On the Auction Block

Maybe you've heard, or maybe not, but the Northwest Film Forum is moving from its small offices next to the Little Theatre on 19th Avenue East to much more spacious, custom-designed digs on 12th Avenue, right by the cop shop near the top of the Pike-Pine corridor. The organization has already sold the Grand Illusion to a smart batch of programmers/investors, and after this weekend's Herbert Bergel musical, the Little Theatre will be going dark. The new space will have two theaters (one as big as the Little Theatre, the other 40 seats bigger than the Grand Illusion), as well as artists' offices and more editing suites than the current incarnation of WigglyWorld Studios has.

Moving, not to mention building a new space, costs a fair amount of money, and the organization has been plugging away with fundraisers for quite some time now. Perhaps the biggest and most exciting event is the upcoming Cinematic Splendor, their annual auction, on Saturday the 15th at the old Roycroft Theater, a half block north of the Little Theatre. Though you can buy tickets the night of the auction, you're probably better off buying them ahead of time. It's really fun, with a world-premiere short film made specifically for the auction, and both goofy and interesting items to bid on. This year, aside from the guitar signed by every member of the Dave Matthews Band, you can get yourself a pair of night-vision goggles, tickets to events, dinners at restaurants, psychological consultations, and bargains on film production and post-production services. Once it's time to screen your work, you need to get the word out through the press. That's why, in the long tradition of Stranger writers selling off their shaky reputations, I'm donating the chance for you to take control of this very column. Plug your movie, plug your friend's movie, or just see what it's like to be a columnist for a week.

One very exciting event is happening the very next day at UW's Kane Hall at 1:00 p.m. The Japanese documentary director Mori Tatsuya will be in town to screen his documentary A2. Perhaps a little background is in order. Back in 1995, the Japanese cult Aum released poisonous sarin gas in the Tokyo subway, killing 12, injuring 4,000, and affecting the whole country. The news media vilified the cultists, and Aum members were shunned and persecuted. Mori started making a TV documentary on Aum, but when he refused to portray them as pure evil and instead tried to understand them, the movie was dropped by the TV station and he had to finish it on his own. (The resulting movie, A, will be screening Monday night at 7:00 p.m. at the Grand Illusion.) After the release of A, the situation in Japan worsened, which led him to make the follow-up movie. With American soldiers in Iraq being thought of as good people brainwashed by a corrupt system, then ordered to do horrific things, there could be no better time to screen these two movies.

andy@thestranger.com