NOTE: “Today” and “tonight” refer to Friday, Sept. 18.
PORT TOWNSEND — The free movies are freer than before, thanks to a new policy.
At the Port Townsend Film Festival this weekend, 15 pictures and programs will screen with no admission charge at a downtown venue devoted to democratic moviegoing.
The festival includes, as always, a trio of outdoor movie showings on the screen looming over Taylor Street: Tonight, “Mrs. Doubtfire;” Saturday night the animated “Ratatouille” and Sunday night “Cinema Paradiso.”
Each starts at 7:30 p.m. with seating — on straw bales or your own chairs and blankets — on the block in front of the Haller Fountain.
And at all three, local magician and comedian Joey Pipia will host contests and distribute prizes starting at 7 p.m.
The rest of these, festival executive director Janette Force notes, will light the screen at the Cotton Building at 607 Water St., which for the next three days is known as the Peter Simpson Free Cinema. Named in memory of one of the festival’s founders, the Simpson is the place to see an array of films including:
■ “The Breach,” about the wild salmon struggle, at noon today;
■ “Songs My Brother Taught Me,” the story of a family on South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, at 6 p.m. today;
■ “Austin to Boston,” a road movie about four bands’ zigzag tour from the South by Southwest festival to New England, at 3 p.m. Saturday;
■ “The Diplomat,” about U.S. ambassador Richard Holbrooke, at 6 p.m. Saturday;
■ The “Spirit of Adventure” program of short films at noon Sunday;
■ “The Mask You Live In,” about America’s “boy crisis” and how we can raise a healthier generation of boys and young men, at 3 p.m. Sunday.
Seats at the Peter Simpson Free Cinema will be more available than in years past, Force said.
“One of the complaints we have had was that the Free Cinema was full of pass holders,” so those who cannot afford festival passes had little hope of getting in.
So this year, “any time a film is in the Free Cinema, it’s also showing in a pass-holder venue at the same time,” she said.
The Simpson theater has 100 seats; moviegoers can get in line up to half an hour before show time to be admitted on a first-come, first-seated basis.
Scheduling films in the Free Cinema and in seven other venues was a logistical nightmare, Force acknowledged, but she was determined to do it.
“We want people to experience the festival,” whether they can buy a $35 to $185 pass or not.
With its eight venues and its pass system, this event can look complex. So program guides — describing all of the movies and explaining how to do the festival, whatever your budget — can be found at the office at 211 Taylor St., at PTFilmfest.com and by phoning 360-379-1333. Festival volunteers in red caps will circulate around the venues and answer questions too, as will theater managers in black baseball caps.
The 16th annual Port Townsend Film Festival brings together 84 independent features, documentaries and shorts from 16 nations; they’re screening from 9 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. today through Sunday.
And as ever, moviegoers have many chances to stay after and partake in question-and-answer sessions with the films’ directors and producers, more than 50 of whom are here.
Then there are special guests Beau Bridges, Chris Cooper and Marianne Leone Cooper, who are set to engage in conversations about their movies and their lives as artists, along with screenings of Bridges’ “The Fabulous Baker Boys,” Chris Cooper’s “Adaptation” and Marianne Leone Cooper’s formative film “My Left Foot.” Details about these events can be found at PTfilmfest.com.
The weekend begins to wrap with the awards presentation at 6:15 p.m. Sunday at the Rose Theatre.
This event, open to the general public on a first-come, first-seated basis, gives you a chance to watch clips from the films in competition, then see who wins the Best Film, Audience Choice, Spirit award and other prizes.
And at 7:30 p.m. Sunday comes “Cinema Paradiso,” a movie Force has wanted to show “forever.”
The story of young Salvatore di Vita, a boy who finds respite at the theater in his war-torn Sicilian town, “is the quintessential movie,” she said, “about why cinema matters.”
