Upcoming Melbourne film events

For those who are festival shy or just can't make it to MIFF, there are other film events happening outside of the event up to the end of August. For example:

• Cinema Nova's Puglia Film Festival starts today and runs to Sunday. It includes 6 features and a number of shorts from contemporary Italian directors. If it weren't for MIFF, I'd be there. More details.
• Nova is also hosting a one day event: Africa's Last Colony – Western Sahara in Film on Wed 1 August. There's three sessions: 12pm, 2.30pm & 5.30pm. "Film-makers from Australia, Uganda, Zimbabwe, USA, UK and Spain have all been moved to give the Saharawi people a voice so they might show their situation to the world on film. Their work reflects both an emerging cinema of Africa and the difficulty of getting your voice heard in a noisy world." More details.
  
• Kino Dendy have a preview screening of Burke and Wills followed by a Q&A session at 6.30pm on Wed 8 August. Burke and Wills is an unconventional effort with interesting results, made on a low budget by Oliver Torr and Matthew Zeremes, who star in the film and will be attending the Q&A. The film opens for a limited season at the Dendy on the following day. More details.
• Inside Paris and Sicko open in cinemas on 9 Aug.
• Les Enfants du Paradis (Marcel Carné, France, 1945) screens at the Astor Theatre on Wed 15 Aug.
• ACMI is hosting the inaugural Australian Malaysian Film Festival over the weekend of 18 - 19 August with three films: The Red Kebaya, Chermin and Puteri gunung ledang. I'm always up for a new film festival and will definitely try to check out this one. More details.
• The AFI screenings commence on Monday 20 August at the Como cinema with Rolf de Heer's Dr Plonk (which I believe is completely full), and continues with screenings of the other AFI award contenders over the following three weekends. These screenings are free for AFI members, who are invited to vote on their favourite films. More details.
• After the break for MIFF, Melbourne Cinémathèque screenings resume on Wed 22 August at 7pm with screenings of Billy Wilder's Sunset Blvd., Eric von Stroheim's Queen Kelly and Alan Schneider's Film by Samuel Beckett. More details.
  
• Not really a film event, but something I plan to attend is a poetry reading, Poets Against the War. Fellow blogger Alison Croggon of Theatre Notes and others "discuss Iraq and how the small clear voice of poets can break through the rhetoric". It's on at the Beckett Theatre, 1.30pm - 2.30pm on Sun 26 August. More details.
• The Astor Theatre has a Polanski double on Mon 27 August at 7.30pm with Repulsion and Cul-de-sac.
  

Check the respective links for further information. These and other events may be found in Melbourne Film Blog's Calendar of Film Events in the sidebar.