Commentary by Gregg Rickman (greggr1@mindspring.com). Times compiled from information available Tuesday; it's always advisable to call for confirmation. Price given is standard adult admission; discounts often apply for students, seniors, and members.
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ACT ONE/TWO
2128 Center (at Shattuck), Berkeley, (510) 843-FILM, www.landmarktheatres.com. $6. This duplex offers a midnight movie series (plus "drawings for valuable and coveted prizes") on Saturdays for 10 weeks. For additional screenings, see our Showtimes page.
SATURDAY (Nov. 9): Jeff Bridges takes on his PC in the computer game adventure Tron (Steven Lisberger, 1982) midnight.
ALLIANCE FRANÇAISE
345 Bush (at Polk), 775-7755, www.afsf.com. French-language films shown on projected video. $5 donation.
WEDNESDAY (Nov. 6): Businessman Daniel Auteuil befriends a man with Down's syndrome in The Eighth Day (Jaco van Dormael, France, 1991) 7 p.m.
SATURDAY (Nov. 9): The Eighth Day 2 p.m.
ARTISTS' TELEVISION ACCESS
992 Valencia (at 21st Street), 824-3890, www.atasite.org. $5 save as noted. This venue offers all manner of strange and unusual video and film.
THURSDAY & FRIDAY (Nov. 7 & 8): Sleeping Giant Productions' In the Dark questions California energy policy. $5 and up, sliding scale 8 p.m.
SATURDAY (Nov. 9): Other Cinema offers a "Projected Gesture" showcase with movie projectors "played" in live-action performances of Melinda Stone's hand-cranked Poop or Berries?, the Overdub Club's dueling 16mm projector piece Night Soil, a 20-minute set of 3-D StereoScopophilia, and more 8:30 p.m.
CASTRO
429 Castro (near Market), 621-6120, www.thecastrotheatre.com; 934-8134 and www.otherminds.org for the Other Minds Film Festival, here Friday through Sunday. Other Minds fest $9, other screenings priced as noted. Short-run rep in a spectacular 1922 Greco-Roman-themed palace designed by Timothy L. Pflueger. Evening intermissions feature David Hegarty or Bill McCoy on the Mighty Wurlitzer.
WEDNESDAY & THURSDAY: The Trials of Henry Kissinger (Alex Gibney, Eugene Jerecki, 2002; 2:50, 7 p.m.) is billed with Patricio Guzman's The Pinochet Case (2001; 12:30, 4:40, 9 p.m.), which reviews the Chilean general's 1998 arrest for crimes against humanity. Separate $8 admission for each film; special $12 combined admission for both. See Ongoing for review of Kissinger.
FRIDAY: "Eyes & Ears," the 2002 Other Minds Film Festival, offers three days of movies devoted to music and sound design. Tonight, Phase Two -- The Big Note (Frank Scheffer, Netherlands, 2002), a video documentary in progress on Frank Zappa. Repeats Sunday 7 p.m. DJ Spooky's live performance piece Rebirth of a Nation, an hourlong version of D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation digitized and recomposed. Repeats Saturday 9 p.m.
SATURDAY: Other Minds -- Two shorts with contributions by Terry Riley and Pandit Pran Nath screen with the fascinating documentary Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey (Steven M. Martin, 1995) 11 a.m. In Absentia (2000), an as-ever disturbing Brothers Quay animation to music by Karlheinz Stockhausen, screens with Dancer in the Dark (Lars von Trier, Denmark, 2000), a musical melodrama with Björk 3 p.m. Frank Zappa's Baby Snakes (1979) 7 p.m. Rebirth of a Nation 9:30 p.m.
SUNDAY: Other Minds -- Michael Meert's docudrama George Antheil: Bad Boy of Music (Germany, 2000) and Michael McIntyre's West Coast Story (1986), a documentary featuring Lou Harrison, John Cage, Henry Cowell, and others 11 a.m. A documentary on pianist/composer Percy Grainger, The Noble Savage (Barrie Gavin, U.K., 1986), screens with an Australian drama about him, Passion (Peter Duncan, 1999) 2:30 p.m. Phase Two -- The Big Note 7:15 p.m. Baby Snakes 10 p.m.
MONDAY: From the last days of Weimar Germany, Fritz Lang's M (1931; 7 p.m.) and Josef von Sternberg's The Blue Angel (1930; 9:15 p.m.) offer different takes on crime, murder, lust, and madness. $8.
TUESDAY: The Arab Film Festival concludes with a round-table discussion on Arab cinema, $10 7 p.m. Elia Suleiman's highly praised comedy-fantasy about an ongoing tragedy, Divine Intervention (Palestine, 2002), $10 8:45 p.m. Closing Night Party, $10 10:15 p.m. A package for all three is available for $25. For more information and advance sales, visit www.aff.org or call 564-1100.
DELANCEY STREET THEATER
600 Embarcadero (at Brannan), (866) 468-3399 and www.ticketweb.com for tickets; www.latinofilmfestival.org for information on this program. The Latino Film Festival continues its annual event here and at other venues around the Bay Area this week.
WEDNESDAY (Nov. 6): A "Women and Film" program, "¡Vivan las Directoras!," offers a panel discussion with visiting female directors from San Ramon to Brazil 6 p.m. Violet Perfume (Mexico, 2001), with director Maryse Sistach in person 8:30 p.m. $9 each, both programs $15.
FILM ARTS FOUNDATION
145 Ninth St. (at Minna), 552-8760, www.filmarts.org. This venerable helpmate for local moviemakers offers occasional programs for the whole community. Free.
FRIDAY (Nov. 8): An "Open Screening" for new Bay Area shorts, with free popcorn and soda, and $2 beer. Filmmakers should contact seans@filmarts.org before show time with any special requirements. First come, first screened, with doors open at 6:30 p.m., films at 7 p.m.
SATURDAY (Nov. 9): The San Francisco Bike Coalition sponsors a bicycle tour of short-film installations around the city, beginning here and traveling to the Brava Theater Center, Lost Weekend Video, the Mission Cultural Center, and other venues. Wheels up at 2 p.m.
FINE ARTS CINEMA
2451 Shattuck (at Haste), Berkeley, (510) 848-1143, www.fineartscinema.com. $7. A fall season continues for this innovatively programmed art house.
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