The official grand opening of the new Northwest Film Forum space is exciting, and the Local Sightings lineup of locally made feature films, documentaries, and shorts (both with and without the help of the NWFF), is even more exciting. It's nice to be reminded how much work is being produced here in the Pacific Northwest. Some of these screenings will get more attention than others, like the world premiere of Borrowing Time, Web Crowell's feature-length tribute to movie serials and Roger Corman special effects, so I'll focus on the works that nobody else will write about. I'm talking about the experimental short films that are part of the program.

On Sunday, October 10, there will be An Evening of Personal Cinema by Jon Behrens and R. K. Adams, which is for anyone who wants to get lost in visuals that can only be created on film. Behrens and Adams work with the optical printer, crafting superimpositions and split screens, and sometimes painting on film in the style made popular by the late Stan Brakhage. On Tuesday, October 12, Dave Hanagan will show a collection of his amusingly surreal shorts in the Prescription: Silliness! program. The next day you can come for the Super 8 Open Screening, but you MUST stay for The Emergency Pants Collection: Nine Short Films by William Weiss. Admittedly, I've only seen one of his films, but from that I can tell he makes movies that are visually rigorous, structurally sound, and above all, absurdly funny. I can't wait to see more. Finally, on Thursday, October 14, the Crackpot Crafters will unleash Not Recommended Usage: An Evening of Cameraless Films, where all the images have been painted, drawn, or otherwise put onto the film without the benefit of a camera.

Elsewhere in town, Sounds of Shadow and Light comes to the Broadway Performance Hall Friday through Sunday. Along with two rediscovered silent films from Japanese director Yasujiro Ozu (a great precursor to the Northwest Film Forum's upcoming 30-film Ozu retrospective), the 1926 Teinosuke Kinugasa film A Page of Madness will show with a live score by the Aono Jikken Ensemble. Meanwhile, the Science Fiction Museum will kick off a fall film series on Friday with The Day the Earth Stood Still, where Klaatu and Gort visit the White House on a peace mission only to find the leadership determined to go to war. How dated is that?

Over at the University of Washington, Sadaa: Voices of Women (www.jazbah.org/sadaa) is a festival put together to challenge the stereotypes of women from Muslim countries. Screenings take place Friday and Sunday in Savery Hall 239. Speaking of women's issues, on Saturday morning you can catch a 9:15 a.m. screening of Tootsie, and then after lunch stick around for a moderated discussion with world-class director Sidney Pollack, all thanks to the Film School and their Master Storytellers series. That will take place at the Broadway Performance Hall. My what a busy week for film lovers.

andy@thestranger.com