Movies
Seattle film festival focuses the spotlight on documentary genre

By Moira Macdonald
Seattle Times movie critic

	"This Ain't No Heartland," a documentary by Austrian filmmaker Andreas Horvath, is one of 48 films slated to be shown during the Seattle International Documentary Film Festival this month.
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So it's the perfect time for a film festival devoted to the genre. The second annual Seattle International Documentary Film Festival, presenting 48 documentaries from around the world, starts Saturday and continues through April 25 at Seattle Art Museum. It's not Seattle's first all-doc festival, but it may well turn out to have staying power.

Founded and directed by Michal Friedrich, a Seattle dentist and film buff, the SIDFF has close ties to Chicago International Documentary Festival, a rapidly growing 11-day fest that concluded this weekend. Many of the films that Friedrich has obtained were shown there, including SIDFF's opening-night film "This Ain't No Heartland." Austrian filmmaker Andreas Horvath, troubled by the U.S. invasion of Iraq, traveled to the American heartland to ask questions of the people he found there. Horvath will attend the opening-night screening and host a question and answer session.

Film festival Seattle International Documentary Film Festival, April 17-25, Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St., Seattle. Tickets: $7 general; $5 students/seniors/members; festival pass $80; one-day pass $25; opening-night gala $15. Available at the door, through www.ticketwindowonline.com, by phone at 206-325-6500, or at Ticket Window outlets in Broadway Market, Pike Place Market and Meydenbauer Center. For general information, see www.sidff.org.

A special coup for the festival is the Seattle premiere of "Super Size Me," Morgan Spurlock's much-buzzed exploration of fast food in America. Spurlock, who won a directing award at this year's Sundance Film Festival for the film, ate nothing but McDonald's food for a month while making the film. He will be the festival's guest Sunday night, hosting the screening of his film.

Other festival highlights include Jane Gray's "Playing House," a look at seventh- and eighth-grade girls in boarding school (with Gray on hand for a Q&A); Tom Roberts' timely and chilling "Inside the Mind of the Suicide Bomber," which includes interviews with three failed Islamic suicide bombers in an Israeli prison; "Putin's Mama," the story of how Russian President Vladimir Putin's mother recognized the son who disappeared many decades ago; and six films from spotlighted documentarian Angus Macqueen ("Gulag," "Dancing for Dollars," "Cry for Argentina"), a British citizen who travels the world to tell his stories.

Several of the festival's offerings, notes Friedrich, are suitable for the entire family, especially "Shepherd's Journey into the Third Millennium," from Swiss filmmaker Erich Langjahr. The director has described the film as "a modern shepherd's story" — a look at one of the oldest cultural forms of human existence.

Friedrich, no stranger to film festivals (he founded the Seattle Polish Film Festival, now in its 14th year), hopes the SIDFF will find a wider audience this year. It's a labor of love for him, and a gift to his city. "We show movies that probably no one is ever going to see here again," he says of the festival's lineup. "I love documentaries — they tell you the truth; they see the world in such a naked way."

Moira Macdonald: mmacdonald@seattletimes.com.

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