Feb. 8-15, 2006

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After Life In Hirokazu Kore-eda's 1999 heavenly drama, the dead find themselves in an afterlife that looks a lot like a dilapidated college dorm. They are told that they have three days to choose the most important moment of their lives. The staff will then make a film of that moment. The dead will watch the film of their chosen moment, then disappear into eternity, accompanied only by that single memory. The angelic auteurs stay up late at night planning their shots. Quantities of tea are consumed as they argue over details. If After Life were an American film, the angel filmmakers would turn out perfect little films with swell special effects. The studio lot would bustle. Instead, they operate on a shoestring budget: The clouds that fly past the Cessna are pieces of cotton batting strung onto wire. (NR) CLAIRE DEDERER Shoreline Community College (Room 1102), 16101 Greenwood Ave. N., 206-533-6700. Free. 7 p.m. Wed. Feb. 8.

The Black Cat Satan worship and human sacrifice erupt in Hungary in this 1934 Universal Studios horror timepiece. Boris Karloff is the madman in his modernist castle, and Bela Lugosi—in one of his rare outings as a hero—is the doctor who wants revenge for his slain wife and daughter; then there are a couple of American tourists (yawn) along for the ride. For some reason, Lugosi is afraid of cats, which has minor significance to the plot. Edgar G. Ulmer derives maximum creepiness from shadows and foreboding; the German émigré to Hollywood rests the entire Karloff-Lugosi grudge on the still-fresh graves of WWI. It's accompanied by The Raven, a loose, loose Poe adaptation which reunited the two stars the following year. Screened on video; admission includes discussion and snack. (NR) Movie Legends, 2319 N. 45th St., 206-632-2092. $5. 1 p.m. Sun. Feb. 12.

Breakfast at Tiffany's Audrey Hepburn plays one of her signature roles, Holly Golightly, in Blake Edwards' 1961 spin on the Truman Capote novel. We won't complain if you don't that the George Peppard character is so unconvincingly straight, nor quibble that his relationship with both professional escort Hepburn and Patricia Neal (client for his gigolo services) doesn't make sense. But everyone will be made uncomfortable by Mickey Rooney's racist caricature as Holly's upstairs Japanese neighbor. So just relax and sing along with Hepburn's undeniably effective one-octave rendition of Henry Mancini's "Moon River." With the other Capote movie in theaters currently emphasizing that writer's darker side, Breakfast reflects his more generous and forgiving view of human nature (which seemed to end with the '60s). The Hepburn and Peppard characters are both morally compromised, but this picture gives them the happy end impossible for the killers in Capote. (NR) Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., 206-267-5380. $5-$8. 7 and 9:15 p.m. Fri. Feb. 10-Thurs. Feb. 16.

Duck Soup In perhaps the most lighthearted war movie ever made, Groucho Marx plays the war-crazed but cowardly leader of Freedonia, who directs an invasion for his own personal gain. Chico and Harpo are enemy spies who try to halt the plan, and everyone pivots around the great and stately Margaret Dumont, Groucho's foil and benefactor. The dazzling 1933 comedy was made at a safe distance from WWI, the Spanish Civil War hadn't yet begun, and WWII was only a gleam in Hitler's eye, so the laughs came easy. ("Remember, you're fighting for this woman's honor, which is probably more than she ever did.") You can make the case for Duck Soup being the Marx brothers' greatest film; today, it's certainly their most topical. It also helps that the gags are so expertly arranged by Leo McCarey, who's being showcased at the GI with two more classic '30s comedies over the next three weeks. (NR) Grand Illusion, 1403 N.E. 50th St., 206-523-3935. $5-$7.50. 7 and 9 p.m. Fri. Feb. 10-Thurs. Feb 16; also 3 and 5 p.m. Sat. Feb. 11-Sun. Feb. 12.

Eyes on the Prize The award-winning 1987 civil-rights miniseries is screened two episodes per evening through the rest of February. Discussion follows. (NR) Bethany United Church of Christ, 6230 Beacon Ave. S., 206-324-1041. 7 p.m. Fri. Feb. 10-Sat. Feb. 11.

Harry Smith: Connections and Transformations Educated partly in Seattle, the avant-garde filmmaker, musicologist, and artist (1923-1991) rose to fame in NYC during the 1950s. Various speakers will deliver talks on his life and work; see Web site for full details. A somewhat uncategorizable polymath, Smith made films via animation, collage, multi-projector installations, and direct animation (working on the negative or film stock without recourse to a camera). A program of his abstract shorts shows his varied animation techniques, often rhythmically set to the jazz music he loved. (NR) Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., 206-267-5380, www.nwfilmforum.org. Free to $8 (on varying evenings). 8 p.m. Fri. Feb. 10. Heaven and Earth Magic is an hour-long animated collage to be accompanied live by Erik Blood and Scientific American. Full of appropriated images and fertility motifs, it suggests the later animation of Terry Gilliam, without the whimsy. (NR) 8 p.m. Sat. Feb. 11. Mahagonny is a four-panel work exceeding two hours in length, set to the Weill-Brecht opera, with street scenes, purely abstract groupings, and a few famous fellow artists (Allen Ginsberg, Patti Smith). It's obsessive and hermetic, like a Henry Darger painting come to life. (NR) 8 p.m. Sun. Feb. 11.