Cinematical

It's a good weekend to live in Los Angeles if you happen to love film festivals. Through this weekend, City of Lights, City of Angels, a weeklong extravaganza of French film premieres, is still going on. If you, like me, love subtitles, you'll want to check out what's still up on the program. Looking the schedule over, I do have a few recommendations for you. Film noir fans, tonight is your night, with a quadruplet of French noir fun for your viewing pleasure.

I don't know much about the films on the noir slate, but after dealing with a pack of kids sick with strep all week, I'm most assuredly in a darkish-noir mood, and I'd love to just sit in the dark for eight hours and chill with these films. Besides, check out the fabulously porntastic noir-stache on the dude on the right, from the poster for Rivals, one of the films on the noir schedule. That's a truly spectacular 'stache, and the whole poster kind of feels like a very dark, very French Starsky and Hutch, n'est-ce pas?

If you're feeling in a lighter mood, Saturday afternoon boasts a screening of OSS-117, a hilarious film about a French super-spy that's kind of James Bond meets Austin Powers. I saw this film a couple years ago at a packed screening at the Egyptian Theater in Seattle during the Seattle International Film Festival, and the fest audience was laughing so hard throughout, I was glad there were subtitles, or I'd have missed some of the funnier lines.

Tomorrow afternoon, there's also a special presentation trailers of upcoming French films, and tomorrow night is packed with both comedies and dramas, including Welcome to the Land of Ch'Tis, starring French comedian Dany Boon, and Water Lilies, which played at Cannes last year and Rotterdam a couple months ago.

The fest wraps up with the world premiere of the closing night film, Behind the Walls (Les Hauts murs), followed by a Q&A with director Christian Faure. The poster for that one looks appropriately gloomy and dark, as one might expect of a drama about a teenage orphan stuck in a juvenille correction facility.

Also going on this weekend is the Los Angeles United Film Festival. For all of you folks who've ever wondered about the business side of your BC-grown marijuana (not that we'd advocate drug use, of course, we're just acknowledging that there are those who might be interested in such things ...), tonight offers The Union: The Business Behind Getting High, with a Q&A with filmmakers and cast. Sorry, kids, no free samples being given out (that I know of), but it looks like an intriguing film.

Saturday's lineup kicks off with some offerings for you documentary lovers out there. First up is From the 50 Yard Line, a doc about a pair of high school marching bands. The film follows two marching bands -- one the former Grand National Champions from Ohio, the other from a Los Angeles school that's recently restarted its program after 18 years of musical silence due to budget cuts -- from band camp, football season, and the all-important regional and national championships.

Saturday afternoon, one of my favorite films of last year, Darius Goes West, gets a little more fest love after a year of winning the audience award at practically every fest it played at, culminating with a spot on the Oscar shortlist. If you see no other film this weekend, try to catch Darius, the beautiful, inspiring story of what happens when a pack of 20-something guys decides to take a roadtrip with their wheelchair-bound friend in a quest to get his falling-apart wheelchair gussied up on MTVs Pimp My Ride.

Also on Saturday, you might want to check out Wiener Takes All. No, it's not a porn flick, settle down. It's a doc about the world of competitive wiener dogs (I know, who knew?); from the fest's website, "This film unleashes the truth as it tracks America's sexiest and fastest weenies on the professional dachshund circuit." Later on Saturday's lineup, check out Strictly Background, about the lives of 10 actors who make a living as Hollywood extras, and The Red Hot Chili Peppers: Untitled Documentary (what, they couldn't come up with a clever title? How about The Red Hot Chili Peppers: Some Like it Hot?).

The fest continues Sunday with Fish Kill Flea, a 51-minute flick about a flea market in upstate New York (no, it's not a Christopher Guest mockumentary, but can't you just picture him making a film about a flea market, with his usual cast as a bunch of colorful flea-market vendors?), Sean Tracy's 66-minute The Jesus Guy, a documentary about the "Barefoot Evangelist," a guy who's walked through 47 states and 13 countries preaching his message, and Kraftland, about a Hollywood film music agent who turns his home into "Kraftland," a shrine to Disneyland and consumer culture, following the death of his brother.

Things wrap up for the fest Sunday evening with Row Hard, No Excuses, about the only American entry in a rowing competition across the Atlantic Ocean, and Piece of Mind, which chronicles four graffiti artists on their journey as they evolve from street tags to gallery shows. Tucked in amongst all that yummy indie film goodness are a slew of short films for your viewing pleasure, too.