News This Week

Now Hear This: 'Hamyln,' 'The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga,' 'Food Chains,' and more

"The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga" Feb. 17

Something like a film essay and only kind of sort of a proper documentary, Jessica Oreck's "The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga" keeps slipping through your fingers and you can never quite keep hold of it for long. Thematically, it's a Herzog-ian look into the stupidly human compulsion to try and top nature ("culture imagines an inherent advantage over the wild and builds high walls to keep it out," the narration tells us at one point), and visually, it's an investigation of urban decay that recalls the Detroit-in-despair tangents in Peter Mettler's documentary "The End Of Time," and an animated exploration of a Slavic fairy tale about children fighting a witch named Baba Yaga. The fairy tale part, by the way, is rendered with roving 3-D quasi-animation, the camera zooming in on different elements of the scenes like a cheapo, fucked-up computer game or something. People throw around words like "hallucinatory" but it's actually true of "The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga." There will be a Q&A with director Jessica Oreck after the screening. 7:30 p.m., MICA Brown Center's Falvey Hall, 1301 W. Mount Royal Ave., fyi.mica.edu/falveyhall, $10 general public, free to MICA students/personnel and MFF Friends of the Festival members. (Brandon Soderberg)

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Love On the Line Feb. 15

It's Sunday, and you have to do laundry before work Monday morning. Laundry's usually a drag, but this time you will hear celebratory Baltimore stories over the swish of your spin cycle. A welcome departure from the hum of a dozen machines--and you know, from those not-so-celebratory Baltimore stories we often get. At the Spin Cycle Coin Laundromat, a commonplace setting will be populated with art, featuring students from Excel Academy and performances by Ama Chandra and Jahiti. Ms. Penny, an East Baltimore native and the event's featured domestic artist, explores the art of everyday life by making laundry folding into a delicate art form. Guests are encouraged to bring their stories to share--along with their quarters for the machines--to this pop-up community event hosted by The Family Arts Museum that, in the spirit of Valentine's Day, shares the memories of "A Baltimore Worth Living For." Aww. 4-7 p.m., Spin Cycle Coin Laundromat, 2020 Maryland Ave., eventbrite.com/e/love-on-the-line-stories-of-a-baltimore-worth-living-for-tickets-15297412974, free with online reservation. (Lindsay VanAsdalan)

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