Film fest of local docs, shorts and features to take off

Northwest Film Forum's Local Sightings Film Festival, going into its 11th year, returns this weekend with a healthy sampling of the diverse movie production taking place in our regional backyard.

The six-day event, Friday through Oct. 8, will showcase strong documentaries focusing on Northwest history and culture, as well as a slew of short works, rich archival programs, a couple of kooky filmmaker challenges and a bona fide horror movie of the young-adults-getting-separated-in-the-dark-woods variety.

The opening-night program of shorts is a little more modest than last year's presentation of the moving documentary feature "The Church on Dauphine Street." But the bill, beginning at 7 p.m., does underscore the fact that most Northwest films are short pieces of sundry classification. Opening-night festivities will continue with a party.

Other "Local Sightings" highlights include "Good Food," an excellent documentary by Melissa Young and Mark Dworkin. It initially looks like yet another movie deconstructing our commercial food cycle, but it takes only a few minutes to see that this surprisingly enjoyable film has a uniquely Northwest character.

Grant Aaker and Josh Wallaert's "Arid Lands" is also very good, an engrossing study of Hanford since its days as sagebrush country occupied by Native Americans through its early development as a small town. The film, of course, also goes beyond that to the city's plutonium-production years, subsequent radioactive hangover and apparent reinvention as a haven for vineyards.

Eric Colley's well-crafted and genuinely tense thriller, "GPS," concerns a bunch of college pals who participate in Global Positioning System treasure-hunt competitions for fun. But they get more than they bargain for when one game leads them into an apparently lethal trap.

Special "In Conversation" talk programs include "Works in Progress," featuring Seattle filmmakers showing clips of current projects. Another fetes Jim Ball, a photojournalist who converted his Post Alley studio during the 1970s into a makeshift theater for independent and experimental film.

Here's the schedule. For details, check the Web site (www.nwfilmforum.org).

Friday

"Stories of Reach," shorts on the theme of wanting what is out of reach. 7 p.m., followed by an opening-night party.

Saturday

"Rose City Revue," a program of Portland-made shorts. 5 p.m.

"Good Food," 7 p.m.

"GPS," 7 p.m.

"Stories of Circumstance," shorts about "the battles we choose and adventures we fall into." 9 p.m.

"Fast, Cheap & Out of Control," a collection of over-the-top shorts, 11 p.m.

Sunday

"In Conversation: Jim Ball," 5 p.m.

"High and Outside," Seattle filmmaker Peter Vogt's documentary about Bill "Spaceman" Lee, the major-league baseball pitcher renowned in the 1970s as a colorful folk hero disliked by the game's corporate owners. 7 p.m.

"In Conversation: Works in Progress." 7 p.m.

"Movement in Place," an eclectic group of films about human movement and technique. 9 p.m.

Monday

"Dry Hump!" in which directors respond to Northwest Film Forum's tongue-in-cheek challenge to craft works about steamy sex, but without any visible skin. 7 p.m.

"Arid Lands." 7 p.m.

"Imagined Worlds," new animation. 9 p.m.

Oct. 7

"The Tribe and the Professor: The Films of Ruth and Louis Kirk." This program looks at documentaries made about Northwest native life and ecology in the 1970s and '80s. 7 p.m.

"On a Wing and a Prayer: An American Muslim Learns to Fly." A new documentary by Max Kaiser about portfolio manager Monem Salam, who enrolls in a flying school and attracts the attention of the FBI. 7 p.m.

"2nd Annual Spletz-O-Rama Invitational," with film critic Andy Spletzer hosting a program of new shorts based on the seven deadly sins, including works by John Kiester and the new executive director of the San Francisco Cinematheque, Jonathan Marlow. 9 p.m.

Oct. 8

"March Point," a documentary about three Swinomish Tribe teens who investigate the impact of two oil refineries on their tribal community, and learn about themselves and their people in the process. 7 p.m.

"Verve: Selections From the Seattle Channel's Artist Portrait Series," a sampling from Seattle Channel's ArtZone television project, Verve, which celebrates local arts and culture with profiles of artists. 7 p.m.

"Documents and Profiles," short documentaries. 9 p.m.

Tom Keogh: tomwkeogh@yahoo.com