Yes, by popular demand, San Francisco Film Society's SF360 Film will once again bring you the one, the only, "Trapped in a Closet" sing-along, the awesomest sing-along this side of the Buffy "Once More With Feeling" sing-along (sing it everyone: "Bunnies aren't just cute like everybody supposes/They've got them hoppy legs and twitchy little noses...") The show will be Friday, January 25, at 7:00 pm at Mezzanine. more ›

And on to Mezzanine Thursday night for the SFIFF closing night party -- with a surprise performer . . . . but before the final sendoff, we headed over to the Castro Theater for what turned out to be one of the best films that we think we’ve ever seen, French or otherwise – (which means “little sparrow”). The “little sparrow” is Edith Piaf, and the film by director Olivier Dahan, is intended to present more of a portrait of Piaf’s life rather than a biography, according to Dahan. more ›

The always-reliable and smartly-snapping Drew Altizer stopped by the SF Film Society's red carpet awards ceremony on Saturday and passes along these views of the scene! more ›

As a Vans salesman recently told us, "Yo, Sis, this is fresh!" Maybe so. more ›

First there was the Sound of Music Sing-Along. Then came a whole lotta other Sing-Alongs. But this Wednesday, there might be the awesomest Sing-Along of them all: a sing-along of R. Kelly's epic magnum opus, Trapped in a Closet. more ›

Total number of people pictured in this week's Swells society column: 100. (It's all pictures and captions this week, with no dishy Catherine Bigelow text, we're sorry to report.) more ›

Total number of people pictured in this week's Swells society column: 56. more ›

We're begging for your help here, readers -- begging! Can someone with a digital camera PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE go to this event and send us your pictures of Chris Daly getting thrown into a swimming pool? We'll throw in some SFist swag if you do! We'd go ourselves, but admission is $125 (and we don't have a digital camera anyways). more ›

Tonight we're headed across the Golden Gate to see the The Tiburon Film Society's presentation of at the Bay Model (2100 Bridgeway in Sausalito). more ›

The opening night screening of a film festival is like having sex with a celebrity -- the experience itself is never that impressive, but it makes for a fun memory and it's nice to be able to say that you did it. more ›

As we find ourselves gearing up for this year's SF Indie Fest (of which we're a sponsor! whoo yay us!) we find ourselves wondering ... is it enough? All these festivals that SF has -- the Indie Fest, Frameline, the Int'l Fest, Hole in the Head, the recently-concluded Noir Fest -- sure, they're all swell, but is that all there is? more ›

We can't explain it any better than SF Film Society Exec Direc Graham Leggat put it to us: "We're interested in creating a public/private partnership between the city, corporations, foundations, media arts organizations, the school districts, and other interested parties, to install a network of digital projectors in select high school auditoriums around the city. You would then use broadband or satellite or hard drives to supply independent content... non-Hollywood content, with lesson plans and curriculum support, and appearances by filmmakers." more ›

Okay, this next component of the SF Film Society's new SF360 program is a bit low-concept, but you're a smart cookie so you should pick it up pretty quick. Listen: "We want to explore the way new platforms help us bring new work to new audiences," Graham Leggat, Exec Direc of the SFFS told us in an interview. So to that end, they're going to select one film, then work with distribution partners like the Iron Weed film club to get that movie out in front of as many people as possible. "And then we'll have materials and organizational tools [for] clubs and discussions," Graham went on. "We'll get local celebrity chefs to creature recipies and add social value to the social aspect of the evening. ... And then at 8 on Wednesday night, the fireworks will go off and folks will turn on their DVD." This is all getting a bit highbrow for us -- "The city is in fact an expanded theater, where everybody focusses on one film at one time and discussing it, if they want to, online. So you have a citywide event that's distributed and yet concentrated. New platforms, new work, new social formations, new audiences, new experiences." more ›

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We saw the saddest obituary last week in the Chron, for the death of Sarah Tucker, a 26-year-old Mission resident who was killed in a hit-and-run bicycle accident on Polk and Geary Street on Thursday January 12. Witnesses reported seeing a black Honda CRV run a yellow light, and heard Tucker loudly shout "Hey!" before she was struck. The driver, reported to be an African-American man in his 40s, then turned off his headlights to hinder the reading of his license plate and drove away. Tucker, who was wearing her helmet, suffered severe head injuries and died shortly afterwards. Tucker, as she was known, was returning home from the Tango, Tango dance party when she was killed. Tucker was a fundraiser for the Cal Academy of Sciences by day and a filmmaker/DJ at night, volunteering for the SF Film Society, screening movies for the SF Int'l Film Fest, and running the Pretty Young Thing dance party at the Make-Out Room, among many other activities. As the obit says, "Sarah loved pugs, soul music, dancing, acronyms, sticky buns, fashion and aesthetics." If you see a black Honda CR-V with a large dent in its side on the passenger door, call SFPD Inspector Pat Tobin of the hit-and-run division at (415) 553-1641 or the confidential tip line (415) 575-4444. There's a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest. Please, folks, ride and drive safely out there. You probably love pugs and sticky buns too. more ›

Well, we enjoyed being all coy and evasive for a while, but now that the SF Film Society has officially announced their SF360 campaign, we're free to reveal to you all the juicy details, like a new broadbanded network of digital projectors that they're installing around the city; or a brand new film festial-convention-market for animation; or their new initiative to, as Executive Director Graham Leggat put it, turn all of SF into an "exploded theater." Neat! more ›

We have to admit, we weren't buying it two weeks ago when the San Francisco Film Society invited us to a pre-Sundance rally at the posh Adagio Hotel. The haute couture, the DJ, the tiny appetizers and free beer -- "surely," we thought, "this must be nothing more than an excuse to have one of those bourgeois parties we're always protesting alongside our Communist friends." But no! No! Just like when we famously predicted that Nixon would ride his troubles out, back in the 70s when SFist was an underground Russian-language zine, we were wrong. Man oh man, the SF Film Society is up to some really cool stuff, you betcha, and we can't wait to tell you what it is. But we promised them we'd wait until they made an official announcement next week. So until then, here's a hint: their announcement does not involve a 32-pound box of hair. OR DOES IT???????? more ›

The San Francisco Film Society is hosting a special screening of at the Clay this Sunday the 11th at 7:30 p.m., and we have passes to give away to you! more ›

Hello, Mr. Fancy Pants! The San Francisco International Film Festival has chosen Graham Leggat to be their new Executive Director (replacing Roxanne Messina Captor). We just want to burn our resume after looking at his, which includes the Film Society of Lincoln Center, the New York Film Festival, and Film Comment magazine. It'll be interesting to see what he brings to the 49th Festival (April 2006 - May 4, 2006), given the mixed response last year's roster seemd to inspire. more ›

SFist stalks the stars at the San Francisco Internationsl Film Festival more ›

SFist usually experiences a frisson of excitement when we visit the Kabuki Theater, usually from the 38 that nearly hits us every time we cross Geary at Fillmore (apparently, red lights don't apply to busses). But this time our excitement wasn't the brush with death kind, it was the far more pleasant brush with celebrity type, as we were at the Kabuki to take in the red carpet arrival of several of the folks responsible for ,the Festival's Zoom! screening. more ›

One of the many perks of SFist, (besides the private jet, sumptious office spaces, and Gavin calling round-the-clock "just to say 'hi'"), is that we are forced to get out of the house and go do awesomely cool stuff in the name of Web Journalism. The latest entry in this big-fun anti-hermit campaign is the San Francisco International Film Festival, which opens tonight and runs through Thursday May 5. You can see the entire calendar, buy tickets, and see the "scoop du jour" on the site for San Francisco Film Society, which presents the festival. Over the next week-and-a-half, 185 film representing 49 countries will be screened, with premieres, special events, and real live movie stars all over the place. more ›

Peter Coyote (some stuff in the 60's that nobody remembers) have joined together to fight Proposition L. In the thirty-second trailer, Penn states that "proposition L claims to save our theaters. In fact, it would hijack $10 million a year from city funds and give it to a group that has never managed a theater and didn't exist until they wrote this proposition." more ›