Calendar
The King and the Mockingbird
Mar 19 - Mar 22, 2015
(Paul Grimault, 1979, France, 83 min, DCP)
Based on a Hans Christian Andersen story, the wildly satirical The King and the Mockingbird follows a shepherdess and a chimney sweep who seek to escape from the clutches of a tyrannical king. A masterpiece of traditional hand-drawn cell animation, the film is credited by celebrated Japanese animators Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata as inspiring the creation of their own studio, the now world-famous Studio Ghibli. Brad Bird's The Iron Giant was clearly influenced by the towering robot menace in this film.
An Honest Liar
Mar 20 - Mar 26, 2015
(Justin Weinstein, United States, 2014, DCP, 90 min)
An Honest Liar tells the incredible story of famed magician/skeptic and enemy of deception, James “The Amazing” Randi. A treasure trove of archival footages of performances and stunts (as well as interviews with the likes of Alice Cooper, Neil DeGrasse Tyson and Richard Dawkins), the film brings to life Randi's carefully-designed projects that publicly exposed psychics, faith healers and con artists with quasi-religious fervor.
Dust in the Wind
Please note screening locations!
Saturday, March 21 at Northwest Film Forum with introduction by Sean Gilman
Tuesday, March 24 at the Grand Illusion Cinema
Mar 21, 2015
(1986, 110 min, 35mm)
"Although the combination of lengthy shots and, in the early work, a relatively static camera has given Hou Hsiao-hsien an exaggerated reputation as a minimalist, his is above all a cinema of movement. The mobile train shot that begins Dust in the Wind, one of the key films of Taiwan’s New Cinema, generates a visceral sensation of forward momentum while also looking back to the medium’s nineteenth century origins. Hou vividly captures the confusion of young adulthood, but maintains a clear-eyed distance on the vicissitudes of ordinary lives by repeatedly returning to the landscape imagery of the opening shots. Based on the memories of screenwriter Wu Nien-jen, Dust in the Wind is both absorptive and reflective, encouraging viewers to continually refine their understanding of preceding scenes even when immersed in the unfolding present. —Richard I. Suchenski"
Flowers of Shanghai
Please note screening locations!
Monday, March 23 at Northwest Film Forum with introduction by Sean Gilman
Thursday, March 26 at at the Grand Illusion Cinema
Mar 23, 2015
(1998, 113 min, 35mm)
1884: In a brothel in Shanghai’s British area, four women build their lives, shut off from the outside world and surrounded by opium smoke, money and men. Acclaimed for its stunning 7-minute opening shot, sensuous cinematography and sophisticated construction of a microcosmic world, Flowers of Shanghai is based on a well-known 19th century Chinese novel.
A Time to Live and a Time to Die
Please note screening locations!
Friday, March 20 at the Grand Illusion Cinema
Monday, March 23 at Northwest Film Forum
Mar 23, 2015
(1985, 136 min, 35mm)
Hou turned to his own coming-of-age story for one of his most acclaimed films, a tale that begins in 1947 and stretches over nearly twenty years. After the war, young Ah-hsiao (a fictionalized version of Hou) and his family move from China to rural Taiwan when his father secures a government job there. Ah-hsaio gets tangled up in street gangs, experiences his family’s evolutions and struggles, and eventually takes up a central role in keeping them together. Jonathan Rosenbaum called it “an excellent introduction to [Hou's] work as a whole.”
The Passenger
Screening held at the Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Avenue
Post screening panel discussion!
Mar 24, 2015
(1975, 119 min, 35mm)
The Passenger stars Jack Nicholson as a television reporter in Africa who assumes the identity of a dead stranger. Tired of his work, his marriage and his life, he senses an opportunity for a fresh start in life, realizing—but too late—the danger he has put himself in. Nicholson considers this his finest performance.
The Grand Northwest Scarecrow Illusion
Free event for members and volunteers of Northwest Film Forum, Scarecrow Video and the Grand Illusion Cinema!
Mar 25, 2015
To celebrate "the film event of the year" (Matt Lynch, Scarecrow), the Hou Hsiao-hsien retrospective co-presented by Northwest Film Forum and the Grand Illusion Cinema, the unstoppable independent film triumvirate of Scarecrow, the Grand Illusion and Northwest Film Forum are teaming up for a combined member/volunteer party.
Millenium Mambo
Please note screening locations!
Wednesday, March 25 at Northwest Film Forum with introduction by Sean Gilman
Saturday, March 28 at at the Grand Illusion Cinema
Mar 25, 2015
(2001, 119 min, 35mm)
The sole contemporary-set feature of this retrospective is one of Hou’s most beautifully shot films—a ghostly story of ennui and regret.
Good Men, Good Women
Please note screening locations!
Sunday, March 22 at at the Grand Illusion Cinema
Friday, March 27 at Northwest Film Forum with introduction by Sean Gilman
Mar 27, 2015
(1995, 108 min, 35mm)
Steeped in the communist history of 1940s Taiwan, the sensitively interlaced stories of Good Men, Good Women unfold as a film-within-a-film. Liang Ching, an actress, gets ready to star in a World War 2 era film about Taiwanese Communists who threw themselves into the anti-Japanese resistance. But when stolen pages of her diary start surfacing, painful memories of a dead lover trigger flashbacks. Past and present start to bleed together as the plot of the film mixes with Liang’s own personal history.
VHSEX 3
Hosted by Spenser Hoyt and Brian Alter! There may be prizes!
Mar 27, 2015
Didn't get tickets to the Grand Illusion Cinema's VHSEX 3? Catch an encore screening at Northwest Film Forum on March 27. We're penetrating Scarecrow Video's Sexploitation room once again in search of more awkward adult situations, humorous humping and weird sexual interludes—all from vintage videotape! Adults only!
Films for One to Eight Projectors: Multi-Projector Experiments by Roger Beebe
Visiting filmmaker!
16mm prints!
Mar 28, 2015
Filmmaker/curator/professor Roger Beebe visits Seattle with a touring program of his multiple-projector performances. The tour features several of his best-known projector performances (including the six-projector show-stopping space jam “Last Light of a Dying Star”), recent award-winning work in single-channel HD video, as well as the premiere of his latest multi-projector mayhem, “SOUND FILM.”
Sabbatical
Director Brandon Colvin in attendance!
Seattle premiere!
Mar 29, 2015
(Brandon Colvin, 2014, United States, 72 min)
A lethargically neurotic Kierkegaard professor goes back to his small hometown on a sabbatical (intended for writing) to take care for his mother after a stroke. A ruminative deconstruction of the lonesome sentiment that we can never go home again, the film follows the protagonist, Ben, as he gets reacquainted with, and subsequently re-alienated from, the old relationships and trappings of his life. As he struggles to maintain his aloof composure while interacting with his deadbeat brother, addled mother and lonely ex-wife, Ben’s own shortcomings are thrown in sharper relief.
Vernae
**SOLD OUT**
World premiere live performance
Apr 03 - Apr 04, 2015
What does it mean to dance yourself to death? Vernae is a darkly cinematic, radically immersive experience based on Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring. Equal parts live performance, sculptural/sound installation and film screening, Vernae is a collaboration born of 29 local and international artists, including sculptors, designers, musicians, visual artists, filmmakers, dancers and performance artists. This manifestation of the Vernae universe will explore themes of contagion, urge and sacrifice during an interactive evening in the richly transformed environment of Northwest Film Forum.
Open Screenings at the Film Forum
Feb 09 - Feb 06
* FEB. 6th OPEN SCREENING CANCELED FOR INCLEMENT WEATHER *
Are you a local filmmaker looking to share your work? Seeking feedback on your film? Want to see what other people are currently working on? Come join us for our monthly opening screening! Hang out with new and established filmmakers and experience films being made right here in our community.
St. Kilda Album Release Show
Live music!
Apr 09, 2015
Skype conversation with director Megan Griffiths!
Inspired by their work together on the soundtrack for Megan Griffiths's 2011 film The Off Hours, Joshua Morrison and Jeramy Koepping recruited long time friend Matthew Brown (Trespassers William, The Soft Hills) to complete the score for Megan Griffith's next film, Eden. In 2013 the trio decided to take their collaboration further and assemble a full seven piece band to back Josh's already haunting and atmospheric indie-folk ballads. St. Kilda releases its self-titled debut album with a live set and screening of selected film scenes and new music videos. Director Megan Griffiths will skype in for a conversation with the band about their collaboration.
Fresh Dressed
Northwest premiere! 7pm: Opening Night Party
Co-presented with Civilization
Sponsored by Officials Vintage
9pm: Screening
Apr 10, 2015
(Sacha Jenkins*, United States, 2014, 82 min, DCP)
Hot off its Sundance premiere, Fresh Dressed opens ByDesign '15 with a chronicle of hip-hop, urban fashion and the hustle that brought oversized pants and graffiti-etched jackets from Orchard Street to high fashion catwalks and Middle America shopping malls. More than a documentary about fashion and music, Fresh Dressed is a thorough contemplation of cultural economy, police brutality and community solidarity—in short, the history of hip hop.
Print the Legend
Seattle premiere!
Co-presented with Civilization
Sponsored by GRAY Magazine
Apr 11, 2015
(Luis Lopez J. Clay Tweel, United States, 2014, 100 min)
3D printing is changing the world: from printing guns and human organs, to dismantling the world’s industrial infrastructure by enabling home manufacturing, it’s “the next Industrial Revolution.” With unprecedented access to the visionaries building an industry, Print the Legend follows the people and companies racing to bring 3D printing to your desktop and into your life.
Less Is More
Free panel discussion!
Co-presented with Civilization
Happy Hour: 5pm
Panel: 5:30pm
Apr 11, 2015
Seattle is in the midst of a design renaissance. Armed with a post-recession resourcefulness and a region defining focus on technology, a multitude of Northwest creatives across multiple disciplines are creating spare, thoughtful, and sophisticated design solutions. Members of the design firm Civilization moderate this panel discussion between burgeoning local creatives to discuss the current design climate and how it’s defining our present and shaping our future.
Microtopia
Seattle premiere!
Co-presented with Civilization
Sponsored by GRAY Magazine
Apr 11, 2015
(Jesper Wachtmeister, 2013, Sweden, 55 min)
For most of us, “house” means stability, structure and permanence, but in an age of rapid population growth and technological advancements, mobile and portable dwellings are increasingly in demand. Microtopia explores how architects, artists and ordinary problem-solvers are pushing the limits of architecture to pursue their dreams of portability, flexibility and independence from “the grid.”
Interiors
Apr 12, 2015
Woody Allen's first foray away from comedy reveals the strongest Bergman influence of any of his films. Geraldine Page was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of Eve, an interior director and mother of three children: Renata the poet, (Diane Keaton), Flyn the actress (Kristin Griffith), and Joey the directionless daughter (Mary Beth Hurt). When Arthur, the family patriarch (E.G. Marshall) leaves Eve, the family is thrown into disarray.
City: Hall
Apr 12, 2015
(Jeong Jae-eun, South Korea, 2013)
Filmmaker Jeong Jae-eun takes on Seoul’s City Hall, which turned out to be one of the most controversial buildings ever erected in a city that has withstood countless acts of destruction and reconstruction—first by an arrogant colonial power, and later by a devastating global war and several military dictatorships hell-bent on splashing the markers of compressed modernity on its face.
100 Years after Birth of a Nation
Event hosted at the Northwest African American Museum, 2300 S. Massachusetts Street at 23rd Avenue
Co-presented with the Langston Hughes African American Film Festival
Apr 13, 2015
One hundred years ago, Birth of a Nation began its notorious life in the canon of American cinema. Rife with such crystallized racism that the Ku Klux Klan deployed it for recruiting new members, historians, critics and film professors have nevertheless long sung the film’s technical praises. A few years after Nation's opening, Oscar Micheaux (the first major African American director) presented his response in the form of Within Our Gates, an explicit critique of racial violence. Join us for an evening of selected scenes from both films, plus expert conversation and analysis led by Charles Mudede (The Stranger) and Zola Mumford (Langston Hughes).
Type:Rider
Co-presented with Civilization
Introduction from Jeff Barlow, Creative Manager for Starbucks
Apr 13, 2015
Jeff Barlow, former AIGA president and Starbucks creative manager hosts a prize filled game night based around typography. First, explore the history of typography with Type: Rider, a new game made by indie developers for typography fans. Play the game and answer trivia questions for a chance to win prizes like contemporary design books Designing for Design (Kenya Hara) and Looks Good Feels Good is Good (Anne van der Zwaag), free movie tickets, Civilization swag and more.
Futuring the Future
Free event!
Hosted at the Frye Art Museum, 704 Terry Avenue
Co-presented by ARCADE, Civilization, the Frye Art Museum and Northwest Film Forum
Apr 14, 2015
Design is being reinvented around the world, and Seattle is one of the places that is at the center of this reinvention. In this presentation, Surya Vanka will describe how the design profession is transforming to remain relevant to the future.
Sauerbruch Hutton Architects
Seattle premiere!
Co-presented with Civilization
Apr 14, 2015
(Harun Farocki, Germany, 2013, 73 min)
"Architects at work: a priori nothing lends itself better to cinema, nothing is more graphic than shots that alternate between the drawing and the built structure, between the two-dimensional plan and the three dimensional result. Yet this film, with its corporate-sounding title, shot over three months in a large Berlin-based firm abandons this clarity to instill a generalised doubt — not so much about the value of those it films as about its own critical viewpoint." —Charlotte Garson, Cinema du Reel
Cheatin’
Filmmaker in attendance opening night!
Screens with Don Herztfeldt's World of Tomorrow on April 16, 18, 19, 21
Apr 15 - Apr 21, 2015
(Bill Plympton, United States, 2014, 76 min)
The incomparable Bill Plympton conjures up his memory of an old romance, infuses it with the noirish tone of Double Indemnity, and animates it with watercolor, pen and ink in Cheatin’. In a fateful bumper car collision, Jake and Ella meet and become the most loving couple in the long history of Romance. But when a scheming “other” woman drives a wedge of jealousy into their perfect courtship, insecurity spells out an untimely fate.