduction, May 29th). If you’re still standing after all of those parties, stumble over to the Cinerama to watch Elisabeth Moss and Mark Duplass surreally rekindling their marriage at a romantic retreat in The One I Love, followed by a massive #SIFForty send-off at MOHAI on Sunday June 8th.  If you plan on diving deep into the SIFF party scene, the “Gala and Party Pass” gets you into most of them along with open bar privileges for $300 ($250 for members).

And this year, SIFF also pays tribute to a several film legends, bringing them into the company of film lovers for the right price. But don’t hold your breath, as these are cancellation-prone:

  • An Afternoon with Laura Dern (SIFF’s Outstanding Achievement in Acting), featuring a screening of Wild At Heart on May 17th @ Egyptian. She’ll also appear with thousands of sobbing teenagers for a presentation of The Fault in Our Stars on Friday May 16th.
  •  An Evening with Chiwetel Ejiofor (also receiving SIFF’s Outstanding Achievement in Acting) accompanies his Half a Yellow Sun on May 19th @ the Egyptian. He’ll also appear with legions of brown coats for a special presentation of Serenity on May 18th.
  • An Evening with Quincy Jones (receiving SIFF’s Lifetime Achievement Award), featuring a screening of his film Keep On Keepin’ On. June 4 @ SIFF Cinema Uptown.
  • An Evening with the Justin Kauflin Trio features the blind jazz pianist from Keep On Keepin’ On performing in concert, with an introduction from Quincy Jones. June 5 @ Triple Door.

 

But wait, there’s more. Along with 3D Bears, animated dragons, Game of Thones stars in non-Westerosi adventures, there are also fourteen film programs (including an archival presentation of Last Year at Marienbad!), seven competitions (a set of which is decided entirely by your votes), and a Secret Festival that includes Sunday morning screenings of films so exclusive that an Oath of Silence is required for entry. 

Can’t wait? Start scouring the festival’s offerings and strategically slotting them into your social calendars, with extra credit for plotting out agendas that allow you to see multiple films at different venues while finding non-popped sustenance. To get yourself in the mood, take a few looks at this year’s trailer and try to (1) identify all of the referenced films and (2) how many viewings it will take for you to despise and/or memorize it.

Film & TV

Short reviews of short films at STIFF

STIFF, Seattle True Independent Film Festival, opens tonight and runs through next Saturday with a bunch great films, both short and feature length and as many zombie fuckfests as they can program. It’s the last year that STIFF is STIFF as we’ve come to know it as next year it rebrands as “Seattle Transmedia International Film Festival.”

I watched a handful of short films, where I only knew the title, to get a sample of what kinds of films one can expect at STIFF. You can find more info and get tickets on the festival’s website, of course.

Absent, dir: Malcolm Badewitz (4 minutes, Saturday, May 3 at 6pm, Grand Illusion Cinema)

Powerful, silent film that deals with the two families involved in a police shooting when a daughter wants to confront the police officer who shot her father. It’s a moving narrative that is made all the more poignant when there’s no sound, forcing you to react to it on your own terms.

Deadbook, dir: Richard Scobie (15 minutes, Thursday, May 8 at 10pm, LUCID Lounge)

Deadbook is a social network that lets people stay in touch with their loved ones for all of eternity. I’m not sure if it’s meant to be a parody of The Social Network, but it is a clever concept, and is still better than getting “poked” by your friends from the grave.

A Dose for Dominic, dir: Ruth Gregory, (7 minutes, Saturday, May 10 at 4pm, Grand Illusion Cinema)

Raising a five-year old child with severe autism and violent outbursts, two parents turn to medical cannabis as a means of treating their son’s condition. It’s an interesting movie that handles the subject deftly, and includes interviews with the doctors on how they developed a treatment that would work their son and how it worked out for them (spoiler: pretty good!).

Drive-Thru, dir: Georgina Higgins, (4 minutes, Wednesday, May 7 at 10pm, LUCID Lounge)

A claustrophobic comedy where two friends from a London suburb re-connect with a long-lost friend for a night in the Big City. It leads them to being chased when that friend turns out to be trouble. Their big night out takes a funny turn when they get hungry.

F’ing with Burlesque: PCP, dir. Tony James (20 minutes, Friday, May 9 at 8pm, Grand Illusion Cinema)

Popular local cult production features Gaydolf Hitler and his Mirror trapped in Gay Hell and they want to get out, so they decide to tempt Beelzebub with pot laced with PCP. It works out about as well as that sounds. The movie feels like it’s trying to recreate (or be an addition to) using hallucinogens. Loved the campiness, though.

I Am Not a Weird Person, dir: Molly McGlinn (5 minutes, Monday, May 5 at 7:30pm, LUCID Lounge)

A sort of twee short with a protagonist who needs to leave the house eventually because she’s out of toothpaste but doesn’t want to because she experienced a traumatic experience outside (someone told her to get out of his way, impolitely).

Meet My Rapist, dir: Jessie Beth Kahnweiler (7 minutes, Friday, May 9 at 8pm, Grand Illusion Cinema)

Dark, low budget comedy about Jessie who has a chance encounter at a farmer’s market with the man who raped her and shows how he’s shaped much of her life since then, and how it affects how people perceive her.

Sixnineteen: A Short Documentary, dir: Brian Nunes (27 minutes, Tuesday, May 6 at 6pm, Wing-It Productions)

This short doc would make an excellent companion to Razing the Bar, a documentary playing at SIFF about the demolished rock club the Funhouse. 619 Western Ave. was the home for artists for about thirty years before having to be tore down to make room for Seattle’s now-troubled tunnel project. It was inexpensive for artists to rent space there, and there hasn’t been anything to replace it. It was a dilapidated building to be sure, but it raises – and answers – some important questions that people anyone concerned with arts in Seattle need to grapple with.

Throwing Punches, dir: Rosalie Miller (13 minutes, Wednesday, may 7 at 8pm, LUCID Lounge)

A short documentary on martial arts instructor-turned-stuntwoman Leanne Hindle. It nicely summarizes the determination that propelled her career, and it’s a portrait of Hollywood (exported to Vancouver, where Hindle is from) that we only get to see on the rarest of occasions.