This year’s Seattle Jewish Film Festival opens Thursday, April 23, the day after Earth Day, and to celebrate they’re putting a special focus this year on having a green festival. Their tagline: “0% Carbon, 100% Entertainment” reflects this focus, as does the closing night (Sunday, May 3) “Green Faith/Faithfully Green” event which combines a panel, films and reception.

In between opening and closing night, the SJFF offers up a variety of features, shorts and documentaries screening at SIFF Cinema, Cinerama, MOHAI and the Washington State History Museum. Among the films to look out for are The Clown & Führer, a drama based on the actual life story of a clown named Charlie Rivel who was summoned for a birthday performance for Adolf Hitler (April 25 at Cinerama) and Stalags: Holocaust and Pornography in Israel, a documentary about the popular and very controversial stalags, pulp books released in Israel during the early 60s featuring eroticism centered on sexy SS guards.

Special events during the festival include a Sunday brunch and family film program, stand-up comedy and a VIP gala.

12:00 PM – Amanda Quick: The Perfect Poison
Seattle Mystery Bookshop
Jayne Ann Krentz visits to sign as her alter ego. I believe this is the third book in her clever and fun Arcane Society series.
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7:00 PM – Ben Cole: Walking the Camino de Santiago
Wide World Books and Maps
In this slideshow Ben Cole, the co-author of Pili Pala Press’s Walking the Camino de Santiago, highlights some of the lesser-known detours that can lead to unexpected delights and brushes with fate.
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7:00 PM – Dr. Bradley Nelson: The Emotion Code
East West Bookshop, Seattle, $5
“Want to remove all the things holding you back from abundance, health, love and happiness?…The Emotion Code is a simple, effective way to integrated healing.”
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7:00 PM – Jennifer Culkin: A Final Arc of Sky: A Memoir of Critical Care
UW Bookstore, U-District
The local nurse, and now author, presents her memoir of blood, death, and drama.
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7:00 PM – Yu-Chin Chen: The Brilliance Behind the Columns: Paul Krugman, an Economist of Scale
UW Seattle, Waterfront Activities Center, $3-$7
The 2009 Nobel Prize Lecture examines the work of Professor Paul Krugman, recipient of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Economics.
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7:30 PM – Simon Armitage: Poetry Reading
Benaroya Hall, Illsley Ball Nordstrom Recital Hall, $20-$35
British poet Simon Armitage is the author of nine volumes of poetry, most recently Tyrannosaurus Rex Versus the Corduroy Kid (2006), four stage plays, and numerous radio, TV, and film pieces. He has received the Sunday Times Author of the Year Prizes and a Lannan Award. His translation of the classic Sir Gawain and the Green Knight prompted The Guardian to declare that Armitage was “put on the planet to translate this poem.” [Seattle Arts & Lectures]
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8:00 PM – Emily Beyer: Sightseeing
Richard Hugo House Cabaret
The poet will read from her manuscript.
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Today started out earlier than normal when I woke up an hour before my alarm and immediately panicked over what we would have for lunch. I haven’t done all of our grocery shopping yet, and only made a loaf of no-knead bread yesterday in advance. Using what I had on hand, I put together a simple lentil soup (enough for 4 servings if we add rice & zucchini to the leftovers) in 30 minutes. Here’s the breakdown of today’s meals: (more…)

6:30 PM – Erica Bauermeister: The School of Essential Ingredients
SPL Ballard Branch
Debut novel: “Eight students gather in Lillian’s Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class. It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen”
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7:00 PM – Cristina Henriquez: The World in Half
UW Bookstore, U-District
A debut novel about estranged lovers and their daughter.
[LINK]

7:00 PM – Gregory Frost: Madonna of the Maquiladora
Richard Hugo House Cabaret, $5
Part of the Fantastic Fiction readings and conversation salon series.
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7:00 PM – The National Parks: An Evening with Ken Burns & Dayton Duncan
Benaroya Hall, S. Mark Taper Foundation Auditorium, FREE
Presented by KCTS 9: Join KCTS 9 for a special evening with PBS filmmakers Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan as they preview and share the stories behind their latest documentary, “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea.” Filmed over the course of six years at some of nature’s most spectacular locales – from Mt. Rainier to the Olympics, Yellowstone to the Grand Canyon this documentary is a story of the people who devoted themselves to the land they loved. Burns and Duncan will share previously unscreened portions of this documentary and tell the stories from beyond the screen at this special event.
Suggested donation is $5 at the door.
[Source: KCTS 9]
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7:30 PM – Jay McInerney: How It Ended
Elliott Bay Book Co.
The author of Bright Lights, Big City is promoting a collection of short stories.
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3:00 PM – Cristina Henriquez: The World in Half
Elliott Bay Books
The Chicago author returns to Elliott Bay to sign and read her debut novel.
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3:00 PM – Wangari Maathai: The Challenge for Africa
Town Hall Seattle, Great Hall, $5
Founder of the Green Belt Movement, former member of the Kenyan Parliament, former Deputy Minister for the Environment and Natural Resources, and the first African woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize, Maathai is an internationally renowned expert on Africa’s socio-economic woes.
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Lentils

I’ve been writing down meal ideas w/ ingredient lists and today I scoped out prices at Madison Market. If we use leftovers for most lunches, we should be able to pull this off w/out resorting to Top Ramen. (more…)

10:30 AM – Dr. Jacqueline Iseman: School Success for Kids with ADHD
Barnes & Noble, University Village
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12:00 PM – Cricket McRae: Spin a Wicked Web
Seattle Mystery Bookshop
Number three, I believe, in the Sophie Mae series of cozies. And is anyone really named Cricket?
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12:00 PM – Kevin Emerson: The Demon Hunter
Mockingbird Books
The author speaks about book four in his YA “Oliver Nocturne” series. He is joined by the band Board of Education for a performance.
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3:00 PM – Dr. Nancy J. Johnson: Presence of Literature to Inspire Writing: Focusing on Poetry
Barnes & Noble, University Village
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3:00 PM – Local Author Gala
Barnes & Noble, Pacific Place, Downtown

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4:30 PM – William O’Daly: World’s End/Fin de Mundo
Elliott Bay Books
O’Daly presents the first English translation of the late, great Pablo Neruda’s book-length poem sequence, Fin de mundo. And if you don’t know who Neruda is, you are dead to me.
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7:30 PM – Cheryl Harris Sharman, Russell Leigh Sharman, & Corey Hayes: Nightshift NYC
Elliott Bay Books
Stories and photographs of NYC’s night people: subway conductors, short-order cooks, cab drivers, street people… and my friend, Corey, no doubt, since he never calls me during daylight hours. Not that I’m bitter. In any case, the book looks interesting.
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Former Washington state governor turned current commerce secretary Gary Locke isn’t the only mover and shaker from our fine state to get noticed by US President Barack Obama: Rajiv Shah, a director at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and a member of the Seattle Community Colleges Board of Trustees has been nominated by Mr. Obama to be the undersecretary of the US Department of Agriculture.

As reported in the PSBJ, Shah’s relevant experience includes managing agricultural development programs for the Gates Foundation. Besides serving on the community colleges board, he’s also a member of the board for the Seattle Public Library.

The Grand Illusion presents their final week of their Pier Paolo Pasolini series with the notorious director’s version of The Canterbury Tales. The second film in Pasolini’s “Trilogy of Life” sees the director himself on screen as Geoffrey Chaucer scribing eight stories “told for the mere pleasure of the telling”, stories enacted with Pasolini’s luminous cinematography and explicit sex and violence. Originally released in the US with an “X” rating, the film is off limits to anyone under age 17.

Midnight at the Egyptian: Christmas on Mars, a goofy, high-spirited sci fi film starring the members of rock band the Flaming Lips, Fred Armisen of Saturday Night Live fame, actor Adam Goldberg, Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse, and musician Steve Burns. Directed by Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne, the story of delirious Mars colonists and an alien superbeing is soundtracked with original music by the band.

One of my favorite films at SIFF last year, quite possibly my favorite of all the documentaries, was Anvil: the story of Anvil. Back in the 70s two Toronto schoolboys, Steve “Lips” Kudrow and Robb Reiner decided to form a band. This band, Anvil, would flirt with superstardom but never quite make it there, despite being a serious influence on many bands who did, including Metallica and Guns N Roses. Decades later, Kudrow and Reiner continue to slog on towards their goal of making it to the top, struggling to balance their musical ambitions with the day to day realities of having to earn a living with day jobs and family support. Director Sacha Gervasi follows the pair as they play Canadian club gigs, woo a mostly disinterest record industry and undertake a real-life Spinal Tap style tour of Europe in a film that is as much about the unbreakable bonds of friendship between the musicians as it is about their resolute never-say-die attitude behind the drive to make their dreams come true. At the Varsity.

James Ellroy’s modern noir take on 1950s Los Angeles is expertly translated from novel to film by director Curtis Hanson in L.A. Confidential at Central Cinema. Kevin Spacey, Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce play three very different Los Angeles police officers who become uneasy allies in a battle to solve a complicated conspiracy involving the LAPD, city officials, mobsters and Hollywood sleaze peddlers.

The final days of the 17th annual Polish Film Festival conclude at SIFF Cinema with A Warm Heart in which a wealthy businessman tries to convince a suicidal man to give him his heart–literally; and a series of features, documentaries and shorts.

12:00 PM – David Hewson: Dante’s Numbers
Seattle Mystery Bookshop
The seventh novel in the Nic Costa series has our protagonist visiting the US for the first time.
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7:00 PM – Aime Cesair, In Memoriam: Group Reading
UW Bookstore, U-District
Readings by Chelsey Richardson, Maged Zaher, James Newman, and Jourdan Imani Keith, plus work by Césaire in both English and French, to commemorate the one-year anniversary of Cesaire’s death. Sponsored by Central District Forum for Arts & Ideas and OMA/D Ethnic Cultural Center/Theatre.
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7:00 PM – Maria Semple: This One is Mine
Antioch University
The former sitcom writer, who recently relocated to Seattle, reads from her debut novel. Semple appeared at the UW Bookstore back on 01/22, so if you missed her, and are very, very sad about it, you can catch her tonight. Allegedly, there will be beverages. I don’t know if they will be adult beverages or just carafes of crappy coffee with a basket of those little fake creamer cups, the announcement doesn’t say.
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7:30 PM – Adina Hoffman: My Happiness Bears No Relation to Happiness: A Poet’s Life in the Palestinian Century
Elliott Bay Book Co.
Hoffman presents her biography of Palestinian poet and Israeli citizen Taha Muhammed Ali.
[LINK]