It’s SIFF season, baby! Seattle’s favorite film fest returns this month with 262 films over 11 days (April 14–24) screening both in-person and online. We’re rounding up some of our favorites. Every day, expect two more recommendations on Slog.

FINLANDIA
Spain, 2021, 92 min, Dir. Horacio Alcalà

This ones got an operatic sensibility with opulent shots.

This one’s got an operatic sensibility and opulent shots. Courtesy of SIFF

This film about a Spanish fashion designer traveling to Oaxaca to steal designs from Indigenous queer people holds many threads. There’s the immediate storyline (the tension between the designer and dress-makers), happening simultaneously against larger, more existential dramas (like a looming, devastating earthquake). Happily, all this narrative threading isn’t melodramatic. The final product from director Horacio Alcalà is ornate, lyrical—but also straightforward and direct. It’s full of contradictions. (And well-shot sex scenes.) And it’s continuously surprising. Very recommended.

Playing at SIFF Uptown on Saturday, April 16 at 8:30 pm and Sunday, April 17 at 11:30 am. Director and producer Horacio Alcalà scheduled to attend.

Chase Burns is The Stranger's former editor. He's covered everything from gay luchadores to chemical weapons to Isabella Rossellini's favorite pets.