Extra! Extra! NOIR CITY 7 Just Around the Corner!

There's a piercing plunge of cold in the air, masking its blade within the usual chill that visits when the streets exhale. Must be January. I can see already, through the denying fog, that it's here again.

Noir City.

San Francisco's premiere film noir festival returns in its 7th year later this month (Jan 24-Feb 1), with an all new set of double bills ready to thrill the Bay. The theme of this year's festival is "newspaper noir," with many of the films set in the world of newspapers, or, in some cases, publishing or radio.

In the past 6 years, Noir City had taken over the historic Castro Theater for 10 days each year to celebrate the tradition of film noir. It's a really cool annual festival if you're into film noir or crime stories, and very unique to San Francisco, the fog-wrapped city of mystery often chosen by authors and filmmakers to set their seedy stories in. The festival's lineup of 22 films reflects actual 1940s-era theater programming by showing rare B-movies of the time, most of which are not available on DVD.

Conceived by the Film Noir Foundation—a nonprofit corporation dedicated to rescuing and restoring America's noir heritage—the festival's proceeds help them find and preserve all those great noir films we know and love. Tickets are $10 for each night's double feature and $100 for a "passport" to the entire festival. The pass includes a special reception night with 1950s favorite Arlene Dahl, who will also be interviewed onstage on the evening of Saturday, January 24, between screenings Slightly Scarlet and Wicked as They Come. A fitting fare for a night of frisson, wouldn't you say?

The schedule is as follows:

Download the program guide here, or find out more at www.noircity.com.