Recent Stories with tag film

SIFF scores yet another week of weather-to-see-movies-to! With the festival almost at its midway point, I don't think there's been a single day I've had to decide between sun and movie theater. Below are some films of note showing over the next two days. For all film screenings, the general/member ticket prices are $11/$9 (and matinees $8/$7), except for special presentations which cost more.

Tuesday brings previously recommended Some Days Are Better Than Others and local high-school effort Senior Prom.

Bilal's Stand  Based on a true story, 25-year-old Sultan Sharrief’s first feature-length film introduces you to Bilal, a Detroit kid heading to the University of Michigan if he can win an ice-sculpting competition and convince his Muslim family he's not selling them out. Be warned: It's either "bursting with heart" or "incredibly hamfisted." (May 31, 6:30 p.m. & June 2, 4 p.m. @ Pacific Place)

Waste Land  It's already won best documentary at both the Sundance and Berlin International Film Festivals, so there you go. New York artist Vik Muniz visits Jardim Gramacho, the world’s largest landfill, outside of Rio de Janeiro, and enlists garbage pickers to help him create a new artwork. (June 1, 7 p.m. & June 2, 9:30 p.m. @ Pacific Place)

Henri Georges Clouzot's Inferno  In this documentary, Serge Bromberg investigates the 13 hours of 1964 footage shot by The Wages of Fear and Diabolique director Henri-Georges Clouzot before his heart attack shut down what was already a troubled production. It's like a sketchbook for a new cinema. (June 1, 7 p.m. @ the Harvard Exit)

Secrets of the Tribe  The Yanomami Indians have launched many an anthropologist's career; now director José Padilha's (Bus 174, Elite Squad) documentary studies the "tribe" of intellectuals and academics who are experts on the Yanomami, contrasting their findings with what the Yanomami actually think. (June 1, 7 p.m. & June 2, 4 p.m. @ SIFF Cinema, June 7, 9:15 p.m. @ the Harvard Exit)

Stigmata  First-time Spanish director Adan Aliaga has "hauntingly" translated a graphic novel in which gentle giant Bruno wakes up with stigmata, and it's not exactly the blessing you'd hope. Filmed in black-and-white, so you know it's serious and moody and symbolic. (June 1, 9:30 p.m. @ SIFF Cinema; June 3, 4:15 p.m. @ Pacific Place)

I Killed My Mother  French-Canadian prodigy Xavier Dolan directed this uneven but wickedly funny gay-son-vs.-mom movie when he was just 21. It's as much about him learning to direct as it is a comic coming of age story, so it should be fun for filmsters who like their moms, too. (June 2 & 6, 7 p.m. @ the Egyptian)

Mother Joan of the Angels  On the classics front, this 1961 Polish masterpiece about the 17th-century exorcism of a Mother Superior has no pea-soup vomit to offer, but instead delves into what repression does to people. Which is actually scarier, if you think about it. (June 2, 7 p.m. @ SIFF Cinema)...

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Director Alan Rudolph is like the American Eric Rohmer--he's made a career out of making the films he can make, and whether you think of them as small, indie, or arthouse, they're almost always watchable, engaging studies of people in particular places.

Yet in his way, contra Rohmer, he's as stylized as Mamet--you can tell a Rudolph film by the emotional distance of the protagonists, their literate wit, the shellacked look of the men's hair. (In the first two instances, he's the cine-godfather of Whit Stillman.) Whatever genre he has chosen to work in each time, the results are best preceded by "off-kilter."

SIFF's "Next Stop Rain City" mini-retrospective this weekend brings six of Rudolph's films, with double-features on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at SIFF Cinema at McCaw Hall.

Friday is the "striking and indelible" noir Remember My Name starring Anthony Perkins as the sane one, plus Choose Me, a sex comedy and guide to falling for Geneviève Bujold. Saturday brings the thriller-ish Trouble in Mind and the slice-of-Scott-Fitzgerald The Moderns, and Sunday, Julie Christie and Nick Nolte heat up Afterglow and Bruce Willis stars in the "painful to watch" Breakfast of Champions.

The Moderns has, as a side benefit, a truly beautiful Paris jazz-inflected soundtrack. Cannily, SIFF has paired one of Rudolph's acknowledged personal bests, Afterglow, with the roundly panned Kilgore Trout vehicle.

If your knowledge on Tibet's struggle against the jackboot of Chinese subjugation consists of celebrity lip service and the odd "Free Tibet" bumper sticker, The Sun Behind the Clouds: Tibet's Struggle for Freedom, Ritu Sarlin and Tenzing Sonam's new documentary on the subject, should serve as an excellent primer. And like any good non-fiction film it throws some welcome curve balls of illumination at viewers.

The film (playing at SIFF Cinema April 16-22) presents a living snapshot of 2008, one of the most tumultuous years of the struggle since China's takeover of Tibet in 1959. Over the course of its 79-minute running time, The Sun Behind the Clouds chronicles the explosion of protests in Tibet that year, the Beijing Olympics, the Dalai Lama's attempts to attain Tibetan autonomy via compromise and diplomacy with the Chinese government, and an angry young generation of Tibetans hungry for a more direct and confrontational approach to attaining their country's freedom.

It's a complex swirl of events, at whose center lives an important--maybe even unresolvable--debate within Tibet itself. For nearly three decades The Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual, religious, and political leader, has pursued The Middle Way, a diplomatic resolution to the conflict. His basic intent: Ceding Tibet's independence in exchange for his country's genuine autonomy. But this methodology, built on his Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compromise, doesn't sit well with the increasingly restless younger face of Tibet. Journalists, radicals, and monks who've spent their entire lives beneath the yoke of Chinese leadership are mad as hell, and they don't want to take it anymore....

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• Hubble 3D plays at the Pacific Science Center's Boeing IMAX Theater through at least June 11.

How good could Hubble 3D be, I asked myself? I don't think I could have imagined it, beforehand. I just had a niggling interest in seeing those cool galactic photos on a big, big screen. But just think how good a film called something really sexy like Hubble has to be to win a weekend-average against the cineplex offerings. Which it did last weekend, says the Baltimore Sun:

...the best news may be that the highest per-screen average for last weekend ($9,146 per theater) belongs to Hubble 3D, Toni Myers’ eye-popping, mind-enlarging IMAX 3-D documentary about the final servicing mission to the Hubble orbiting space telescope.

That is the 43-minute story: After a brief introduction to telescopes (Hey, it's for the kids!), the film traces the life of the Hubble, from its initial launch into space, to the discovery of its blurred vision, and subsequent repair attempts...and more repair attempts. The "present day" takes up with NASA's final attempt to upgrade Hubble in 2009--and a 3D IMAX camera comes along for the ride.

You visit with astronauts prepping for the task in a 6-million gallon pool (that simulates weightlessness) containing a replica of a shuttle payload bay and the Hubble. It's like an outtake from The Abyss, but with better lighting. You're up on the gantry when the visibly worn Atlantis shuttle takes off. You watch from a camera outside the shuttle as the rocket boosters disengage and fall away. You suddenly develop vertigo during a 3D spacewalk; helmet cams show their tussle with a stuck bolt. Inside, it's like how many astronauts can you fit in a phone booth. Trips to the bathroom, an astronaut says, waggling a vacuum hose, rely on the power of suction....

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A few days after interviewing director Dan Ireland (see Part One here), I attend the SIFF Twelve-Hour Marathon on March 21. The director's in attendance to introduce the screening of his beloved debut, The Whole Wide World. I introduce myself, and sure enough, in person he's as gregarious, focused, and cheerful as he was on the phone. He thanks me profusely for the interview, and enthuses about introducing the night's final film, Trouble in Mind.

Then he buzzes into the auditorium to usher in this screening of his baby. Ireland's hearty and infectious laugh resonates through the auditorium as he speaks passionately about the rigors of making The Whole Wide World, and about his pride in the director's cut he's brought.

The movie screens to a sizable and engrossed audience. It holds up incredibly well as an unforced evocation of its period setting, as an incredibly astute mirror to the creative process, and as an affecting love story.

At one point I turn away from its ambling beauty to glance to my left. The director's sitting in the center of the theater watching his work, and the expression on his face reflects not so much the scrutinizing perfectionist or the gloating egotist so much as the enchanted movie fan. It's taken him years to be able to watch The Whole Wide World with the non-critical eye of an audience member, and he--like the rest of the crowd--is allowing himself to be captivated.

That expression revisits his face again during the screening of Trouble in Mind, and it's not too much of a stretch envisioning this grown man as a kid in Vancouver, drinking in the magic of cinema on the proceeds scraped from the inside of his mom's purse.

In Part Two of his interview with the SunBreak, Ireland speaks in detail about the rest of his body of work, about the pleasures and pains of being a truly independent moviemaker, and about the role his mother played in forming his passion for cinema.

I wanted to ask you about the development of The Velocity of Gary...was that another situation where D'Onofrio had a lot of input?...

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15th Ave Coffee & Tea has its own rain table.

I'm not too proud to admit I've been in 15th Ave Coffee & Tea a few times, drawn like a hapless mariner by the siren song of the Clover machine. But it wasn't until I read this Reuters story on Starbucks' experiment with "indie" stores in Seattle that I learned how good we really have it.

First of all, the wine and beer are Seattle options. You're not going to find that elsewhere. Why? Because we're adults, in Seattle. We can have nice things. The rest of the country--pfft. Scrubs. Also, Howard Schultz lives here. You know Howard, he likes a glass of wine now and then.

(Luckily, he can still afford the nice stuff. The New York Times reports:

Howard Schultz of Starbucks requested last year that his base salary be reduced from $1.19 million to $6,900 as "a personal contribution to cost-control efforts," according to a company statement. However, the company later gave him a $1 million "discretionary bonus" that nearly made up for his sacrifice.)

The alcohol is an interesting "experiment," because Starbucks tells Reuters: "We have no plans at this time to offer these beverages in other locations."

Secondly, we get movie night. I hadn't realized this, either. At Roy St. Coffee & Tea (not on Roy Street, so don't get lost) at the north end of Broadway, they've been showing independent films, with a preference for shorts. And they're participating in Capitol Hill's Blitz Art Walk this Thursday with a jazz/modern dance combo--speaking of things that won't play in Peoria. (The 15th location is also doing jazz CD release parties.)

I know that in some circles it is not permitted to admit that you go to Starbucks, let alone an appropriated-hipster Starbucks, but I have to say: Seattle, we're getting a pretty sweet deal with this experiment. Now, we're owed--a lot--because of the Sonics. But I blame the NBA more than Howard, and I'm willing to let him try to make amends.

The beer and wine and jazz and movies and fireworks are nice. Let's keep this ball rolling. If you have suggestions, I'll collect them and forward to Starbucks.

In an age when even the most idiosyncratic film directors allow their visions to be diluted by the tsunami that is corporate-sponsored modern cinema, Dan Ireland has defiantly crafted subtle, engrossing, and fiercely-independent character studies for fifteen years.

Ireland studied directing at the figurative feet of masters as co-founder (with Darryl MacDonald) of the Seattle International Film Festival, purchased and renovated Seattle's beloved Egyptian Theater, and segued into film production with Vestron Pictures in the mid-1980s before taking the director's chair on The Whole Wide World in 1996. With that kind of trajectory, it's no surprise that Dan Ireland's rife with great stories about every phase of his journey to date.

Informed by the arthouse features he championed at SIFF as a programmer, Ireland's own films cover a wide swath of subject matter--from a romantic triangle involving a bisexual porn star, a male hustler, and a waitress (The Velocity of Gary), to a vividly-observed portrayal of Massachusetts-based Portugese-Americans (Passionada), to a bravura showcase for the legendary Joan Plowright (Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont), to his award-winning E.L. Doctorow adaptation Jolene. The trademarks of his style: an emphasis on characterization and a unique eye for spotting up-and-coming actors, as well as bringing out the best in already-established ones.

SIFF's prodigal father returns to Seattle on Sunday to present a director's cut of The Whole Wide World, his affecting drama detailing the relationship between pulp author Robert E. Howard (Vincent D'Onofrio) and schoolteacher Novalyne Price (Renee Zellweger, in her film debut). It's a perfect opening film for SIFF Cinema's Twelve-Hour Movie Marathon, an innovative fundraiser showcasing a stellar lineup of films significant to SIFF's history. The movie stands, in its own quiet way, as one of the best films of the '90s, and one of the Fest's most cherished progeny.

Ireland talked to The SunBreak in detail about the many hats he's worn over the years (stay tuned for part two of this interview next week). But the first portion of our conversation orbited around his acclaimed first feature, its impact on his life and career, and how the director's cut of The Whole Wide World differs from the original theatrical release....

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"An hour-long parade of topless women," is the grabber DVD Verdict uses to get you into the review of LeGong: Dance of the Virgins, but it also says the 1935 film is "like a National Geographic photo spread come to life, replete with the gaudy temples, weather-worn faces, and vaguely erotic naked torsos. From historical, sociological, and ethnographic standpoints, the footage in this film is fascinating."

"Actually filmed in Bali," the movie poster assures you, by Marquis Henry de la Falaise. It was shot in two-color Technicolor. You wish the Paramount would have rounded up a gamelan orchestra, but it looks like the Paramount's Mighty Wurlitzer will be pressed into action, with Jim Riggs at the keyboard.

Trader Joe's Silent Movie Mondays begin at 7 p.m. (tickets are $12 adults/$9 students & seniors). After LeGong, the Silents of the South Seas brings Sadie Thompson and F. W. Murnau's Tabu, before closing up on March 29 with a collection of three Charlie Chaplin shorts.

After you watch the other film award show this weekend, take your sense of outrage and "we wuz robbed" to the 20/20 Awards, held next weekend, March 15th at Central Cinema (1411 21st Ave). It features a little less red-carpet treatment, and more brutal honesty.

The organizers explain it like this: "We're going back 20 years to 'correct' the Academy Awards with the advantage of time, perspective, and history." They're doing 15 categories; things start at 7 p.m. Unsuccessful Oscar-defenders will be forever sullied, "new" faces will be rewarded with a Felix.

But of course, just holding an awards show is honor enough. They've managed to placate the lawyers for AMPAS (the cease-and-desist letter was "surprisingly friendly, breezy, and showed a sense of humor"). Some film industry folks were all set to become part of the 20/20 Voting Syndicate body, then reconsidered going on record.

This year, it's the 1990 Academy Awards put under the scrutiny of hindsight. Of the six 20/20 nods for Best Picture, none were noticed by the original Academy back in 1990. Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing is up for seven 20/20 Awards, despite its poor showing with Oscar voters. And up for Best Doc is Michael Moore’s vastly influential Roger & Me, which didn’t even get a nomination.

The cavalcade of 20/20 stars includes Tyrone Brown (BrownBox Theater); Michael Seiwaerath (former NW Film Forum honcho); Curtiss Marlowe (Geek #1 in Heathers); Brendan Kiley, Lindy West, David Schmader (the Stranger); Andrew Chapman (cinematographer); dj Riz Rollins (KEXP); Jennifer Zeyl (scenic designer); Josh Feit (Publicola); Paul Mullin (gadfly/playwright); Gavin Borchert (Seattle Weekly); Sue Corcoran (writer/director), Brian McDonald (writer/bon vivant) and Sean Nelson (man about town).

Breaking Upwards Movie Trailer from Breaking Upwards on Vimeo.

Not since the Stanford Experiment has someone come up with such a jarring hypothetical "Now let's see what happens" scenario. In Breaking Upwards, director/actor Daryl Wein and actress Zoe Lister-Jones film their own break-up by degrees. Instead of quitting each other cold turkey, they take days "off" from their relationship. The results, not wholly unexpectedly, don't go according to plan. Film School Rejects gives the film, on the other hand, an A. High Times says it kicks the shit out of Garden State.

Tonight at 7 p.m., Breaking Upwards plays at Central Cinema, as part of STIFF Night for February. Pizza, beer, and a break-up movie: we've got your perfect Thursday night right here.

"Their Love Was a Flame That Destroyed!" was a tagline for The Postman Always Rings Twice. Remade  in '81 with Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange, it was the 1946 original with Lana Turner and John Garfield that set the standard for erotic thrillers to come.

The YouTube trailer, above (compare with the original trailer), updates the opening credits so you aren't fooled into thinking all classic black-and-white films feature wholesome glimpses of sleepy small towns. Some are about plotting to kill your husband.

Tomorrow, Sunday, February 21, SIFF presents Postman (1:30 p.m., 6 p.m.) in a double feature with John Garfield's last film, 1951's He Ran All the Way  (4 p.m., 8:30 p.m.). There's a small-time hood, a cop shooting, a manhunt, and Shelley Winters. The Guardian says, "It's a doom-laden movie, wonderfully lit by cinematographer James Wong Howe." Here's a clip.

Tonight only, at 8 p.m. at the Northwest Film Forum, For the Love of Movies is screening, with the director in attendance. If you can pry yourself away from the Olympics for 81 minutes, it sounds like a wonderful evening. Or so SFGate tells me.

Critic Gerald Peary has documented the history of film criticism in America as it heads--like just about every other field of criticism--into an online form whose future is still obscure. The film includes commentary from reviews such as Roger Ebert, Kenneth Turan, Lisa Schwarzbaum, and A.O. Scott, along with some "young, articulate, internet voices." 

On the history front, the high moments are likely to do with 1960s and '70s--that high-water mark of American cinema was accompanied by critics (Pauline Kael, Andrew Sarris) whose work is still read for its own literary merits.

Much like Joe Camel and smoking, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's 1948 film The Red Shoes has corrupted generations of young people by giving them the idea to become dancers. The romance! The beauty! The ruined bodies, lack of steady pay, and short career that leaves you with few options other than to become a yoga instructor! Well, I may be being hyperbolic (actually I'm not), but whatever the case, the film's a gorgeous classic, wrapping the story of a young ballerina making it big around Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tale about an enchanted pair of ballet slippers. There are three more chances to see it this week at the Northwest Film Forum--if you can get tickets at the door. They're sold out online.

We're in the Christmas homestretch, with New Year's on the way, which means that there's extra time to watch movies, either in the warm/suffocating bosom of your family or as far as possible in the opposite direction.

Luckily Hollywood, like a deranged mother, has given us everything we could possible want in a holiday theme, whether it's impossibly heart-warming or wonderfully black-hearted. Here are our top picks. If we've missed yours, please let us know in the comments. And keep in mind that our sponsor Scarecrow Video would be a great place to get any of the following:

Seth: The Apartment: They just don't make movies like this anymore. Billy Wilder's masterpiece about a schlubby office worker (Jack Lemmon) who meets the girl of his dreams (Shirley MacLaine) defies categorization. Where does Blockbuster put a comedy that contains a suicide attempt? Set during Christmas--if not exactly a "Christmas movie"--this is one of the best things you'll ever see, film-wise.

Tony: Gotta throw in the Strangeoid Quotient and give my nod(s) to Black Christmas, a sly and creepy 1974 chiller in which a shadowy killer picks off a group of sorority girls in their creepy old house: Margot Kidder makes a great nasty Queen Bitch Kitty, its ending twist predates the slasher spate of the late '70s/early '80s, and it's directed by (Six Degrees alert!) Bob Clark, director of A Christmas Story. Of course my all-time favorite is Santa Claus, a 1959 Mexican flick in which Santa operates from a City in the Clouds, scores wacky dust from Merlin the Magician, and runs afoul of Satan. It's a kid's movie!

Jeremy: It's cliche, but A Christmas Story. Come on! [SPOILER!] He actually shoots his eye out!

Josh: Arnaud Desplechin's Un conte de Noël is probably not the first DVD to grab for heartwarming times around the family DVD player, but it's depiction of a sprawling dysfunctional French family might just make your own relatives seem reassuringly quaint in comparison. Catherine Deneuve is the caustic matriarch with a recent cancer diagnosis, Mathieu Amalric is son who was only conceived to save a dying brother, Anne Consigny is the eldest sister who banished her brother in a questionable family business-saving legal maneuver. The film would be worthwhile for the guardedly tender insults that comprise almost all of Deneuve's conversations with Amalric, but there's also another brother, a friendly neighbor, plenty of long-suppressed romantic intrigue, a teen who hallucinates wolves, and adorable kids who put on an incomprehensible play. After spending five cinematic days with this bunch, you'll feel like a part of their extended clan. Whether you want to return to them or stay at the vacation house for the rest of the holiday may vary.

Don: Die Hard. Nothing brings home the concept of holidays being about family like defending them from terrorists using your wits and a clever, profane catch phrase. Also: things blow up and America wins.

Jack: Elf. [Which not coincidentally is playing right now at Central Cinema, through December 23!] No one could have played that role like Will Ferrell. Also, Zooey Deschanel is my girlfriend. My favorite scene is the one where Miles Finch (Peter Dinklage) attacks Buddy for calling him an elf over and over again: "He's an angry elf!"

Donte: Love Actually. Hugh Grant at his stammeringly charming best, surrounded by an ensemble cast (Bill Nighy, Liam Neeson, Emma Thompson, Colin Firth) portraying the many facets of love in holiday season London. "Chick flick" or no, this movie can calm anyone's inner Scrooge--the attractive cast doesn't hurt either. (Josh: For the record, there are those whose inner Scrooges are inflamed by Love Actually. Clint: Donte's right: Love Actually is wonderful.)

James: One of the funniest screwball comedies ever made ends with a Christmas miracle, which makes it as much a Christmas movie as its contemporary (and reigning Christmas movie king) It's a Wonderful Life (showing at the Grand Illusion through December 31st). What's the Miracle of Morgan's Creek? That would be telling, but small-town girl Trudy Kockenlocker needs one. Trudy winds up married to and pregnant by a soldier--possibly named "Ratzkiwatzki"--who ships out before she sobers up. Norval Jones, who's been infatuated with her for years, sacrifices every last shred of dignity to help her out, but the two of them end up buried under a madcap mudslide of bad decisions. Preston Sturges is a master of slapstick satire, and in Miracle he's working at top form (almost--The Lady Eve ain't a Christmas flick, but it's equally unmissable). George Bailey makes you weepy; the Kockenlockers clan make you weep with laughter.

Clint: Planes, Trains and Automobiles. (Thanksgiving counts, right?) Steve Martin + John Candy + R rating = Unforgettably awesome. The mismatched, accidentally-aligned duo attempts to get home for Thanksgiving and, yes, hilarity ensues. A great (refreshingly non-teen angst) movie to remember Candy ("I like me. My wife likes me.") and Hughes by. And there's Martin dropping 18 F-bombs in less than a minute. "I want a fucking car. Right. Fucking. Now." They don't make mature/silly comedies like this anymore.

RvO: The Ref is a bitter, caustic, profane and frequently hilarious holiday treat. Denis Leary is a thief on the run who kidnaps the hyper-bickering Kevin Spacey and Judy Davis and hides out in their lush suburban home on Christmas Eve. If you thought your family gatherings were dysfunctional, think again. Leary, who punches out Santa at one point, has never been better and Spacey is brilliant in a similar, but much better, role than his Oscar-winning turn in American Beauty. Or turn back the clock for Stalag 17, set in German POW camp during WWII. On Christmas Eve, officers in one of the barracks find out that they have a Nazi spy among their ranks who is tipping the guards to escape attempts. William Holden gives a brilliant performance as the cynical, hard-bitten Sgt. Sefton who is accused of being the spy. Magnificently directed by Billy Wilder, this tense, thrilling and award-winning film about deliverance at Christmas is a stunning tour-de-force.

MvB: Double feature! Scrooged with Holiday Inn. Bill Murray is an updated Scrooge, a gloriously cynical TV exec, and is joined by an outstanding cast including Bobcat Goldthwait, Carol Kane, Robert Mitchum, and Jamie Farr. He's so bitterly funny, you're sad to see Murray cheer up near the end. Holiday Inn is the ur-Christmas movie, starring Bing "White Christmas" Crosby and Fred Astaire. You should probably be wearing a sweater, vest, or sweater vest, and be sipping egg nog or a butterscotch schnapps/hot chocolate combo....

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For one day only, the HDFest is in town at The SunBreak sponsor Central Cinema. (Round of applause!) Screenings will run all day tomorrow, December 6, from 1:30 to 10:30 p.m.

Tickets are just $10, but if you're among the first ten people to tell the box office, "The SunBreak sent me!" you get in free. How wonderful is that. That way you can spend that $10 you saved on pizza and beer, which will be delivered right to your table.

At the festival you'll see a variety of shorts and features shot in--wait for it--the high definition format all the kids are talking about. I am told the program includes the documentary film Down Days (shot in Haines, Alaska, it takes you inside the life of the big mountain extreme skier) and the U.S. premiere of the Scottish eco-thriller Dark Nature, along with animated shorts and music videos.

In theory there is more information at the HDFest website, but it's down as of my typing this. it's up again. Animated shorts come first (1:30-2:30), then music videos (2:45-4:15), then short films (4:30-6:00). Each of these showcases is $10, I think. At 6:15, it's a documentary on how to colonize the stars, and Down Days screens, followed by Dark Nature.

• HDFest runs Sunday, December 6, at Central Cinema, from 1:30 to 10:30 p.m. The first ten people to tell the box office, "The SunBreak sent me!" get in free. Otherwise, it's just $10.

Pragda's annual Festival of New Spanish Cinema brings eight films to SIFF's McCaw Hall theater, tonight through October 21 (full series pass: $50, $40 for SIFF members--that's a big savings because each film is $10). That "new" is supposed to tip you off that it isn't all Almodovar. In fact, there isn't any Almodovar. Let's get that straight right now. But there are Almodovar actresses (see photo).

Tonight's opening night fiesta kicks off with Desperate Women (Enloquecidas), directed by Juan Luis Iborra. It's a "hilarious and outrageous thriller" in which a young woman meets the man of her dreams, only to discover that he's supposed to be dead. Ha! Spanish women don't let a little thing like death stop them.

After the film, there's a see-and-schmooze event at the Alki Room at Seattle Center, in celebration of the festival. Irene Cardona, director of A Fiance for Yasmina, is supposed to show, and there'll be Spanish music, complimentary Freixenet Spanish Cava, and paella from Taberna del Alabardero. (Tickets<...

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Up until a few years ago, the zombie movie was looked down upon by the masses as Horror Cinema's thick-witted, bloody-jowled stepchild.

But no more. The sub-genre's now a beloved fixture of modern pop culture. Between George Romero's pioneering efforts on its behalf, and modern contributions like Shaun of the Dead and the turbocharged sorta-undead epic 28 Days Later, the zombie film has definitely shown legs. Not all of them have been ripped from bodies, either.

Hordes of the living dead (OK, enthusiastic horror nerds) converged on the Museum of History and Industry Saturday night for the 2009 Revenant Film Festival, a celebration of zombie cinema put on by the new plasma-pumping periodical on the block, Revenant magazine. And happily, those fans were greeted with independently-made features and shorts that provided plenty of gut-munching bang for the buck.

The most pleasant surprise of the night? The remarkably high quality of all of the film submissions....

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Ólöf Arnalds

To mark Icelandair's new direct flights to Iceland from SeaTac, Iceland Naturally is putting on a mini-Icelandic cultural festival, and that marks the most times I've typed "Iceland" in a sentence, ever.

 

For the foodies hungering for innovative tastes, you've got chefs Thorarinn Eggertsson (from Reykjavik's Orange) and Peter Birk at Ray's Boathouse. Their Icelandic menu is available today through the 13th.

Probably that menu will not include whale because of the potential controversy, disappointing fans of tremendously musky, salty, oily food. But if you want to talk about Iceland and sustainable fisheries, for free, then tonight you can weep salty tears of joy. Don't miss "The Icelandic Project on Documenting and Communicating Responsible Fisheries" (6-8 p.m., UW Health Sciences, Hogness Auditorium Room A420).

There's also a free Icelandic film fest at the Varsity in the U-District: White Night Wedding (6:30 p.m.) and Rafskinna (8:20 p.m.). For White Night Wedding, writer/director Baltasar Kormákur has updated and tweaked Chekhov's Ivanov, and the results are a distinctly Icelandic bittersweet sensation. A middle-aged professor is about to marry a former student on the island of Flatey, during the time of year when Icelanders all get a little crazy from the unending daylight.

The third episode of Rafskinna, a DVD magazine, is about music and features: "Animal Collective, Antony and the Johnsons, Olaf Arnalds, Dalek, Emiliana Torrini, FM Belfast, Retro Stefson, Ragnar Kjartansson, Michael Madsen, Finboggi Petursson, Nico Muhly, Psychic TV, and Curver Thoroddsen." That's a nice segué to our next item!

Friday night, September 11, singer Ólöf Arnalds appears at the Crocodile ($10, 21+, 8 p.m.). Expect "emotionally rich" folk music of the kind you can preview right here. It's her first West coast show. People Eating People open.

A still from "Confessions of a Ex-Doofus-Itchyfooted Mutha"

Melvin Van Peebles makes movies his own damned way, thanks. So it’s no surprise that in his latest directorial effort, Confessions of a Ex-Doofus-Itchy-Footed Mutha (now that's a title), he wears his heart on his ragged sleeve. That distinctive passion and drive make Van Peebles’ new movie well worth checking out. (It screens at the Northwest Film Forum September 8 through the 14th.)

Confessions serves as sort of a kinder, gentler companion piece to his breakthrough guerilla mission statement, 1971’s Sweet Sweetback’s Badasssss Song. As in Sweetback, Van Peebles plays a character on a journey of flight and self-discovery.  This time, however, his protagonist finds escape from neighborhood bullies in the pages of travel books and gives in to a wanderlust that takes him through childhood in Chicago, young manhood in New York, drama on the high seas as a merchant marine, and danger at the epicenter of a militant...

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