A new local indie film fest debuts
Both the African Film Festival at the Museum of Fine Arts and the Bugs Bunny fest at the Brattle Theatre are still underway -- they both run through next weekend -- but otherwise, February is a relatively quiet time on the Boston festival calendar. Which makes it as good a time as any to launch a new weekend-long event.
What's being billed as the "first annual" Ruff Cutz Indie Film Conference debuts at The Holiday Inn in Brookline next Saturday and Sunday. The program starts at 10 a.m. on Saturday with a panel discussion featuring Laurie Kirby, executive director of the Newport International Film Festival; Kevin Anderton, founder of Midnight Chimes Productions; Jenna Sullivan, co-producer of Image Icon Entertainment; Mike Messier, an actor and director; and Carol Patton, publisher of Imagine magazine. The afternoon includes sessions on writing, finding financing, casting, and animation, and there's a networking party in the evening.
Sunday features screenings of 40 short films from 10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m., capped by a Q&A with attending filmmakers and closing party.
The event was launched by Jamie Benti, founder of Image Icon in North Attleborough. Two short films that Image has produced, "The Pee Pee Dance" and "Last Call," will play the event. Information is at rcifc.com and 617-650-0770.
PARTY TIME: The Brattle Theatre is hosting its seventh annual Oscar Night Party next Sunday. The evening starts with a 5:30 fund-raiser before the 7:30 screening of the Academy Awards live. The gala is open to members for free and attendees of the fund-raiser (617-876-6837 and brattlefilm.org).
CONVERSATIONS WITH: The volunteer-coordinator agency Boston Cares is hosting a free screening of "Race to Execution" on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Democracy Center, 25 Mt. Auburn St. in Cambridge. Coproducer Jim Lopes will lead a discussion about the film's look at the death penalty system in the United States. The documentary will be broadcast on PBS television in March as part of the Independent Lens series (617-492-8855 and democracycenter.org).
German director Michael Hofmann is being featured at the Museum of Fine Arts in a three-film program copresented by the Goethe Institut Boston. Hofmann will be at the MFA on Thursday at a 7:45 p.m. screening of "Eden" and on Saturday at a 2:20 p.m. screening of "Sophiiiie!" and a 5:45 p.m. show of "Trouville Beach."
"Eden" won the audience award at the 2006 Rotterdam Film Festival and is described as "a sensual tale about the magic combination of love and food" in the tradition of "Eat Drink Man Woman." " Sophiiiie!" is about a 20-year- old woman who finds herself pregnant and gives herself one night to decide whether to have an abortion or start a family. And "Trouville Beach" looks at young true (or not-so-true) love.
Village Voice senior film critic J. Hoberman will host a screening and discussion of sci-fi classic "The Incredible Shrinking Man" on Thursday at 7 p.m. at the Boston University College of Communication , 640 Commonwealth Ave., Room B-05. The program is part of the BU Cinematheque series sponsored by the school's Film and Television Department.
The Cinematheque also is bringing Harvard law professor Charles Ogletree to host a screening and discussion of "Lumumba," the story of Congolese president Patrice Lumumba, on Friday, at 7 p.m. in the same location.
SCREENINGS OF NOTE: Today at noon, the Boston Science Fiction Film Festival starts its 24-hour marathon at the Somerville Theatre (bostonsci-fi.com). Also today, the Alloy Orchestra performs its live scores to the silent films "The General" at 2 p.m. and "Phantom of the Opera" at 7 p.m. at the Institute of Contemporary Art (617-478-3103 and icaboston.org).
Boston Open Screen, where shorts are shown on a first-come-first-served basis and anything goes, happens on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Coolidge Corner Screening Room. Organizers say the February theme is to "make a movie with a character named President Groundhog." They note that you are not required to stay on theme but it would be "awesome" if you did (bostonopenscreen.com).
Also at the Coolidge, it's Harry Potter week for all the kids on school vacation, with a noontime film each day from Tuesday through Friday (617-734-2500 and coolidge.org).
A week-long series of the work of German director Helmut Käutner, who died in 1980, starts on Tuesday at the Harvard Film Archive with a 9:15 p.m. show of the 1943 "Romance in a Minor Key." It's the story of a married woman who has an affair with a young composer (617-495-4700 and hcl.harvard.edu/hfa).
Also at the archive, six films by downtown New York artist Jack Smith play on Friday in two sets, at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. Smith died in 1989 from AIDS and has been described by the Village Voice as "the original DIY artist, scavenging on the streets to get material for props, sets, and costumes."
The Balagan Film Series presents a program of new experimental films and videos by Kathryn Ramey, Pierre Desir, Robert Todd, and John Gianvito on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. at the Coolidge. And experimental they are: Desir's film "Satchmo: the arrival of Gabriel on a Wing and a Half-note" is described as "the timeline of dreams borrowed from the pillows of cheap motels," while Ramey's "The Passenger" is a "meditation on madness, motherhood, psychoanalysis and the possibility of escaping one's fate." All four filmmakers are faculty members at Emerson College.
And if you missed some -- or even all -- of the movies nominated for Best Picture for this year's Oscar, you can fill in the gaps next Saturday in one marathon swoop in advance of next Sunday night's Academy Awards. The AMC Theatre chain is showing all five nominated films back-to-back at 78 theaters, including those in Framingham and Methuen. The day starts at 11 a.m. with "Babel" and unfolds with "The Queen," "The Departed," "Letters From Iwo Jima," and "Little Miss Sunshine." There will be two 15-minute breaks and a longer dinner break -- and unlimited refills on popcorn and soda, natch (amctheatres.com) .
Leslie Brokaw can be reached at lbrokaw@globe.com. 
