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State of the art
Boston Underground Film Festival
BY CARLY CARIOLI

The biggest draw at the fourth annual Boston Underground Film Festival, which opens Wednesday and runs through next Sunday, is likely to be the East Coast premiere of Penelope Spheeris’s documentary on Black Sabbath madman Ozzy Osbourne and his metal-circus tour OzzFest — a film titled We Sold Our Souls to Rock and Roll (screening Saturday, February 23 at midnight at the Brattle Theatre). And that wouldn’t make a bad slogan for this year’s hard-rocking festival, which also includes screenings of Justin Mitchell’s indie-rockumentary Songs for Cassavetes (Sunday, February 24 at 3 p.m. at MIT), which in turn includes concert performances by Sleater-Kinney, the Make-Up, and K Records honcho Calvin Johnson; Alan Zweig’s Vinyl (February 24 at 3:30 p.m. at Oni Gallery), a look at obsessive record collectors; and Jessica Villines’s cult classic Plastercaster (Saturday, February 23 at 3:30 p.m. at the Milky Way), a "cockumentary" on infamous groupie/sculptor Cynthia Plaster Caster, whose work has chronicled the long and short of celebrity-rock packages from Jimi Hendrix to the Demolition Doll Rods.

Festival organizer David Kleiler — a film producer, professor, and former director of the Coolidge Corner, whose Local Sightings series has been bringing independent film to venues in and around Boston for ages — has a bit of rock history in him. He’s good friends with Mission of Burma, and his son, David Kleiler Jr., who was a member of Peter Prescott’s post-Burma group Volcano Suns, is now a co-producer of the upcoming Burma documentary. "My son and I both entered the alternative-arts scene 23 years ago through Mission of Burma," the elder Kleiler concedes.

More so than in any previous year, this year’s BUFF has become a showcase for the vibrant network of independent-film series that have popped up around town. "I’ve encouraged all the curators to use the festival as a vehicle for self-promotion," says Kleiler. "These are people who are all really good at what they do, and I think of the festival as being a kind of celebration of alternative visions." Next Saturday night at the Oni Gallery in Chinatown, you can catch programs curated by Coolidge Corner’s Video Balagan at 7 p.m.; the Underground Film Revolution (normally in residence at the Milky Way in Jamaica Plain) at 9 p.m.; and sex-boutique owner Kim Airs at 11:30 p.m. Also look for CyberArts organizer Andrew Warren’s "Whitney Houston Bi-ennial" on Friday at 7 p.m. at the Oni Gallery. And Chicago filmmaker and producer Rusty Nails, who grew up on the North Shore, curates an edition of his long-running Chi-town film salon "Undershorts" on Thursday, February 21 at 9 p.m. at the Milky Way.

Other highlights include Doug Miller’s satirical Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, which Kleiler describes as a "kind of gay-themed What’s Up, Tiger Lily" — a Peter Graves B-movie re-dubbed as a satirical farce about an Army plot to develop an anti-homo bomb. It screens Wednesday at 8 p.m. at the Brattle. The festival’s lone concession to exploitation, Puking Zombies — "It’s not a film festival without a gross-out spectacular someplace" says Kleiler — screens at the Oni Gallery on Friday, February 22 at 11 p.m. Jeff Hudson, of the cult new-wave band Jeff & Jane, screens his sex, drugs, and bikes flick Black and Chrome (starring Dave Tree, Cynthia Von Buhler, and others) on Sunday, February 24 at 9:30 at the Oni. And a closing ceremony, featuring clips from the best of the festival, wraps things up next Monday, February 25 at 7:30 p.m. at the Milky Way.

The fourth annual Boston Underground Film Festival opens this Wednesday and runs through next Sunday at the Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle Street, in Cambridge (617-876-6837); MIT, Lecture Hall 10-250, 77 Mass Ave, in Cambridge (617-253-3913); the Oni Gallery, 684 Washington Street, in Chinatown (617-542-6983); the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center, 41 Second Street (617-577-1400); and the Milky Way, 405 Centre Street, in Jamaica Plain (617-524-3740, extension 22). Admission is $8 per screening, or $60 for a festival pass. For a complete schedule, call (617) 975-3361 or visit www.bostonundergroundfilmfestival.com.

Issue Date: February 14 - 21, 2002
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